By Jeremy Peeples, WrestlingObserver.com
Last week, EC3’s barbershop quintet sang his theme, while the Dirty Heels beat The Wolves. Spud cashed in the X Title to get a title shot, and D’Angelo Dinero returned to do commentary with Josh, who despite being a fashion podcaster, didn’t tell him to wear something other than a blinding black and white shirt. Also, James Storm pushed Mickie James onto train tracks to possibly set up a PPV match between Storm and Magnus.
The X division gets a highlight video to start the show. Nine of the top X Division stars will fight for the title – including, yes, Crazzy Steve. Christy intros Spud vs. Kurt, but EC3 comes down while Josh runs everything as fast as humanly possible and sides with EC3. EC3 complains about not being in one of tonight’s two title matches. EC3 stages a sit-in and cancels Destination X. He dares someone to stop him, so Kurt comes down and Josh goes on some more about how great EC3 is. Angle tells him that the fans don’t want to see a bitch, while EC3 tells him he’ll knock his something bleeped into the dirt. EC3 and Tyrus leave. Spud comes down and walks right past EC3 and Tyrus. Josh says this match is just a publicity stunt by TNA. Well, that failed. JB gives this the big match intro and we’ll get the match after a break.
Kurt Angle vs. Rockstar Spud – TNA World Title Match
We start with a collar and elbow and takedown by Kurt. Kurt rides the challenger, who slides underneath him to the ropes. Hard headlock throw by Kurt leads to Josh talking about Spud being in way over his league. Spud gets a drop toehold, a missile dropkick, and spinning headscissors sending the champ to the floor. He dives to Kurt, but eats a belly to belly on the floor. God do I want a Brock vs. Rockstar Spud match now. Kurt busts out a tilt a whirl backbreaker, which I don’t recall seeing him do before.
Kurt punches Spud down and eats a snap suplex while Josh talks about Spud showing his impact. He talks about that for seemingly ages, and is beyond annoying. Yet another tilt a whirl backbreaker by Kurt when Spud rushes in. Angle slam countered into an armdrag and enzuiguri. Spud kicks the leg and punches away before taking Kurt down with a bolo punch. Kurt rushes Spud, who sidesteps him to send the champ to the floor. Baseball slide sends Kurt down, so he climbs up top and gets a flip dive to the neck and shoulder.
Josh says Spud now has a slim chance, and Spud goes up top only to eat a super belly to belly for 2. Spud counters an Angle slam and dropkicks the knee to set up the running forearms, but he gets the ankle lock out of a shining wizard. Spud rolls the champ into the buckle, gets the Underdog on his second try, but only gets 2.5! Kurt pops up and gets a grapevine ankle lock for the win. Now Josh is rooting for Spud and Spud taps. Kurt says under his breathe that the son of a bitch is very good. Kurt shakes Spud’s hand while Pope says he’s taking his shades off for the kid. Then Aries comes out and points at him – they should have let this breathe a bit more.
The Dollhouse comes out while their theme drowns out Taryn’s promo. Taryn says that if Kong wants to fight her, they’ll bare all to get the better of her. Taryn challenges Kong to a lingerie pillow fight and if she doesn’t wear the lingerie Taryn’s picked for her, Kong doesn’t get a shot. And then they just go to a Kurt-Spud video because the X Title has been vacated. Everyone going for the X Title gets some weird title, including “and um…GRADO!” which was pretty funny. Generic X division hype vid brings Low-Ki down to the ring, but doesn’t have the BDC mask. Josh says that we’ll have 3-ways tonight to determine seeds for a future match. Okay then. Graphics would be helpful here. Manik’s out, followed by “The Insane Clown” Crazzy Steve.
Manik vs. Low-Ki vs. Crazzy Steve
Pope says this match is filled with craziness while Manik and Ki punch it out (not unlike Josh Nason’s new podcast). Steve holds onto the ropes and gets kicked down. Ki European uppercuts Steve and Josh says that Steve communicates via horn. Manik gets Gail’s headscissor/Octopus hold while Josh says that Spud is trending worldwide. Manik gets 2 on Ki because Steve breaks up the cover. Steve shoves Manik off the top, but he misses a crossbody off the top. Ki hits his running dropkick to Steve, which sends Manik into the buckle. Warrior’s Way hits Manik and Ki advances to the title match.
Grado tries to lose some weight by running. Twitter thinks he’s X division, so does his mum, but he needs to cut some weight. Grado goes through some parkour. First, he wants to hop over a small box and then a bigger one. He gets over the bigger one, but falls over and then runs to the bathroom. Recap of James Storm shoving Mickie off the train platform. Josh updates us to Mickie not being physically harmed – so apparently, her possible concussion symptoms have subsided completely. X Title qualifers continue on with the second airing of this generic X division video in about 15 minutes.
Tigre Uno vs. Mandrews vs. DJZ
None of these guys get an intro. Z gets a headlock on Mandrews, while Uno headlocks Z. Z cradles Uno for 2. Uno gets a wheelbarrow armdrag to Z, who dropkicks Uno down. Josh talks about Mandrews moving to America, who then eats a pop-up dropkick while Z is on his back. That silly thing gets 2. Uno hits a missile dropkick to both men and sliding dropkicks Z in the corner. Josh says that if Uno wins, he’ll buy a Tigre Uno mask. Pope says that will keep Josh from talking, so he’s all for it. Can we get a Kickstarter going for that? I’ll kick in $5 for the “watch Impact for one show without Josh on commentary”.
Uno avoids a Mandrews suplex, but eats a springboard tornado DDT from him. Inside-out rana to the floor to Uno from Mandrews! DJZ is all alone and flip dives onto the pile. Apron-to-ring DDT from DJZ to Mandrews leads to Uno landing with his knees to Mandrews’ face off a Phoenix Splash for the win. Well, the replay showed that the move completely missed all of Mandrews’ body – so that’s good for Mandrews. Jessie comes down and beats up DJZ. Nice mounted forearm rakes by Jessie and he tossed DJZ down. Josh is against this heelish action, by the way, and is very much against the press slam to the floor. Pope calls him the modern-day Adonis, while they plug Angle-Aries. Taryn walks backstage for the lingerie pillow fight challenge.
Grado is in a trash bag and tells Tigre that he’s a good wrestler and that he needs some training tips. Grado has his name taped on the trash bag and is so goofy. Uno calls him a jackass. The Dollhouse comes down with an actual dollhouse while Pope asks for silence. The crowd is happy to oblige here, as Josh says he didn’t know Pope was such a huge Courtney Love fan.
The Dollhouse gets on a twin bed as Josh runs down the trope of Kong not accepting this match and just destroying the Dollhouse here. Taryn tells “Konk” to come out while making hilarious faces. Kong comes out and looks ready to kick some ass. Taryn is very angry at Konk for ruining fight time. Marti talks Spanish and says Kong’s a big dummy. This doesn’t go well for her, as she and Jade feel Kong’s wrath. Kong slaps and chops the goons away. Kong tosses Jade onto Marti while Taryn says she’s a tease and that Christy can go announce her as the winner of the match.
Brooke (who does in fact still have a booty) comes down and says that having this title in a lingerie pillow fight is a disgrace to the title. Taryn lets Christy know she can call her the winner now. Brooke tells Taryn that she promised to defend the title and to show some skin. Brooke has no problem fighting Taryn, but Taryn didn’t challenge her – she challenged Konk! Brooke forearms her down and strips her down a bit before they do a bullfighting bit with Taryn’s robe. This was hilarious. Brooke says that she took her robe and she’ll take her title next. So is she getting a shot at the PPV? Josh was a face here and supports Brooke. Roode tells Aries that things are lining up now for them. It’s time for them to regain the tag titles and for Aries to get the World title – if he wins, Roode gets the first shot. These two have wonderful chemistry.
Hilarious stuff with JB and Grado backstage. He’s in his trash bag and strips down and asks JB “how’s it looking?” before JB asks him to be specific and tells him the X division has no limits, so this whole thing was pointless. Grado is overjoyed and goes to the ring. Kenny King comes out to face Cruz, who I honest to God don’t recall seeing before today. Grado’s out with dance music while Pope says he’s glad he’s covering up.
Grado vs. Cruz vs. Kenny King
Grado catches the foot and King kicks his head off. An ROH plug is on as former ROH tag champ Kenny King chops Grado in the corner. King gets a chinlock on Grado while a few fans do a Kenny King/sucks chant. Josh puts out Grado beating Al Snow “a legend in our sport”. Grado gets 2 off some comedy spots with Cruz. Kenny hits the Royal Flush on Cruz, who is in a bootleg Kalisto costume. Grado punches away at King, but eats an overhead chop to the chest. Grado hits bionic forearms and gets King down and he backdrops him over the top. Cannonball to Cruz gets the win – Grado goes on to the future X Title match. Bram stands over a fallen camera man and he hates Destination X. He’s going to come to the ring and make history.
Bram vs. Crimson
Bram is in the ring as they plug his “Dark Grid” shirt. Bram talks about the X division building TNA and how Slammiversary is a celebration of TNA’s history – and he hates history and the past. Bram wants to fight any TNA stars of the past, of which there are many backstage, and man is his delivery great. The words aren’t amazing, but his delivery is perfect – he’s so arrogant. Crimson came out to about the level of reaction you would expect for someone who came back out of nowhere. Josh says he had the look. Crimson appears to have Hall’s black and blood red gear in shorts form.
Backdrop by Crimson and Pope says that Crimson hasn’t aged a day. Well, he’s in his early ’30s, so that’s good. Crimson catches the foot and shoves Bram back to the ropes. Josh talks about Bram being a loose cannon and maniac. The crowd begins chanting for Crimson, who eats some shots on the floor. Bram talks smack to Crimson while beating him up with mounted punches and doing Bray’s back bridge – which one of the fans yells at him. T-bone suplex by Crimson looks sharp and he follows it up with a Fujiwara armbar and the Rings of Saturn – the actual one, not the crossface variant Batista did. Bram bites Crimson’s hand and hits the impaler DDT for the win. This was a shockingly good match and well worth going out of your way to see as a whole for Bram’s pre-match mic work and Crimson’s work in the ring.
Kurt tells a camera guy that tonight is special – he’ll have two matches tonight. Spud took him to his limit and was the ultimate underdog – but he beat him. Now, he has to fight the guy who created Option C and guarantees a match of the year. Slammiverary is 13 years in the making and has no matches penciled in for its card with less than three weeks to go. EC3 says that he’s pissed Spud and Aries got shots before him, and his EC3 2015 merch is plugged. The main event is up at 10:37, so it should be getting plenty of time. We see Kurt beating Spud and then Josh goes back and forth between whether Spud should or shouldn’t have gotten the shot. JB gives us the big match intro.
Main Event – Kurt Angle vs. Austin Aries – TNA World Title
A collar and elbow tie-up mid-ring starts us off. Kurt takes him down and Aries floats over. Aries gets a side headlock takedown while a We Want Ethan/No We Don’t chant. Kurt avoids a dropkick and eats corner punches. Aries clotheslines him down and gets 1. Back and forth punches from each man in the corner. Aries flips out of a German for an ad break. EC3 hype video by DA airs and really makes him look great.
Outside-in tope con hilo gets 2 for Aries. Corner charge hits as Aries gets a diving back elbow to the back and a chinlock. Kurt elbows out of it and avoids a brainbuster with a back suplex after a suplex counter. Overhead belly to belly sets up the rolling Germans. Aries DDTs his way out of an Angle slam for 2. Last Chancery is locked on, but Aries moves around to get a better position and is ankle locked for it. Given that this move beat Spud, it’s got that much more meaning.
Corner rollthrough leads to an eye rake on the ropes from Aries. Missile dropkick lands for Aries and sets up the corner dropkick, which is countered by an ankle lock! Aries gets the ropes and is waistlocked, which he tries to counter with a discus elbow, but it’s seamlessly turned into an Angle slam for 2! Kurt goes for a moonsault and misses – landing right on his braced knee. Last Chancery is on again, but Aries turns it into a front facelock and Kurt gets to the ropes.
Aries goes up for the 450, but Kurt runs up for the belly to belly. An Aries eye rake and boxing of the ears ends that – the 450 hits and gets 2.9! Josh talks about Aries being in yet another match of the year candidate and he may be the best man who ever lived. Would Josh mind stating that on the record as a reference for Aries if his TNA deal isn’t renewed? Discus elbow out of the Angle slam leads to another elbow and the corner dropkick! Brainbuster hits hard and gets 2.9 thanks to his foot being on the rope.
Aries gets an ankle lock on, which Pope says is a slap to the face. Kurt rolls through and the master of the move gets it on once again. Aries rolls through and Kurt goes to the floor, likely before a suicide dive. Bingo – but it misses! Kurt rolls him in and pulls down the straps before an Angle slam that is countered into a sunset flip for 2. Ankle lock is on with the grapevine, which gets yet another win for Kurt tonight. Josh says that there’s no better wrestling on Earth than TNA, and EC3 jumps Kurt. Pope says Kurt should have his moment and Josh agrees. Can he be consistent for at least one show? EC3 raises his hand high while holding the title belt high. Next week, Magnus does something with Storm, Melendez gets a match with EY, and we’ll get more with EC3 and Kurt.
To see every screen taken for the show, just click here.