Hola Knockout fans and welcome to this week’s Impact Write-Up. I hope everyone has had a joyous Valentine’s Day with their special someone. If you didn’t or if it was just any other day for you, fear not for there is plenty of love going around from our Knockouts this week!
We have that mixed tag match challenge Brandi Rhodes threw down to Rosemary from last week, a bachelorette party from the Lady Squad, a Knockouts rematch between Brooke and Sienna and Angelina Love continuing to play conductor in the war between for TNA Tag Team Champions Davey Richards and Eddie Edwards.
We immediately start this week’s program with our scheduled mixed tag match between Big Moose and Mini-Moose (AKA Brandi Rhodes) taking on Decay members Crazzy Steve and Rosemary. As expected, Steve and Rosemary by fellow Decay member Abyss as the trio make their entrance first. Moose and Brandi are out next as the commentary team discuss through how this whole mixed tag match came together.
To be fair Madison Rayne, wasn’t it really just Rosemary who was bullying and physically harming Brandi; Abyss/Steve just happened to be there when Moose made the save last week. But moving on….
The Knockouts start things off in this contest… or so we think. Apparently, Steve has other plans calls for this match when he calls Rosemary to his corner to make a tag, thus forcing Brandi to step aside in place of Moose. A few distractions between Rosemary from the ring apron and interference from Abyss on the outside gives Steve a slight advantage for the first half of this match.
However, the second of the match favors Moose as he launches Steve via powerbomb from over the top and onto Abyss! When Rosemary intervenes by jumping on the back of Moose, in comes Brandi to knock off the Knockouts champion and lands in a few good chops to Rosemary.
Brandi follows up by climbing the second rope of a turnbuckle, in full support of the Impact Zone, and takes down Rosemary with a flying dropkick. Team Moose end up picking up the win after synchronizing punches and clotheslines against Rosemary and Steve.
The winning team is all smiles backstage as they soak in their big victory. The duo end their night with Moose reminding Brand to give him a call should she ever run into trouble again.
From one mixed tag team deed to another, we move on to witness the fallout between former tag team partners Eddie Edwards and Davey Richards along with their wrestling wives Alisha Edwards and six time Knockouts Champion Angelina Love.
Mic in hand, Eddie calls out Davey for the personal lines he and Angelina crossed last week. Davey is a no show, as it is Angelina (who is sporting a new theme song) answers Eddie’s cries and informs him that she decides when Eddie will confront Davey.
She then questions what Eddie is so mad about. After all, the man was defending the TNA World Heavyweight title all while Davey was at hobbling and recovering from his torn ACL with his nine month pregnant wife at home. Did Eddie even bother to text, call or visit? NOPE! With the integration done, Angelina introduces and unleashes her husband, The American Wolf Davey Richards. Hey, Davey has some new music too!
The men get in to a heated war of words but Eddie doesn’t back down from his agenda of going after Davey! It takes a band of TNA’s security to separate the men but Eddie slips away long enough to roll back into the ring to challenge Davey to a street fight to serve as this week’s main event!
Raise those glasses Knockout fans, its time for our bachelorette party for our bride-to-be Laurel Van Ness! Has there ever even been a televised wrestling bachelorette party before? In any event, Ms. Maria has left her assistant Allie in charge of putting this party together. What could go wrong?
Well… for starters, Allie’s idea of a bachelorette party comes across more as a children Valentine’s Day party, to which The Lady Squad DO NOT approve of! What is even more sad is Allie still has no idea that this bachelorette party is actually for her nemesis Laurel, who set to marry Braxton Sutter on next week’s Impact! When Maria breaks the news of next week’s wedding to Allie, she becomes dishearten.
Still trying to be positive spirit in any situation, Allie suggests The Lady Squad take turns to pop open a colorful piñata named Carl she brought, wear fun headbands and make some noise with party favored horns. Maria shoots down all of Allie’s suggestions, while Sienna is just ready to pour the champagne.
Drinks are poured when the time comes to open the only gift at this party – some sexy nightwear to Laurel from Maria. Yay? The bigger take from the ending of this whole party is Maria, once again, bullying her assistant to make sure next week’s wedding is a hit. She tells Allie to order the non-pink bridesmaids dresses and to get comfortable in her role as the ring bearer.
Well, at least this Lady Squad party was, somewhat, more tolerable than the bachelor party Mike Bennett hosted for Braxton.
Speaking of the Lady Squad, they’ve settled well after their girls night out and are back at the Impact Zone as Sienna is scheduled to take on Brooke. Prior to this Knockouts match, cameras get a quick word from Brooke, who says she isn’t surprised by Maria trying to sabotage Brooke’s TNA return.
Brooke adds that she isn’t scared of Maria’s “thug” Sienna or her devastating AK47 finisher (which is way better than the Silencer), as she has taken on bigger and some of the best Knockouts already. Their match from two weeks ago had a BS ending, thanks to Maria’s involvement, but Brooke vows to fix things this time around. She sends one final message to Maria: these power trips will come to a halt, once and for all.
After Sienna makes her entrance, Brooke makes hers but instead of going straight for Sienna, Brooke goes after Maria! Sienna guards Maria before Brooke can physical harm Maria. Brooke goes on to land some forearms to Sienna, tosses her head to the steel steps and into the six sided ring. A small distraction from Maria allows Sienna to take Brooke down with a big boot, leading for the sound of the bell to official ring.
Brooke bounces back after ducking a clothesline from Sienna to counter with a running dropkick. Brooke follows up with some shots to the head until Sienna counters with a wheelbarrow suplex. Sienna gains control of the match and wears down Brooke with an illegal choke while Maria distracts the referee.
Sienna goes for a cover after hitting Brooke with a running Samoan Drop, earning a near three count. Brooke nearly picks up the win herself after dodging a corner charging attack from Sienna to hit the Butterface Makeover. In response to this close call, Maria jumps to ring apron to distract Brooke.
The plots works, as Brooke’s focus turns to Maria, allowing for Sienna to regain control of the match and deliver two good fallaway slams. Sienna follows up by setting Brooke up for the AK47 but Brooke slips behind Sienna and rolls her up for the three count!
Time for our main event street fight:
Just like earlier in the show, Angelina introduces her husband for this match from the entrance ramp but this is all just a mere distraction as Davey attacks Eddie from behind! The men battle back and forth from the outside but eventually make their way inside the six sided ring. A proud Angelina hands Davey a steel chair to attack Eddie and even finds room to kiss her husband.
After an outside dive nearly takes out Davey, Angelina inserts herself in the match. She stands across Eddie with a chair in her hand but its Davey who lands the chair shot from behind. When the husband and wife look to do more harm, in comes Alisha to the ring! She jumps on Davey’s back and tries to fight off Angelina but the former Knockouts champion lays her out with a powerful right forearm.
And what’s this? Handcuffs just happen to be lying around on the mat and suddenly Alisha finds herself in some trouble. Angelina cuffs Alisha to the bottom rope, grabs the chair from Davey’s hands and is looking to do some serious damage. Eddie crawls to his trapped his wife, protecting his with by covering her with his own body and endures a brutal chair attack from Davey!
As if that wasn’t enough, the Beautiful Wolves take it a step further by forcing Alisha to watch up close as her husband takes another chair shot, this time to the head! When referee Earl Hebner finally does try to restore some order, Angelina low blows him and acts the referee when Davey “pins” Eddie for a three count. So I guess is your unofficial winner of this street fight?
Thoughts: So a couple different topics to juggle this week. I’ll start off with the mixed tag match.
As I predicted in the ‘Thoughts’ section last week, this mixed tag match was pretty much handled my the men. Nothing wrong with that, given Brandi still being a newbie when it comes to in-ring action but I still wish a bit from Rosemary. Aside from still being one of the most interesting performers in TNA at the moment, Rosemary is also the Knockouts champion, a title that is starting to regain some value. I would just prefer to see Rosemary continue to elevate the belt within the Knockouts division as oppose to this side feuds that are more so a filler for Brandi.
While I give props to Brandi for adding some more offense to her move set, there was still this off pace beat about watching her wrestle; almost like she’s counting her steps as she goes. It’s something that can be improved overtime but I do hope she continues her training if TNA plan on throwing her in more matches during the next set of tapings. More so, if she’s going to keep feuding with the Knockouts champion…
I had some low expectations when the bachelorette party was announced for this week’s show, which is why I can say I’m not too disappointed on how it played out. For me, wrestling weddings feel so outdated. These party segments were cheesy and more about Maria holding on to her primadonna ways than about Laurel, who is the one getting married.
On the positive, it was nice Allie gain some sympathy points, be aware of what’s going on and that we’re moving that much closer to seeing how this storyline will end for everyone involved.
Brooke/Sienna was better this time around than their first encounter. There were less mistakes and I think we saw more from both women this time. I appreciated the little video opener from Brooke. She sounded like a confident and tough babyface, which are always welcomed. There wasn’t exactly a lot to take away from the match other than both Brooke and the Lady Squad have a win over another. Let’s try and add some more backstage interaction backstage with Maria/Brooke before we go for the third match between these two.
And finally, my favorite part of the night, Angelina and Davey Richards! Wow, I’m really digging Angelina as this manipulative and vindicate wife! It’s different from the Beautiful People persona we know her as. While Angelina and Davey have been married for some time now, TNA have never really acknowledge them as a couple until last month. I wasn’t sure how it would play out but it’s been great so far and, obviously, Davey and Angelina have that chemistry on-screen.
Of course, it helps that their feuding with babyfaces such as Eddie Edwards and his newly introduced wife Alisha. As a viewer, my heart absolutely reached out to Eddie when he was determine to defend his family’s honor and when he was so willing to take the chair shots for his wife!
I’m not sure if Alisha is officially signed to TNA but I do hope we get to see more of her. She’s a clean slate right now and I’m sure fans would love to see how she, and Eddie, plan on getting some payback to their former friends.
Now I’ve some discussion on the idea of bringing in mix tag team titles given the late amount of couples in TNA at the moment. While I’m not against the idea, seriously since TNA do have enough couples to run a few feuds, I just don’t think they’re committed enough for another set of titles. Just look at the Knockouts Tag Team Titles. Besides, isn’t it more fun when fans can get behind these personal feuds/storylines that don’t necessarily revolve around a title?
What did you think of this week’s episode of Impact? Excited for the wedding of Barton and Laurel? Should TNA introduce the idea of mixed tag team titles? Let us know in the comments below!
