Keith Watanabe * NET 2.0

Good show. I'm liking TNA more and more lately and these guys are delivering on quality. There's a lot of naysayers, but all things considered, TNA is generally moving in the right direction. Quick rundown: Alex Shelley vs Jay Lethal - You can tell these guys have been watching a ton of Japan tapes (maybe even participating over there?). These guys work a junior style mostly. High paced, typical Japanese stand off after the opening feel out process, and then fast pin attempts. Unlike the junior style though, there's really no focused bodywork that leads anywhere. They do have flashy submissions that look cool, but there's no real point except to woo the crowd. Of course, the announcers often mentioned these two guys' age, 22 and 20 respectively. They've got a bright future ahead of them. I'm not as familiar with them as possible but it seems that Shelley's finisher is that Sliced Bread #2 (what a strange name!) and Lethal's is a version of the Dragon Suplex Hold. Both guys show some sweet moves and quick transitions, but little psychology, no selling except for instances here and there, which demonstrate their inexperience. Here's where Chris Benoit, Dean Malenko, etc. would be good in showing them how to structure a match of this style a little better. Or even if they could get Jushin Thunder Liger in this camp for a full two months to "train" these guys in the finer arts of the junior style, this division can become far bigger than it is. Matt Bentley vs Lance Hoyt. Most notable point for me was Hoyt doing a moonsault. Nothing particularly great one way or another and this deserves to be placed exactly where it was. Bentley seems like the Scotty Riggs, Brad Armstrong type of the X-Division/TNA. he's decent enough to stick around, but nothing spectacular that'll shoot him over the edge. Bobby Roode/Eric Young vs The Naturals. A lot of people are really starting to notice Eric Young. He seems like a great heel-to-be. He's really developing his in-ring antics and has his own bumping style. Not to mention he seems to connect with the crowd. And he's funny. Bobby Roode, I'm guessing, is a mini-Arn Anderson. He's solid. He needs to get more gritty offense, like pulling hair, racking the eyes, scraping guys' faces across the ropes, stomping on fingers. And add some submissions that just break people's joints. Then he'd get the Arn Anderson in-ring package together. The Naturals are probably one of the more solid, true tag teams in the sense that they do a lot of fun double team moves and really are meant for the tag division. They can do some cool shit like a shooting star press outside, but you really can't tell them apart, which makes them a good tag team because their identity revolves around being together. Some good stuff here, but i'm keeping my eye on Eric Young since he's the guy that's slowing coming up. James Gang vs LAX. I skipped this match. I heard some guys in LAX are decent, but I'm just not interested in either team at this point. Next. International X Match: Petey Williams vs. Chris Sabin vs. PUMA vs. Sonjay Dutt. Okay, this was fun. A lot of people have been talking about Puma. He's fast, decent and will make an interesting addition to the X division. Don't know what type of finisher he has but he can keep up which is good. Sabin looked good after breaking his ankle previously. Jeff Jarrett, AMW and Abyss w/Mitchell, Jackie and Gail Kim vs. Team 3D, Ron Killings and Rhino. Brawl at the beginning was fun. Really seemed to get the crowd involved. Seems likely the big War Games style match will be coming up soon. Ultimate X: Samoa Joe © vs. AJ Styles vs. Christopher Daniels. This is the match that most people were waiting for. I think a lot of people were disappointed because it ended early. However, I must say that despite the unexpected finish, this match was pretty good. Also, people were complaining about Joe not being in his element. That was after the fact that people were speculating whether or not he could handle the rope climbing. Now, doesn't that make the situation interesting because there's a more realistic element to this? Matches that have a real unknown factor are great because you have true speculation, especially when you have guys people care about. So a storyline could eventually go where if he's placed in this situation again, people would wonder whether or not he'd be able to fulfill the match because it's obviously a weak point. So right there you'd have an angle that's match driven and focuses on a realistic aspect about a person's ability. The challenge would be for Joe to be able to outsmart the bookers to get his title back. Honestly, I'm glad he didn't win because this allows room for failure and shows a weakness for him. It gives him a new dimension. If he was able to handle it, then what next? Finally Christian Cage vs Monty Brown. This wasn't a bad match and went long. It's obvious that they wanted to have a main event atmosphere. I read a comparison between this and a WWE main. The thing about this match was that it was solid. In the WWE, it would've been considered very good with the right promos and more emphasis on structure. Basic storyline was decent with Monty focusing on Christian's injured ribs and having the majority of the control in the match. Christian is a good worker but he's not at the elite level. He's got good promos, but he needs to carve out something a little more. I think the problem is that his matches compete against the X-Division for quality and none of his matches have ever exceeded what the X-Division has. If you notice in the WWE, the Cruiserweight matches are toned down so that the main events are never outshone. It's a strategy to really give focus on the mains. With TNA, the guys on top aren't bad workers, per se, but they get outclassed in some ways from their lighter counterparts on a pure workrate viewpoint. It's not a horrible thing because TNAs mains aren't horrible the way say Age in the Cage (Piper vs Hogan) would have gone. One thing that it does do is that it should demonstrate that the guys in the main need to put more focus on psychology and storytelling. This was good for Christian's first real outting as the main event guy. But it might not have been the way people initially wanted to see him as the champion. The storyline basics were good, but they needed to have a higher paced match that had more spots, imo, to send a message that these guys, especially Christian, was the man. He wrestles too much like Flair in some ways, taking a lot of bumps. But his bumps aren't as programmatic as Flair and he doesn't have a formula that the fans buy. However, he has to be on top for a year and go through as much competition to vary himself and really learn what it means to be on top. He should watch some Bret Hart tapes and see how Bret works with a variety of guys. Sure he uses the same spots, but those set up expectations that lead to his finish. But watch what the guy does in between spots leading up to the finish. He adds things here and there that would make his matches more interesting. Lastly the beatdown. This was good. People complained saying that this may not have been the way to end a PPV. But look at the result. They delivered in terms of bringing in a big name guy. Whether or not Scott Steiner delivers in the end has yet to be determined. But the good part is that they brought in someone that'll get people talking. It wasn't like TNA bringing in say Brutus Beefcake or Scotty 2 Hotty as the guy to take Sting out. People will buy (maybe not initially in PPV buyrates) Scott Steiner as a serious threat. Also, the visual of Scott Steiner taking out Sting was good. Now, this makes Christian's title reign in jeopardy. Steiner is a known name and people would be willing to take him seriously as a challenger. Right now you can see Christian going through the motions of taking on people on top from Jarrett, to Monty Brown and next Abyss. If Christian gets guys like Samoa Joe and lead towards a Christian vs Steiner it might be worth something in the case that Christian is allowed to beat Steiner. I mean, you can really take Steiner seriously as a heel threat so we'll see how this goes....