Category: TNA

Preview by Josh Nason

Tuesday’s Impact Wrestling has the promise to be another newsworthy edition of the show as AEW Champion Kenny Omega will be on the show, flanked by Don Callis. 

It’s unknown what Omega is planning on doing or saying, but he did make a surprise appearance on Saturday’s Final Resolution to reacquaint with old friend Karl Anderson, giving him a pep talk before his match (and win) over Ethan Page.

This will be the first show the aforementioned Final Resolution where World Champion Rich Swann and Knockouts Champion Deonna Purrazzo retained their titles while Rohit Raju lost his X Division title to Manik in an open challenge.

Also planned for tonight’s show: Anderson will face Chris Sabin; Manik (TJP) will face Chris Bey in a non-title match, Tasha Steelz and Kiera Hogan will face Rosemary and Taya in the first Knockouts Tag Team Championship tournament semifinal; and Tenille Dashwood will go one-on-one with Alisha.

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Opening video was a new recap of Kenny Omega and Don Callis’ promo from last week, where they explained their plans. Also, we got a recap of the three championship matches from Final Resolution, plus Karl Anderson defeating Ethan Page to deny him a title shot. A lot of teasing of what titles Omega could decide to chase.

Kaleb with a K opened the show to introduce Tenille Dashwood to the ring. 

Tenille Dashwood (with Kaleb with a K) defeated Alisha Edwards (with Eddie Edwards)

Dashwood and Alisha had once considered becoming a tag team, but after Edwards had other things to worry about, mainly her husband, Dashwood was insulted that she wasn’t someone’s priority and turned on her. The Edwards household lost to the team of Dashwood and Kaleb at Final Resolution, so now Alisha has a chance at Dashwood in a singles match.

Match saw a fired up Edwards running wild early on, but it wasn’t long for Dashwood to cut her off with a draping neckbreaker and gain control of the match. Dashwood worked on her for a little bit, mostly making fun of her. Eventually, Alisha made a comeback, but Kaleb was there to save Dashwood from getting pinned. 

Eddie Edwards tried to get rid of Kaleb, but instead got a shot with Kaleb’s tote bag. Alisha hit a dive on Kaleb, but it was the opening for Dashwood to hit Alisha with a kick and pin. Match was ok, one of Alisha’s better performances.

After the match, Sami Callihan cut a promo on the screen telling Eddie that he was tired of attacking from behind and challenged Edwards to a match next year, and he made it sounds like a career vs career match.

– Gia Miller Interviewed Alex Shelley and Chris Sabin. They talked about being done with two steps of their return, beating XXXL, and beating The North, and so now, they’re focused on the Good Brothers and they want their rematch clause as soon as Gallows returns, but for now, Sabin will take on Anderson.

– Karl Anderson was hanging out with Kenny Omega and Don Callis, and once again, they’re bullying Anderson that he needs to bring back the G1 Climax Karl Anderson.

– We saw Anderson approach Rich Swann and complain about what Sabin and Shelley had said. Swann stood up to Anderson and blamed Omega for Anderson’s behaviour, and so Anderson put down Swann telling him Omega was the real world champion. MCMG approached Swann and backed him up. 

– Moose came down to the ring, looking dapper as always. He tolds us that Willie Mack won’t be able to compete on Impact for several weeks because HE hurt him. Moose said that even after that, people only talked about Rich Swann, who he respected, but Swann is injury prone, and so Swann should call Mack to see what it feels to be hurt.

Willie Mack came down to the ring, but security stopped him since he was not cleared to get physical. Mack said he wasn’t out here to wrestle, but he was mad that he was lost to a referee decision, and not to a pin. He challenged Moose to an I Quit Match at Genesis. 

Mack rushed the ring and they tried to brawl, but security were on their feet and pulled them apart. Moose beat up some of the security for messing up his shirt while the rest took ack away.

Gia Miller interviewed Moose coming back. Moose said that he was tired of all these indie wrestlers trying to get opportunities as security guards and getting on his way and putting their hands on him. He threatened them all.

– Chris Bey approached Rohit Raju and made fun of him for losing the X Division title. Raju said that Bey also lost, but at least He had a rematch clause. Bey convinced Raju that if he could unmask Manik and reveal TJP, he’d have an argument to take the title off TJP and get it back, and the perfect chance was during Bey’s match with Manik later tonight.

– We got an AEW commercial with Tony Khan and Schiavone. Khan dropped some underhanded comments like he was funding Impact and that thanks to Callis, Omega was doing free publicity for free and that he got him his best ratings. Schiavone ran down tomorrow’s card, also dropping shade about how Daniels and Kaz were now on AEW and how they didn’t remember TNA. Khan vs Callis continues.

– We got a vignette for Eric Young, once again in prison, like his Bound for Glory promos. He talked about disease and what his true purpose was. He said he’d baptise Cody Deaner in the ‘holy water of change’.

Chris Bey (with Rohit Raju) defeated X Division Champion Manik by DQ in a non-title match.

The story of Manik winning the title comes from TJP not being able to challenge for the X Division title, and so he masked himself in his old gimmick, challenged for the title, and won the title at Final Resolution. TJP have a long history together while they both chased Raju’s title, and now they face each other in a non-title match.

Match saw Manik out-wrestle Bey early on, he kept countering and dodging his approaches. Manik started getting more aggressive as the minutes went on, but it was then that Bey managed to cut him off and start going after his mask. Bey had the upper hand only for a couple of minutes before he locked a submission and was countered by Manik. 

Manik and Bey went back and forward the last couple of minutes, but after being tossed to the floor, Manik snuck under the ring to surprise him from the other side of the ring, hit a detonation kick and went for the finish. 

Finish, and Chris Bey plan came at the end, when he tricked Raju into attacking him, winning by DQ and earning a proper X Division title shot. Good match overall and a good finish that will advance the story between the three. Chris Bey vs Manik sounds like a Genesis match.

– Impact+ Flashback Moment of the Week was FInal Resolution 2006, where Sting returned to TNA.

– Ethan Page and Josh Alexander met backstage. Page told  Alexander that everything was going to be ok, but Alexander said that it was time for Page to get his life together and go get help. He teased having someone to back him up. 

Brian Myers walked up to Alexander and proposed to him that he should ditch Page and join him. Alexander told him off and challenged him to a match instead.

Kiera Hogan & Tasha Steelz defeated Rosemary & Taya Valkyrie in a Knockouts Tag Team Championship Tournament Semi Final match.

Hogan and Steelz defeated the Sea Stars to advance to this match, where they faced Rosemary and Taya, who defeated the team of Deonna Purrazzo and Kimbe Lee. These two teams have a small history together from a couple of months ago when Taya feuded with both Hogan and Steelz. 

Rosemary and Taya started the match with the upper hand, given the size advantage, but after some aid from Steelz, Hogan cut off Rosemary and cut the ring in half on her. Rosemary wasn’t able to move away from her opponent’s corner for most of the duration of the heat segment, Hogan and Steelz kept her at bay with quick tags and quick moves. 

It wasn’t until Steelz locked in a sleeper that Rosemary managed to get her off for a breather and catch her with a spear to finally tag in Taya. 

Finish saw Deonna Purrazzo and Kimber Lee come down and attack Rosemary, distracting Taya so that Hogan could take her out and pin her. This wouldn’t have been so bad if the referee hadn’t looked like the only idiot that didn’t notice Purrazzo and Lee out there, that aside, this was a good match between the two teams that should have met in the finals.

Hogan and Steelz will wait for the winner of the Jordynne Grace & Jazz vs Havok and Nevaeh match.

– We got another vignette with Eric Young and Cody Deaner, the former telling the latter that professional wrestling has a disease and that Deaner never saw the parasite latch on to him, whatever that means.

Brian Myers defeated Josh Alexander by DQ

These two started going back and forward, but only a minute in, Ethan Page ran down and tried to get Alexander out of the match. Myers took him out against the ring post before returning to the ring and continuing the match.

They kept going back and forward, but Myers always had a small upper hand, but suddenly when Myers was coming close to finishing up Alexander, up rose Ethan Page’s alter ego — The Karate Man, who attacked and beat up Myers for the DQ. This match had a lot of potential, but it was unfortunately only used as an angle so Page could reveal his Karate Man gimmick.

Alexander left the ring and left Page alone in the ring. If this is the direction, it’s not that bad that Page may be leaving.

– We got a third vignette with Young and Deaner where the latter got baptized. I’m all in for a character change in Deaner in his new heel run.

– Acey Romero approached Tommy Dreamer about Larry D being set up. Dreamer told him to prove it. After that, Rhino and Cousin Jake talked about what Eric Young and Joe Doering had been doing, and so Dreamer told them both to go and take out EY and Doering before things got worse.

– Matthews and Rayne announced that the next two weeks of Impact will be Holiday Specials, but they return on January 5th with Sami Callihan vs Eddie Edwards.

Karl Anderson defeated Chris Sabin (with Alex Shelley)

A month ago, Alex Shelley and Chris Sabin made the plan to reclaim the tag team titles, but before that, they had things to settle with XXXL, The North, and the Good Brothers, and after being done with steps one and two, the MCMGs have their sight set on Anderson and Gallows, but while the latter is out of commission, Sabin takes on Anderson tonight.

Good match between these two. While not a full fledged heel, Anderson did work a slightly more heel match, considerably more aggressive than his tag matches. He cut off Sabin early on and didn’t let go for a long while. Anderson focused on Sabin’s leg, but would switch to the head every so often when cutting Sabin’s comeback attempts. It wasn’t until Anderson accidentally collided with Sabin head-on-head, that Sabin had an opening to recover and pick up speed to turn things around. 

They traded strikes until both men were down for the double count tease. They traded near falls before chasing their finishers, but at the end, it was Anderson that took the win when he rolled up Sabin and pulled the tights. 

Omega and Callis celebrated on the bus. Rich Swann confronted Anderosn about cheating to win. Gallows returned and the Good Brothers attacked Swann and the MCMGs. Omega took out Rich Swann. Omega said he wanted Swann at Hard To Kill, and so Callis made it official. Kenny Omega & The Good Brothers vs Rich Swann & MCMGs to main event the Hard To Kill pay per view.