Impact Wrestling 697 Review // Team Eddie Edwards vs. Team Chris Adonis // Eli Drake Gravy Train Turkey Trot

Bound For Glory 2017 Review // Johnny Impact vs. Eli Drake
Impact Wrestling 695 Review // Alberto El Patron and Johnny Impact Brawl

Impact Wrestling 696 Review // Petey Williams vs. Eli Drake

It was Thanksgiving on 23rd November, so Impact Wrestling treated us to a Turkey based episode. Yeah. Taped at the Aberdeen Pavillion in Ottawa, Ontario, the show featured just one original match, pitting Team Eddie Edwards against Team Chris Adonis. Throughout the show names were drawn, taking up an outstanding near twenty five minutes, leading to Fallah Bahh, Garza Jr., Richard Justice and Allie joining Edwards' team and Adonis' team consisting off KM, El Hijo del Fantasma, Caleb Konley and Laurel Van Ness. The show also featured a number of flash back matches from Thanksgivings gone by including Rhino, Alex Shelley & Sheik Abdul Bashir battling it out in a three way from 2008. But was it any good? Let's take a look. (SPOILER - IT WASN'T GOOD. NOT GOOD AT ALL)

Eli Drake Gravy Train Turkey Trot // Team Eddie Edwards (Eddie Edwards, Allie [Cherry Bomb], Richard Justice [Dick Justice], Garza Jr. & Fallah Bahh [Franciz]) def. Team Chris Adonis (Chris Adonis [Chris Masters], El Hijo del Fantasma, Caleb Konley, Laurel van Ness [Chelsea Green] & KM [Kevin Matthews]) // Pinfall

*If the following paragraph seems repetitive, drawn out and entirely unnecessary, then I've made my point. It's also good to remember it took up 25 minutes* 

Robert Irvine prepared a Thanksgiving meal, whilst Jeremy Borash fannied around with a tumbler...Borash did some more fannying around with a tumbler...Eli Drake told a story to Borash about his Dad's creamy mashed potatoes. They also drew the first team captain for the newly rechristened Gravy Train Turkey Trot, Eddie Edwards...Edwards told McKenzie Mitchell that tonight he'd be ticking an item off his bucket list by competing in the match...Borash drew El Hijo Del Fantasma as the first member of Team two, whilst Drake stole his bread roll...Fantasma told Mitchell that they don't have Thankgiving in Mexico... Borash let us know that they'd be drawing more names later on... Eli Drake gave his thoughts on Johnny Impact vs. Alberto El Patron happening next week, which didn't amount to a whole lot...Borash finally drew the next member of Eddie Edwards' team, Allie...Allie actually seemed pretty excited about the prospect of dressing as a turkey...Borash let us know that they'd be drawing more names later on...Caleb Konley was drawn as the next member of Team Two by Borash...Trevor Lee told Konley that he'd better not lose the match, in another Mitchell interview...Drake pulled Richard Justice as Edwards' next team member...Justice was buzzing for the opportunity when he spoke to Mitchell... Borash drew KM as the next entrant into the Gravy Train Turkey Trot...KM told Mitchell that all he cared about was impressing American Top Team later on...Laurel Van Ness was the next name out of Borash's tumbler... van Ness danced around like a turkey in her interview with Mitchell...Drake asked Chris Adonis "would you?" with Adonis replying "I would stuff that turkey" seemingly in regards to van Ness...Borash pulled another name out of his tumbler, Fallah Bahh...Bahh spoke to Mitchell, saying only the words "Bahh" and "Gobble Gobble"...Borash and Drake spoke about Bahh's weight and then drew Garza Jr.'s name out of the tumbler...Garza Jr. told a Mitchell that a Mexican wrestler never gives up or something...The team captain for the second team was revealed as Chris Adonis, with Drake attempting to put the name back in the tumbler, Adonis seemed furious about the possibility...Adonis gave Caleb Konley, Fantasma and KM a pep talk, whilst van Ness danced around like a turkey...Edwards gave Allie, Justice, Garza and Bahh a team talk, with Justice more interested in the fact that there would be food around the ring...Before the match began Drake made Borash read an oath to the competitors, making them promise to wear the Turkey suit if they were pinned in the match, whilst standing around tables full of Thanksgiving treats... 

Yeah. Well, the match certainly was something. It wasn't completely terrible, but it was pretty terrible. My highlights included Justice attacking Konley with a bread roll, van Ness riding around on Justice's back for a bit, Josh Mathews continuously corpsing on commentary, Bahh and Justice teaming up on KM and a comedy dive spot where Justice pulled his straps down and then fell off the apron, getting caught by the majority of the match, before Allie came flying off the top to knock everyone down. Undoubtedly, the comedy from Justice was the best part of the whole thing, which says more about the use of the likes of Edwards, Garza, Fantasma and Konley, than it does Justice's skills. Then there was the other stuff. Oh dear the other stuff. The commentary making jokes about Bahh and Justice being larger gentleman, KM hitting some of the weakest strikes you ever did see, Garza once again wrestling with an obviously injured arm, Adonis knocking Edwards off the apron to distract the referee and then simply kicking Garza a bit, the referee dropping Garza's hand to the mat multiple times when in an Adonis waistlock and then doing NOTHING about it, followed by Garza eventually escaping and then going straight to the hot tag with absolute no build or struggle. Just a general lack of psychology or common sense in the structure of the bout, with it appearing at multiple times like no one had discussed anything about the match at any point. After Adonis shouting "Masterlock" like a fucking teat, Edwards escaped quickly and got a roll up win in a sloppy finish. After twenty five minutes of mindless build-up segments, the match was over in under half that time and I felt like I'd lost at least three years of my life and many, many brain cells.

You thought this was over? Oh no, my naive friend. There was still ten minutes left of the show. How did they fill those ten minutes? Well, Adonis had to get in the turkey suit, of course. This was much more interesting than the match, but that's not saying much at all. It went like so; Eli Drake said Adonis didn't have to wear the costume, Jeremy Borash said he did, Adonis tried to leave, security stopped him, Adonis tried to leave again, security stopped him again, Borash said if Adonis didn't wear the suit then Drake would have to wear it and then in the best moment of the show, Drake motioned for security to take Adonis back to the ring, whilst saying otherwise on the mic, then Adonis wore the turkey suit. It wasn't high class television and went on for an excruciating long time, but there were moments of relief, mostly enjoying the depth of Drake's performance. The show concluded with a food fight, including Garza Jr. lobbing an entire turkey at Eddie Edwards (his own captain) and Edwards ducking a cherry pie attack from Adonis, leaving Drake covered in pie as the show went off the air.

Turkey Bowl // "The War Machine" Rhino def. Alex Shelley and Sheik Abdul Bashir [Shawn Daivari] // Pinfall 

This bout originally aired on iMPACT 231 (broadcast in November 2008, taped at Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida) and was certainly not a classic. That being said it was probably the best of the three archive bouts, with Shelley and Bashir teaming up to tackle the more powerful Rhino, only for the War Machine to come flying back and pin Shelley with a Gore.

After the match, Mick Foley forced Alex Shelley to wear the Turkey Suit, in an over-the-top promo, threatening to fire the Motor City Machine Guns member. This segment was not entertaining the first time, it really didn't need to be re-aired.

Eli Drake, Dezmond Xavier, Petey Williams, Trevor Lee, Bobby Lashley and Allie let us know their favourite Thanksgiving memories...Drake, Sami Callihan, Alberto El Patron, Williams, KC Spinelli, Johnny Impact and Matt Sydal let us know what their favourite Thanksgiving food was...Drake, Sienna, Ethan Carter III, Impact, Sydal and Allie let us know what they were thankful for...Drake, Willliams and Eddie Edwards (who looked quite ill) told us about their Thanksgiving Traditions... 

Turkey Bowl // Eric Young def. Robbie E // Pinfall

This was a baffling encounter from Impact Wrestling 385 (aired November 2011, taped at Universal Studios in Orlando Florida), with my enjoyment coming from Taz relentless taking the piss out of the whole thing on commentary. Referee Rudy Charles was for some reason positioned as the star of the contest, using the turkey suit to count pinfalls and also randomly breaking out into a chicken dance at various points, before Young picked up the win with a jumping Piledriver.

After the match, Eric Young and referee Rudy Charles made Rob Terry wear the turkey suit.

Turkey Suit Challenge // Robbie E def. Grado // Pinfall 

From Impact Wrestling 645 (aired in November 2016, taped at Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida) we had this bout that was straight up comedy wrestling, as well as having Aiden O'Shea [Jay Bradley] on the outside as some kind of enforcer. Nipple twists, both being terrified of the turkey suit for reasons that weren't explained and Grado pulling out Robbie E's arse were amongst the "highlights", en route to Robbie E earning the victory after blocking a sunset flip.

After the match, Grado put on the turkey suit and rather enjoyed it, beginning to cut some shapes in the suit, whilst Robbie E also pranced round like a fool, whilst Aiden O'Shea looked on for some reason.

Sienna, Madison Rayne, Rosemary and Allie spoke about the upcoming tournament for the vacant Knockout's Championship

The Pluto TV rewind of the week was Diamond Dallas Page given Raven a Diamond Cutter in a match against Monty Brown, taken from Impact 24 (aired November 2004, taped at Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida)

This may have been the worst episode of any professional wrestling show that has aired in 2017. 25 minutes of drawing names out of tumblers and bad jokes, ten minutes of talking heads discussing Thanksgiving traditions without a single interesting story, one original match that if you were kind you would call "not awful" and three previous Turkey Bowl matches, that ranged from short unoriginal comedy to bizarre referee dominated action to a three way that was certainly a match that happened at one point. Also, does anyone want to watch two Robbie E matches on the same show? After a killer episode last week, Impact Wrestling let themselves down on Thanksgiving and episode 697 deserves to be burned in a bin.

Review by James Marston (@IAmNotAlanDale)

Re-Making an iMPACT - #8 - Jeff Jarrett v Shark Boy

TNA Xplosion #87 Results (17th July 2004) - Total Nonstop Action Wrestling #107 (21st July 2004)

Let's be honest, the first seven episodes of iMPACT have hardly been a tour de force of wrestling. There's been some good matches here and there, but on the whole things haven't been great, especially when looking at Jeff Jarrett's NWA World Heavyweight title reigns' coverage on the show. So with even more enhancement matches this week and Jarrett in action in the main event...this was going to great, yeah? 

What an utter treat on 23rd July 2004's iMPACT as Jeff Jarrett defeated Shark Boy [The Stroke] in the NWA World Heavyweight Champion's debut on the show. This was actual a much more entertaining bout than I was expecting with Boy getting in a surprising amount of offence in against the top heel in the company, pulling out a couple of missile dropkicks. Boy also works as a perfect whipping boy for Jarrett earlier on, willingly bumping around the iMPACT Zone, as they brawl in the audience. A nasty slam on the steps and a couple of chairs shots, whilst the commentators are putting it over as Jarrett sending a message to potential challengers Monty Brown and Jeff Hardy, made for a entertaining brawl. It was a shame however that the referee had actually called for the bell before all this, because of course, everything Jarrett was doing should have resulted in disqualification. The show would conclude with Hardy making the save for Boy, only for Brown to deliver a Pounce and stare down with Jarrett as the episode went off the air. 

In tag team action, "The Monster" Abyss and "The Baby Bear" Alex Shelley would overcome Team Mexico's Abismo Negro and Mr. Aguila [Double Stomp to back of the head, Shelley to Aguila] in a fun match with a shoddy ending. The finish was a real shambles, as Abyss would get pissed off with Shelley for pinning Aguila, because "The Monster" had been about to pin Negro, clearly forgetting that only the legal man should be able to get the pin and that the legal man was Shelley. Either Abyss was supposed to look stupid or the booker decided that this rule that the audience was stupid and wouldn't recognise. It was a real shame that the match would end this way, as after a bit of a shit start, things began to turn the corner with Shelley pulling out a sweet head-scissor takedown on Aguila using Negro's shoulders, Negro hitting a dropkick to knock Shelley off the top and too the outside and Aguila would handspring off the rope and straight into a Shock Treatment backbreaker from Abyss. 

Team Canada's Bobby Roode, Eric Young, Johnny Devine & Petey Williams conquered a make-shift X Division team including Chris Sabin, Mikey Batts, Sonjay Dutt and The Amazing Red in a pleasing but brief eight man tag bout. As seems to be the way with these multi-man X Division style bouts, there were a couple of guys that shone brighter than others. For me that was Bobby Roode in Team Canada and Chris Sabin on the babyface side. Both men looked extremely crisp on the offence pulling out some nifty moves, including a butterfly suplex from Roode, whilst Sabin hit brilliant three person version of his enziguiri/DDT combo, before nailing stereo tope conhilo's with Red. The finish would nicely build throughout the match, with everyone but Batts on the outside, before he'd be corner by Roode and Williams for a spectacular, yet heely finish. These guys deserved more time to fully showcase what the four could do together, as what they did in five minutes was easily the best match on the show.

X Division Champion AJ Styles collected a quick win over Jerrelle Clark with a lovely double underhook transition into the Styles Clash, he'd have a stare down with Kazarian and Michael Shane after the match. Raven dominated (Kid) Romeo, slamming him into barricade with three Russian leg sweeps and finishing him off with a Raven Effect DDT, before having a brief pull-apart brawl with Sabu. Another squash match for "The Alpha Male" Monty Brown this week as well, as he destroyed Antonio Banks (Montel Vontavious Porter) in minutes with the Pounce! 

Results 

Singles Match: X Division Champion "The Phenomenal" AJ Styles def. Jerrelle Clark

Tag Team Match: "The Monster" Abyss & "The Baby Bear" Alex Shelley (with Goldylocks) def. Team Mexico - Abismo Negro & Mr. Aguila 

Singles Match: "The Alpha Male" def. Antonio Banks

Eight Man Tag Team Match: Team Canada - Bobby Roode, Eric Young, Johnny Devine & Petey Williams (with Scott D'Amore) def. Chris Sabin, Mikey Batts, Sonjay Dutt & The Amazing Red

Singles Match: Raven def. Romeo

Singles Match: NWA World Heavyweight Champion Jeff Jarrett (with The Elite Guard - Collyer, Hernandez & Onyx) def. Shark Boy

Finally...

ATPW Scale Rating - 4.67/10

Whilst the amount of squash matches is worrying, this was the strongest episode of iMPACT since the original, thanks to three solid matches. Nothing particularly spectacular, with the eight man tag being the strongest bout of the show, but unlike previous episodes there hasn't been anything to majorly drag things down. The booking of the main event scene has begun to improve and this has definitely been a big problem for the company thus far. With Jeff Hardy being positioned as a challenger for Jeff Jarrett and whilst Monty Brown is hardly a favourite of ours, he's at least been built up very well by the company for a similar role. 

As we move closer towards the end of the weekly PPV's, I've a feeling we'll see the quality of these shows begin to increase. At least that's what I'm hoping!

Written content by James Marston. Additional content by David Marston. 

Re-Making an iMPACT - #7 - Kazarian & Shane v AMW

TNA Xplosion #86 Results (10th July 2004) - Total Non-Stop Action #106 Results (14th July 2004)

A little worryingly iMPACT seems to be shifting to feature more enhancement contest and less to clashes between regular roster members. This started on the previous week's episode and continues on the 16th July 2004 episode that we look at today. After just seven weeks on the air, the show is already beginning to feel less important. Would there be any diamonds in the rough, though? Let's have a look. 

This week's main event featured America's Most Wanted (Chris Harris & James Storm) going over Kazarian and Michael Shane after Dusty Rhodes named them the winners following a ten minute time-limit draw. I have to say that I came away being a little disappointed with the match that four-some put on, as all four have shown potential on previous episodes, but this match never didn't show much of that potential. Everyone seemed to be going through the motions with both their wrestling and character work with no one seemingly wanting to make the most of their main event slot. The action was okay, with James Storm's hot tag sequence probably being the brightest of the bout, but these men can definitely do better than they show here. A personal highlight of the match was when Chris Harris hit a Catatonic (Swinging Side Slam) so strong that it resulted in Kazarian landing on Harris' back! The Naturals and Triple X would get involved after the decision was made with the show ending in an eight team brawl. 

Another disappointing tag match would open the show as Triple X (Christopher Daniels & Primetime) would best Team Japan (Miyamoto & NOSAWA) [Powerplex] in a clunky collision. It felt like Miyamoto & NOSAWA were a step slower than they needed to be at any given moment and this in turn would harm Christopher Daniels' hot tag attempt, removing any real excitement that could have been had. Neither Team Japan member has impressed me so far with what they have to offer, with fairly sloppy offence, whilst struggling to keep up with the pace of their American colleagues. It's a shame the pair were chosen to represent Japan when competitors like Katsuhiko Nakajima, Kaz Hayashi & TAKA Michonoku were all on the AJPW at the time. 

The best match on the show came in the form of "The Baby Bear" Alex Shelley's victory over Roderick Strong [It Came From Japan II]. Both men are still pretty green at this point, with just over two years experience each and their best work still a head of them, but put together a short, technically sound encounter, that was more balanced than I was expecting to be. Both men hit tasty back breakers, with the match having an "Anything you can do, I can do better" type of vibe and Strong even manages a decent near fall after hitting his Death by Roderick double knee gutbuster. I'm not a massive fan of Shelley being partnered with Goldylocks and Abyss, the Baby Bear gimmick is very cringey, but Shelley himself has been impressive in what he's shown, despite clearly not being comfortable in the heel role. 

There's another two matches on the show, which feature Sabu squashing Alistair Ralphs (A1) and "The Alpha Male" Monty Brown making short work of Lex Lovett, before demanding a future NWA World Heavyweight Championship match.

Results

Tag Team Match: Triple X - "The Fallen Angel" Christopher Daniels & Primetime def. Team Japan - Miyamoto & NOSAWA

Singles Match: Sabu def. Alistair Ralphs

Singles Match: "The Baby Bear" Alex Shelley (with "The Monster" Abyss & Goldylocks) def. Roderick Strong

Singles Match: "The Alpha Male" Monty Brown def. Lex Lovett

Tag Team Match: America's Most Wanted - "Wildcat" Chris Harris & "Cowboy" James Storm def. Kazarian & Michael Shane via Judge's Decision

Finally...

ATPW Scale Rating - 3.25/10 

If two week's ago was the worst iMPACT to date, then we have a new contender to the crown. Three matches of any substance and I enjoyed one of them. Shelley v Strong was the best match on the show without the pair coming close to what they could do at the time, let alone what they'd be able to produce in the coming years. Two tag team matches that failed to deliver, as well as two enhancement bouts, there wasn't much else to say about this as iMPACT edges ever closer to a "Very Poor" rating. 

Content by James Marston. Additional content by David Marston.