As noted here, this year's incarnation of the Bound for Glory Series has been a disaster for TNA. After word got around of as much and inconsistencies in the scheduling were pointed out, the company attempted to explain it away by saying the format was simply different this year and it was followed to the tee, save for an exception that had to be made for Magnus, who was having "an unforeseen issue."
That turned out to be a problem with his work visa that was worked out between shows last night in Cleveland.
With the new explanation from TNA, everything was supposed to culminate in during last night's episode of Impact. Indeed, the show was dubbed "MUST WIN THURSDAY", signifying how important the three matches scheduled for the show truly were. That's because it would drastically affect the points standings leading to the Final Four, who would go on to No Surrender to battle it out for the right to challenge for the heavyweight title at the Bound for Glory pay-per-view (PPV) in October.
Except it wasn't really "MUST WIN THURSDAY". It was more like "KEEP YOURSELF IN REACH THURSDAY".
That's because after the Final Four was determined and the standings apparently locked in as follows:
General Manager Hulk Hogan would later come out to say he was booking a Gauntlet match for Impact next week with 20 points on the line. The standings show that puts 10 of the 12 competitors in the running to make the Final Four.
Well, next week's show was taped last night and AJ Styles won, making everything before it seem like an oversight that needed to be corrected. Or, even better, TNA realizing they had one more week of TV before actually getting to the No Surrender show on Sept. 12.
All this has served to further the notion that this has been nothing but an unorganized mess that we shouldn't care about because, well, they'll just pull the rug out and book on the fly anyway. And what's better is they'll try to explain that they aren't doing that right before doing it!
TNA gonna TNA, or something like that.