TNA Genesis 2006

Hype is a curious thing. Without it, nothing would be special and everything would be just as important as everything else. Unfortunately for the wrestling business, hype is a very neccessary evil. Without it, no-one would buy the ridiculous number of wrestling pay per views, DVDs or merchadise and the wrestlers would be back working in bingo halls and circus tents. Unfortunately, when the month of November and December features 5 consecutive weeks of pay-per-views, you can't really blame TNA for hyping up the long anticipated match between Samoa Joe and Kurt Angle as being anything but 'the dream match of the decade'. After all, this is Kurt Angle who has had classic matches with just about anyone who is anyone in the wrestling world and he is going against Samoa Joe, the man who has had more 5 star matches in the last 3 years than anyone else in North America. On paper, this had classic written all over it, unfortunately when something is hyped to this degree, then it has to be something out of this world to even begin to live up to it. However, when you add in the idiosyncarcies of the wrestling business, then you begin to learn that there is no such thing as a sure thing and so instead of delvering a classic match for the ages, TNA delvered a confusing mess of a match that managed to do more damage than it did good, not only to one of it's top stars, but also to the rest of the show as a whole.

Forget all the talk of whether TNA should have held off on doing Samoa Joe vs. Kurt Angle until a later date, the build for this match had been fantastic. Unlike WWE where many of it's shows are forgettable, meaingless shows, this was a marquee match and was the focal point of the show. In fact, it was so focussed on, that you could argue it made the world championship match play second fiddle to it, however that is not something I have a priblem with and so I won't go into that at this point. At the end of the day, TNA needed to strike while the iron was hot with Kurt Angle and a match with Samoa Joe was the, wihtout a doubt, the match that most fans wanted to see. The probelsm was, with these two atheletes the hype got out of control. Would this be as good as Angle vs. Benoit from the Royal Rumble '03 or would it be as good as Joe vs. Kobashi from New York in 2005? In the minds of the fans it would be better, and so we get back to the subject of hype. Looking back, this match could never reallistically live up to the expecatiotns that the fans had placed upon it. However it could still have been a fantastic contest but,u nfortunately, TNA failed to capitalize on this buzz and in the end devliered a mediocre match that, rather than establish Joe and Angle as the next epic feud, made Joe look second-rate to a 'real' superstar like Kurt Angle. Not only did Angle make Joe tap (a first for TNA), but he ended his 18 month undefeated streak and all this in just over 15 minutes. Hardly an epic battle on the same level as Flair vs. Steamboat or even Joe vs. CM Punk. Now I know that not every great match has to last 30+ minutes. God knows, that is something I have been critical of ROH for doing. However, for a match of this much importance it could have gone a damn site longer. It's not even like it went at full pace for those 15 minutes as there was a riduclous amount of stalling at the beginning when Angle was outside the ring. The fact this caused Angle to be busted open, surely could have been used as away to put Joe over. However instead we got the bloody and battered Angle, making Joe tap after kicking out of the muscl-buster and escaping the choke. So there it is, after 18 months, the great saviour of TNA has been out wrestled by a WWE guy in his first match. The anlge afterwqards where Joe was refused the rematch seems to have been some kind of failed attempt to turn Joe face at long last and turn Angle heel and set up a rematch, however what really is the point? Angle complrehensively out wrestled Joe and made him look bush league compared to tghe guys in WWE. In the last year, Joe has gone from the centrepiece of the company thanks to his matches with Styles and Dnaiels, to a guy who's only clean pay per view win in the last year has been against an ageing Scott Steiner and against Jeff Jarrett (and even that was in a gimmick match where he had to be helped out by the fans). So much for TNA builidng the company around him. I guess that old WCW mentality still lives on abnd the moegrown guys are only as a big a star as the next guy to jump ship from the opposition.

As for the undercard, it was another consistentyly strong show with some poor matches that were soon eclipsed by some really good work. For every VKM vs. Kazrain, Maverick Matt and JOhnny Devine, there was a Chris Daniels vs. Chris Sabin or a Christian Cage vs. AJ Styles which were both excellent and a darn sight better than the disappointing main event. LAX and AMW had a fun brawl, however they failed to capture the excitement of AMW vs. Styles and Daniels, however it was the first matchg in their feud and with any lucxk this should develop into something really good as LAX are one of the hottest acts in the company right now (and if you need convincing of that, then check out the response they get when Jim Cornette threatens to strip them of the tag titles. I've not heard a crowd shift allegances quicker and they turn on Cornette in an instant).

Last but by no means least, I feel I should comment briefly on the NWA title match. For tyhe most part, this was another entertaining brawl, with Sting and Abyss seeming to work well togetherl. The only bones of contetniotn I had were with the spot where Sting hung Abyss by his feet in order to beat him with the bat and of course, the final result which I fgound very confusing. As far as the 'pinata' spot, it was completely ridcilous and was one of those moments which really showqed how 'fake' the wrestling business can be. Sure, do it at the end of the match wqhere the guy is beaten down and not going to put up a fight. However don;t do it in the middle of a amnatch where it takes 5 minutes to get it set up. Plus, why was he being so careful, surely if he wanted to hurt Abyss he would have hosited him up and dropped him down on his hgead!! As for the result, well, as cute an idea as it was, it reeked of Vince Russo and that is not a good thing. Why Sting got DQ-ed for shoving the ref when he had used thumbtacks and hoisted Abyss up on a rope I don't know. However it must have been an accumulaive thing as it was Sting who used the thumbtacks (even if he didn't bring them into the ring) and it was Sting who hoisted Abyss up while outside the ring. The problem is something that is rife within wrestling right now, and that is consistentcy. If this is going to get a DQ this week, then why have we not seen referees enforce the rules more in the past and will we see them enforce the same rules in teh future. Jeff Jarrett got away with as much referee abuse as Sting and he remained as NWA champ for months. Also, would it have hurt for them to do a little anagle ahead of this where te referees were told to execute more authrotiy, so at least this could have made a bit of sense. The same could also be said of the 'titles can change hand on a DQ'. Admittedly, that would have completely telegraphed the result of the match, but at least it would have made sense!!

Overall verdict: B-
"A decent show that failed to live up to the pre-show hype. Still a damn sight better than the majority of WWE shows thanks to the high standard of in-ring work, but the goofy booking of the main events pout a serious dampener on what should have been a blow-away event."