TNA Genesis 2010

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Here's a review I did for TNA's Genesis 2010 for my youtube account back in January in written form. (Yep, I script my reviews, it helps me collect my thoughts and sound a little more professional.) While a few opinions have changed (namely AJ turning heel), I've kept the original opinions expressed here for posterity.

Before I get into the show, here's a listing of my grading system to give you an idea of how I feel about the match. I have a 10 point grading system:

10 - This match will make your eyes tear up and you'll be on your feet cheering/booing, it's that damn good!

09 - They told the story flawlessly and I was hopping in my seat, giddy as a schoolgirl!

08 - This is a solid match, told well and executed.

07 - A good match with a lot of potential.

06 - The potential was there, but it just felt like it was missing something.

05 - Middle of the road match. I could take it or leave it.

04 - Come on, I expect better from these guys/girls!

03 - Don't try my patience, but do try to improve your wrestling ability.

02 - You've got to be kidding me! Why are these guys on the card?!?

01 - Your match sucks! You both suck! Whoever suggested this match sucks! And I suck for sitting through it! Thanks for nothing!

So, with that, on with the review.....

Let me get this out of the way immediately – TNA has dropped the ball building up to Genesis 2010. They’ve relied almost solely on the appearance of Hogan and few others to make or break this event. In my eyes, that’s poor planning. It wouldn’t have been impossible to devote some of the 4th Jan. Impact taping to setting up the ppv while keeping the spotlight on Hogan, then taping a second Impact on Tuesday to air on the 7th and then finally have a third Impact on the 14th to finish things up and solidify the card. Instead, they rushed to build the ppv almost exclusively this past Thursday and the card, at least on paper, suffers needlessly for it. While I’m going into this show with a very low expectation, I’ll also retain an open mind to keep things in perspective.

They start things off with a good promotional package, mostly hyping up Styles and Angle but also showing some of the other talent. If I have any criticism, it’s that its style and theme felt more like a lead in to Bound for Glory than Genesis. I still enjoyed it.

Hogan and Eric Bischoff open up the night welcoming the crowd to the show and introducing the four sided ring. Personally, I don’t care how many sides a ring has. What matters is what goes on in the ring. Hogan came across very standoff-ish, which the audience didn’t appreciate. I’m of two minds about that – change is inevitable, you gotta roll with it, but you should also be willing to placate your audience sometimes or risk the loss of that audience. People might figure “Well, they won’t give us six sides, what else won’t they give us?” and change the channel. I would have stuck with six sides in this instance. He also said they’re coming for WWE and mentioned Vince McMahon by name which to me sounds like he’s blowing smoke, hoping for a fire at this point, but we’ll see.

Our first match of the night sees Amazing Red defend his X-Division title against a mystery opponent who turns out to be Brian Kendrick. Brian starts things off with some ground and pound mat wrestling that’s generally unusual for him. I like it, though, because TNA has enough high flyers; it’s smart for Brian to go a different route and show he’s not just a one trick pony. Red goes high risk at one point, doing a diving summersault onto Kendrick outside the ring and looks like he lands badly on one leg. Is Brooke dating one of them because each time they go outside for a spot, it’s right where she’s at ringside. Hmmm. While I enjoyed the match, it lacks from any build up or story to speak of and the title shouldn't have been on the line. I hope this is a start of a good long running feud between both men, though. I’m giving this a 6 out of 10.

After that, Sean Morley takes on Christopher Daniels over a battle of who’s balder. This past Thursday, Daniels attacked Morley leading to this match, but instead of getting right to the match, they waste a couple of minutes cutting promos against each other. I don’t like the way they’re trying to make Morley the face and Daniels the heel. I’m just not buying it and neither is most of the crowd. Daniels tries his best to draw their ire, but he’s the hometown boy and he’s gonna get cheered. TNA should have known better. The match, though, is passable. Daniels gets Morley in a Koji clutch to which Sean wisely rolls with his shoulder, countering it into a pin and forcing Daniels to break the submission. Honestly, this is a bad feud for Daniels to be in – going from vying for the title last month to losing to the new guy this month and hopefully it won’t last long. Maybe if Daniels was the face, it would have worked better. I’m giving this a 5 out of 10.

Up next, ODB defends her newly won Knockout title against Tara in a 2 out of 3 falls match. On the 4th Jan. edition of Impact, Tara ended her less than 20 day reign as champion and if you go back to listen to my thoughts (you'll have to check out my side to side Impact/Raw comparison on YT for that), you’ll see why I’m not really into this match. This stipulation feels completely unnecessary and it proves so when Tara wins both of the first two falls, gaining her third title win. It begs the question why even give ODB the title just 13 days ago. THIS time, TNA had better give her a lengthy and healthy reign. I’m giving this a 5 out of 10.

Pope D’Angelo Dinero’s promo ability reminds me a little of Dusty Rhodes, if you will. He’s growing on me.

After that, the British Invasion (Doug Williams & Brutus Magnus) defends their TNA Tag Team titles against Matt Morgan and Hernandez. I can see why TNA is teaming Morgan up with Hernandez – they don’t have anything else for either man individually. The problem is that they don’t work well as a team and I can think of better things both men should be doing than chasing the tag titles. I don’t see why TNA can’t. Morgan should be vying for the TNA title and Hernandez should be feuding with someone like Morley. At no point does either man work with the other in this match and it has no build up to speak of. It’s not all bad though. You have some of the common elements here – heelish tactics and near falls. At one point, Hernandez has Brutus over his shoulders in a gut-wrench and then falls backwards, sending Brutus face first into the ring. I don’t know if there’s a name for it, but it looked well done. The end sees Morgan and Hernandez win the titles and to me, it’s more of a victory out of convenience than it is one born of logic. I’m giving this a 5 out of 10.

Then we cut backstage where Bobby Lashley’s attacked by Abyss for very little reason, but the real reason is because Bobby has an MMA match in 13 days. Which begs the question – why book him in a match to begin with? Afterwards, Hogan calms Abyss down by telling him that his match is still on, but against a mystery opponent….okay, our second one of the night. I chuckled a bit, though, when Abyss told Hogan that he’s crazy enough for both of them.

Up next, Desmond Wolfe and D’Angelo Dinero have what TNA touts as a return match, which is a fancy way of saying rematch. Early on, Dinero gets Wolfe between the ropes and looks like he’s about to piledrive him but does some form of mock illegal submission move, I guess? It doesn’t look too impressive or painful and it just stands out as a rather silly thing to do. Dinero injures his knee shortly after and Desmond wisely focuses on it to wear down his opponent. From there, Wolfe takes over with multiple submission moves that really excited me. Then Dinero gains a momentary upper hand and does a nice spike suplex. While things start off slow, the match really gains speed and by the end I’m on the verge of cheering for the Pope while admiring Desmond. Where I think things could be improved is if this was the rubber match instead of a rematch. As it stands, they’re one-one even and having that deciding factor would have made this a little more momentous and garnered a better rating. I’m giving this a 7 out of 10.

After that, Jeremy Borash gets put on hiatus from backstage interviews by Bischoff and Christy Hemme talks with Ric Flair about his role in TNA. (Who cares?)

Then, there’s a promo package about the next match – Beer Money taking on Kevin Nash and Sean Waltman. It was revealed on the previous Impact that Nash, Hall and Waltman attacked Beer Money (and Rhino and MCMG, I assume) backstage on the 4th Jan. show and Robert Roode and James Storm wanted their revenge. Earlier in the night, Nash and Waltman traded places in the match presumably because Hall wasn’t fit enough to wrestle. So why book him in the first place and if Kevin Nash is already under contract (earlier Bischoff mentioned Nash had nothing to worry about), why is he even wrestling? He doesn’t have to prove anything while Scott Hall and Sean Waltman do. Shouldn’t they be teaming up? It’s just a confusing ill-thought out storyline. That being said, this match is surprisingly entertaining! I find myself cheering for Beer Money and Sean and Kevin do a great job of selling and the right people go over. My only criticism is when Scott comes down and attacks a “fan” which I find to be a needless distraction. Otherwise, it’s a pretty impressive match that isn’t too inhibited by the lack of coherence. I’m giving this a 7 out of 10.

Up next, Abyss takes on his mystery opponent….Ken Anderson. I’ve always had a soft spot for Mr. Ken…Anderson. He’s an average wrestler at best, but he’s a great talker. I like the way he premieres here and the crowd eats it up, but I really think he should have been on the Jan. 4 Impact building to his first match tonight against someone besides Abyss. Their styles are just too different, they don’t match up well and it shows here. Ken relies on punches and kicks and doesn’t really pull out much wrestling through most of the bout and while some will argue that Ken might have ring rust, I’d argue that he’s never had much to rust to begin with. The way the match ends is believable and passable and I can see them continuing the feud down the road, which is unfortunate. I’m giving this a 5 out of 10.

Finally, we come to the main event – AJ Styles defends his TNA title against Kurt Angle with the stipulation that if AJ retains, Kurt can’t vie for the title for the rest of the year as long as Style is champ. Honestly, it’s a pointless stipulation and prior to the match, I'm convinced Angle is winning back the title.

The match starts off slow with AJ matching Kurt almost move for move, proving that they are equals and then it’s back and forth, building excitement. When AJ goes for a flip dive over the ropes, it looks like he lands badly on Kurt cause he goes right to his knee as if in pain. Towards the end, Angle gives AJ his own move, the Styles Clash and AJ responds by giving Angle his move, the Angle Slam which I find to be a nice spot. The end sees Ric Flair, who had come down earlier, interfere and help AJ retain. What’s most amusing is that while they pull a heelish tactic by costing Angle the win and having an unclean finish, the audience still cheers for AJ so it has the opposite effect they were probably hoping for. How do I feel about it? I don’t think he’ll be a complete heel. With Flair behind him and his mentor, he’ll be just like Ric was back in the 80’s – sometimes good, sometimes bad, but always for himself. It could work. I’m giving this an 8 out of 10.

Overall, TNA still has a lot to correct, but they’re on the right track. Half of the card is simple matches without hokey stipulations and they’re not trying to cram every wrestler onto the show. There are still a few setbacks. The lead up to this event was lackluster and some of the matches suffer because of it. They chose to focus on premiering too many new wrestlers when that time should have been reserved for people with more crowd appeal. I would have included a Young Bucks – MCMG match and done a bit reshuffling of the card. They have to make coherent stories and they really need to work on building to the next event, but it can be done rather easily and they’ve got plenty of time to do it. Honestly, though, this is miles above Final Resolution or even the January 4th episode of Impact and while the numbers add up to a 6, I’m feeling charitable and bumping it up to a 7 out of 10. Is it worth buying the replay? Eh, not really, but I have no qualms about buying the dvd when it comes out.