Impact Wrestling results, review, & video (Sept. 28, 2017): Sweetest Victory

Impact Wrestling returned last night (Sept. 28) with their Victory Road special. You can find all the results at the live blog here.

Chaos

Impact ended this show with some chaos. And it wasn’t the fun kind that makes you excited at all the possibilities. it was the over the top stuff that takes away from the action and is too much even for the world of professional wrestling.

The set up was the main event title match between champion Eli Drake and challenger Johnny Impact. It was a long match and for most of it, it was very good. Then referees started getting bumped and things started getting nuts.

The first ref bump was an inadvertent one and it was fine. One ref bump is OK if used properly. It prevented Johnny from winning with a big kick. It brought Chris Adonis down to the ring, who was ejected earlier. This allowed Drake to grab the title and hit Johnny in the head with it. Of course, the ref was still down and by the time the next referee came out, Impact kicked out of Drake’s pin.

Things continued to get more ridiculous as Drake punched out the new ref. Just straight up clocked the official. Yes, he’s a heel, but that’s a suspend-able offense. But whatever. The match picked back up to an enjoyable end sequence. Drake hid behind the referee when Johnny went up top for his Impact elbow. Johnny jumped over the ref, screening him from the low blow kick Drake delivered to the challenger. Eli then hit his finish for the win.

It was a good match that was brought down with just too much referee junk in the middle. Heels cheat, but they can do it in a way that doesn’t completely kill the flow of things. But that wasn’t even the worst of it.

Adonis and Drake double teamed Johnny until Garza Jr. came out and made the save. Why Garza? I don’t know, but I really like him so if it means a match with Drake, I’m in.

Then LAX, who were pissed about losing the tag team titles earlier, came out, beat up Garza and Johnny, and the started shoving fans and assaulting officials. While they beat up officials on the outside of the ring, Adonis and Drake did so on the inside as Impact went off the air.

It was all just too much random assault that won’t get the punishments they likely should, even in the world of wrestling. The match was fun, but there was too much chaos and assault on the officials (by multiple factions) to be an enjoyable close of the show.

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Unlikely allies

James Storm and EC3 are telling an intriguing story regarding their issues each other while they deal with a common enemy.

Storm came down to the ring to address the issues with the Triple A wrestlers when Triple A’s Texano came to the ring. This soon turned into a fight that El Hijo de Fantasma interjected himself into and they double teamed the Cowboy.

This went on for awhile without anyone coming to aid Storm. It was only when Fantasma and Texano were about to break a bottle over Storm’s head that EC3 came to the ring to make the save.

James Storm offered his hand to Carter, but EC3 declined to shake it. However, after thinking about it, he opted to shake his old foe’s hand.

The unlikely alliance has been quite interesting, and much of that rests on the shoulders of the facial expressions and body language of both men. They do a great job selling how much they dislike each other (remember they were in a blood feud at Slammiversary) while at the same time needing each other.

I appreciate that Ethan didn’t make the save for James Storm immediately. He waited, as if he was fine to let the Cowboy deal with this crap himself until it looked like these Triple A guys were going to take it too far. I can imagine an internal struggle for EC3 backstage before deciding to finally lend a hand.

He still didn’t want to shake Storm’s hand, but he convinced himself that if he wants to get rid of these foes from a rival promotion, he has to team with a man he hates.

There were a couple smaller things of note I wanted to mention:

• Storm started a GFW chant in the beginning of his promo. He didn’t just subtly encourage the crowd to do so. He asked them to stand and chant GFW. Who would have thought that wouldn’t age well in just two months?
• When Texano came out, the crowd started chanting USA and Storm surprisingly shut it down. He told the crowd isn’t not about USA and Mexico because in the day, they’re all people. You don’t see that often in a pro-wrestling ring. It didn’t stop the crowd from chanting Taco Bell though.

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A loaded division

The team of Sienna, Taya Valkyrie, and Taryn Terrell defeated Allie, Gail Kim, and Rosemary. It ended up being a really fun match that highlight one thing: This division is loaded.

All six of these women are extremely talented.

They’ve kind of dropped the whole “Allie is learning to wrestle” bit, though Josh did mention she’s improved for some continuity’s sake. That’s perfectly fine. Better to have her wrestle in her super bubbly persona (so bubbly she comes out to actual bubbles) instead of having her slowly learn her way.

Rosemary has done an excellent job translating her gimmick into a babyface persona. It showed more last week when she got to come out on her own and cut a promo. She still has her signature mannerisms, but has incorporated the crowd has part of her “Hive.” And I’ll co-sign what Stella said last week: Rosemary looks fantastic as the Glam Demon.

This was the first time we really got to see Taya and now I just want to see her wrestling more in the Knockouts division.

Seeing this match left me wanting to see all six of these women in feuds with each other.

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Just Getting Started

Trevor Lee successfully defended his X Division title against Petey Williams with a whole lot of help from his Carolina bud Caleb Konley.

It looked like it was going to be standard fare. There was some pretty good in ring action. Lee used a Konely distraction to take control, Petey fought back and set up for the Canadian Destroyer; however, Caleb distracted him. Williams was able to dispense of Konley and deliver the Destroyer to Lee. Caleb pulled the referee out of the ring before he could count to 3, even pleading for a DQ to save his friend’s title.

Williams talked the referee out of that and Konley was ejected instead. While the referee was dealing with Caleb, Trevor hit the challenger in the head with the title and went for the cover. It looked to be over.

But it wasn’t!

The match could have ended there, but Petey kicked out and we got the extra innings of the match that add on the excitement. Lee ended up escaping another Canadian Destroyer and delivering a big double stomp on a standing Williams. He made sure to get a handful of tights as he pinned for the win.

This feud will surely continue. Most of the match was pretty standard for the X Division, which very well may have been by design. If they’re going to do this again, they shouldn’t use everything they’ve got now. We did get that extra 3 minutes after the surprise kick out that made this match feel a bit bigger and builds anticipation for the eventual rematch.

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New tag team champions

oVe defeated LAX to win the tag team championships. Konnan was stunned that his boys lost.

It was a really fun match with the styles of these teams meshing well. Impact still needs to add some teams though because these two are pretty much the division now.

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Pros of the Show:

• Tag title match and X Division match were really fun
• Main event title match itself was fun outside all the interference
• Storm/EC3 story has been intriguing
• The KOs division is looking great

Cons of the Show:

• Way too much ridiculousness during and especially after the main event

Outside the messy main event post angle, this was a strong show.

Grade: B+

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