Welcome everyone to The People’s Column! My name is William Pruett and I’ve been writing this column for over a year now. I’m always excited to share my wrestling opinions with all of you. Another place that I do that is at my personal blog, itswilltime.wordpress.com. Here you can find me discussing TNA’s Bound for Glory main event and The Miz’s interaction with Daniel Bryan from Raw. Without further ado, on to the subject of today’s column.
On Sunday night TNA ran their annual No Surrender pay per view. This show meant even less than it ever has, since there was no TNA World Championship match on it. The entire show was build around semi-final matches in the tournament to crown a new champion. TNA has proven with this tournament that their booking strategy is ineffective and unexciting.
First of all, in one night they had all of the quarter final matches, then waited three weeks to have semi-final matches. The plan is to wait another month until Bound for Glory to crown a new champion. Now, let’s remember back to when the tournament was made in the first place. The decision was made because RVD could not defend the championship after 30 days due to an attack from Abyss. Normally, in this kind of situation, a champion is crowned within thirty days, so title defenses can still occur at a regular pace. What was the point of stripping the champion of the title, when he will be back in action at the time that a champion is crowned?
Shouldn’t Rob Van Dam be angry that he was not instantly given a championship match? Or perhaps he should be upset that he did not just get to keep his title? If he was truly the fighting champion that he was built up to be, why is he not upset that his title was stollen from him. He has his personal issues with Abyss to solve, but he should still be focussed on his championship, which is the most important thing in the business.
Now, we focus on the tournament semi-final matches. First of all, Jeff Hardy and Kurt Angle was a great, well fought match. This was a match where Angle dictated the pace and really made himself and Hardy look like a million bucks. This match was good enough to be the main event of Bound for Glory (and it probably should have been).
The finish of this match made no sense. For those of you that did not see it, Angle and Hardy wrestled to a 20 minute time limit draw. After this, Eric Bischoff and Dixie Carter added five minutes because there must be a winner. At the end of those five minutes, another five minutes were added. At this point Angle was bleeding and the match was stopped due to excessive blood loss.
The logic holes in this match are gaping. Why, if there must be a winner, was there only an overtime period of five minutes? Why, if there was a 20 minute time limit, was it not announced before the match? Why was Kurt Angle’s cut bad enough to stop a match when Ric Flair has been busted open far worse than that on TNA television and nothing has been done about it?
Many of these issues have nothing to do with the action. They just show a lack of planning on TNA’s part. They have had a month to get used to announcing time limits in matches. This would have been great in terms of preparing fans for eventual time limit draws. It also adds drama to matches and is a great old school touch.
I’m also not saying that Angle should have been cut worse. Quite the contrary actually, I believe that blading in wrestling should be reserved for occasions where it really means something. What did it mean for Flair to bleed all those times? What did it mean for Dreamer to bleed so much? These instances could have been dropped from programs months ago (since according to Eric Bischoff they have had this all planned out since March), but instead they were left there.
The in ring performances of the TNA roster are great. They have an amazing list of talent working for them. Some of the best performers in the business today grace the TNA ring. These performers just need to be pushed in at least an adequate manner.
Thank you everyone for reading today. Remember to check out itswilltime.wordpress.com for a discussion of TNA’s Bound for Glory main event and The Miz and Daniel Bryan. Until it’s time for another 10 Thoughts on Monday, be well.
