NWA-TNA #5

NWA-TNA #5
07/17/2002 from Nashville, Tennessee, USA

I'm starting to become uneasy with how much Jeff Jarrett I am going to have to watch for these reviews. Don't get me wrong, there's nothing really wrong with Jarrett. He is a serviceable worker and a good promo. He has a good mind for the business. I just don't think he is a strong enough guy to build an entire company around, much less one that was to compete with WWE.

This was always a problem with the company. Focusing on the wrongs guys. Be it Jarrett, Hulk Hogan or Magnus. Or stars way past their prime like Mick Foley. At varying points in it's history TNA has continually focused on the wrong people. When they focused on the right people like AJ Styles or Samoa Joe, they fucked it up.

Anyways let's take a look at what it was like five weeks into it's history.

The show of course starts with a recap of various Jeff Jarrett stuff. His brawling with Scott Hall and his feud with the NWA. Then there is a clip from "earlier this week" where Goldylocks stalks Ken Shamrock during his walk in a park, trying to get Shamrock's comments on last week's events. Our babyface(??) champion calls her a bitch and gets pissed that she was trying to do her job. I guess Shamrock is supposed to be a tweener, but does he really need to verbally abuse Goldy? Dudes are constantly calling her a bitch and tell her to suck their dicks.

There's a backstage brawl between Hall and Jarrett. They go back and forth a bit, slamming each other into various things in the backstage area. Brawling is going to be a common theme tonight as we will see. Eventually NWA Vice President Bill Behrens tells Jarrett that he has forfeited hit match tonight, and he is escorted out of the building. Wasn't he suspended last week?

We are told that the original opening match was going to be Malice vs. Jeff Jarrett in a ladder match. Jesus.

Father James Mitchell and The Disciples Of the New Church come out and Mitchell cuts a promo. He says that "Jeff Jarrett will not be able to bleed here tonight". That's a cute line. He calls Malice his weapon of mass destruction(which were talked about a lot in those days before the Iraq war). He issues an open challenge to anyone to face Malice for a contract for a NWA title match. The lights dim and when they turn back on it's none other than... SABU!!!!!

Match #1: Ladder Match For a NWA World Heavyweight Championship Match Contract
Malice vs. Sabu

There's not as much interference from the members of the Church as you would think in this match. You'd imagine that this being a ladder match and thus no DQ that they would all just gang up on Sabu, putting him out and then Malice could just climb the ladder unopposed. Instead they have a ladder match. Malice dominates most of the match. Occasionally Tempest chokes Sabu on the ropes, while also telling him stuff, possibly spots because Sabu is too fucked up to remember the match they planned out. There's a really badly botched high knee by Malice. There's a cool body slam with Sabu in between Malice and the ladder. Sabu bumps a lot for Malice and there's also a bunch of typical Sabu stuff involving a chair. Don West says "what will we do if this match takes up the entire broadcast?" god I should hope not. Eventually Malice is about to grab the contract but Sabu knocks down the ladder, causing Malice to fall on a table that Sabu had set up earlier in the match outside the ring. Sabu grabs the contract for the victory. This was okay for a ladder match, but not a ladder match sold on pay per view. **1/4 stars.

After the match the Church attacks Sabu. He tries to fight them off but they get the best of him. Malice gives Sabu a chokeslam from the apron to a table. That was cool.

Back outside Jarrett is still fighting with security. Apparently he had been doing so for the last 20 minutes.

AJ Styles comes out and starts cutting a promo on Jerry Lynn. He is interrupted by Lynn himself before he can even says anything. Lynn cuts a promo on Styles explaining why he beat down Styles last week. He says Styles is inexperienced and hasn't paid his dues. Looks like they are doing a verteran vs. upstart feud for these two. Could be good stuff and obviously these two will have good matches together. Styles acts like he is going to be an apprentice to Lynn and follow his lead, but then he attacks him while his back is turned and hits him with a Styles Clash.

They cut to Goldy who is gonna interview Jasmin St. Claire in the ladies bathroom. Francine interrupts and beats the shit out of Jasmine in the bathroom and leaves her in the shower.

K-Krush comes out for his match and also cuts a promo. He says he should be a huge star but people have been holding him back. He says he was released by WWE(where he was known as K-Kwik and in a tag team with Road Dog) because they were afraid of how big he would get. He says he has been kept down his whole life and has always been treated as a second class citizen because the promoters know he is a great, and they are afraid of that. He basically says everything but racism held him down. It's a total babyface promo and some fans get behind him. Everything he said was sympathetic. This is basically the beginning of the The Truth gimmick.

Match #2: K-Krush vs. "Screamin'" Norman Smiley

Smiley is basically a jobber to the stars. He is a reasonably recognizable guy from WCW who is being used to put over younger talent here. It's a good role for him. Smiley and Krush go back and forth for a little bit and eventually Krush wins with his sit out front suplex. Basically a squash match. *

After the match Krush takes off his belt and starts to whip Smiley with it. He hangs Smiley over the top rope with the belt, choking him out. Smiley's wife runs out from the back and pleads with Truth to stop. Nice touch and it puts over the severity of Krush's actions. Eventually Krush backs off.

The show has been fine up to this point, but next came one of the most appalling segments I've ever seen on a wrestling show. And that includes the time Vince McMahon gave Jim Ross a colonoscopy. Backstage Goldy interviews Puppet, the killer dwarf. For some reason Puppet is in a trash can. They insinuate that Puppet is beating off in there. He says he has PMS, Pissed Midget Syndrome and the only cure is beating midget ass. He says he is going to wrap his six inch pythons around Meatball's neck later, and that maybe later he will show Goldy his dick. Needless to say this was garbage.

Goldy then proceeds to walk five feet over to The Dupps. Stan Dupp is playing with fire and Bo is making out with his sister Fluff. Stan says that Goldy has "pretty lips". Goldy thanks him for the compliment and then Stan clarifies that he was talking about her pussy lips. What the fuck. What was the point of this? I don't even know what to say.

Match #3: The Flying Elvises(Jorge Estrada & Sonny Siaki) vs. Christopher Daniels & Elix Skipper

This must be one of the rare times Christopher Daniels was a babyface. During this match Sonny Siaki goes to the announce table to put himself over. He also buries his partner, calling him a knucklehead. I would say this is too fast to break up these two but if it gets them out of this stupid gimmick then it's for the best. This match went on forever with basically no heat. The finish came when Siaki comes in and hits the Money Clip(a variation on the swinging neck breaker) on Elix Skipper, and Siaki pins him. Siaki wasn't the legal man at the time. There was some good action from Daniels and Skipper but Estrada is really sloppy and the match was really just there to force the break up of the Elvises. 1/4*

After the match The Dupps come out and lay out Jorge Estrada with wooden boards. Weird choice of weapon. Siaki bails on Estrada.

We see TEO dancing with one of the cage dancers. This is weird and gross and I have no idea why TNA thought the audience wanted to see perverted midgets.

They cut to Goldy and K-Krush. Krush threatens to slap Goldy around. Well at least it's a heel verbally abusing a woman this time. Hall attacks Krush and lays him out. Yet more backstage brawling. Yawn.

Match #4: Hardcore Match
Puppet vs. Meatball

Here comes the long awaited match between Puppet and the world's largest midget, Meatball. He really is the largest little guy I've ever seen. He's billed as being 251 pounds. They do some brawling outside the ring to start. They have a grocery cart full of food by the entrance ramp and they throw some food at each other. Puppet wins with a Vader Bomb onto a chair. I'm getting really tired of this exploitative bullshit. This was just a freak show match. Don't get me wrong it's totally within their rights to be pro wrestlers, but the way this was presented was really embarrassing. -**

They follow this up with TEO(remember this stands for Total E Outstanding) groping a dancer in the cage. FUCK THIS SHOW.

Jasmin St. Claire comes to the ring and calls out Francine. When  Jasmin gets in the ring Jeremy Borash acts smitten because she gave him a lap dance last week.

Match #5: Jasmin St. Claire vs. Francine

They do cat fight stuff to start. Everyone's favorite fat fuck Blue Meanie comes out and gives Francine a DDT, and takes Jasmin away in his arms. Apparently they were dating at the time but I'm pretty sure that's kayfabe. DUD. Francine does a stretcher job and Ed Ferrara comes to the ring to check on her. If this is all leading to a mixed tag team match with Blue Meanie & Jasmin St. Claire vs. Ed Ferrara & Francine, then may God help me.

Goldy tries to get a word with Lo-Ki before his X title match with AJ Styles. He refuses to comment. Say what you want about this particular show but at least we didn't have to hear a Lo-Ki promo.

Match #6: NWA-TNA X Division Championship Match
AJ Styles(c) vs. Lo-Ki

The announcers mention that both of these men will be on a Ring Of Honor show coming up, saying it's a small start up promotion based out of Philadelphia. 13 years later and ROH is bigger than TNA and they are both on the same cable channel. Styles and Ki do some mat wrestling to start, and they exchange martial arts kicks to the legs. Styles misses an Asai Moonsault to the floor. Ki does a Dragon Clutch on the ropes for a near fall.

Ki goes for the Ki Krusher into the turnbuckle. He holds onto the hold and goes for a Ki Krusher in the middle of the ring, which Styles reverses into a DDT which was a pretty cool counter. The finish comes when Styles catches Ki coming off the top rope, catching him in the Styles Clash for the win. This was a really good match but I wish it could have gone a bit longer. ***1/2

After the match we get the inevitable beat down of Styles by his rival Jerry Lynn. This is starting to get way overdone in this company. Every match has a beat down at the end of it, or there is a brawl backstage. Is there seriously no other way they could have continued this story? Lynn spears Styles at the top of the ramp and then drags him to the ring. He does an overhead suplex onto the ladder, a piledriver, and a front suplex onto the ladder. He backs off but then runs back to the ring to give Styles a DDT on the ladder and a Gotch piledriver. I guess this is leading to a ladder match between the two. That's fine but we just saw a ladder match with Sabu and Malice. What's even more puzzling about this is that immediately after this angle they announce a Ladder Or Submission match between Ken Shamrock and Sabu for the NWA title next week. Maybe it will be an all ladder match show.

Brian Lawler comes out for this main event with Scott Hall. He cuts a promo talking about his father Jerry. He says that Jerry has been married three times and all of his wives were younger than himself(this gets a pop). He says in what he calls a "shoot"(Russo booked this segment probably) that he left a ticket for tonight's show for Jerry to come and watch his son, but he wasn't there because on Wednesdays(when TNA was airing these weekly PPVs) he was usually at the local high school trying to lure girls with candy. He then starts talking shit about Hall and his drinking, when Hall sneaks up behind him. He listens to Lawler bury him for a while before he gets fed up and attacks.

Mach #7: Scott Hall vs. Brian Lawler

They brawl around the ringside area for a little bit. Hall basically beats Lawler's ass. The fans are pretty into it. Lawler grabs a purse from out of the crowd and hits Hall with it. They get in the ring and Hall makes a come back with his fall away slam. K-Krush interferes but Hall fights him off. Hall hits the Razor's Edge on Lawler for the victory. Match was fine but it was too short and really nothing better than what you would see in the main event of Raw at the time. At least they finally gave Hall a win. *3/4

After the match Krush and Lawler double team Hall. They hang him up over the top rope with Krush's belt. Hall does yet another stretcher job(his second within five weeks of the start of this company where he was one of the bigger stars, not to mention the second one of the night). As they wheel him out none other than JEFF JARRETT comes out and attacks everyone with a chair. Jarrett was disguised as a paramedic, which allowed him to get back into the building, apparently.

This show was pretty bad. The best thing on it was the AJ Styles vs. Lo-Ki match, but even that wasn't as good as it could have been. The show was bogged down with stupid carny shit like midget wrestling, and an over reliance on sex and sleaze. Worst of all the angles were very repetitive, with nearly every match ending in a beat down, stretcher job or backstage assault. In fact it was like watching a Let's Play of WCW Backstage Assault. I really hope they switch things up a bit in the coming weeks.