TNA Impact: Everybody wants a shot at Nic Nemeth

Bob Kapur

TNA Impact: Everybody wants a shot at Nic Nemeth

It’s appropriate that Nic Nemeth calls himself “the Wanted Man” because it seems that everybody wants a shot at his TNA World Championship. From his nemesis Frankie Kazarian to his frenemy Joe Hendry to every member of The System, it seems that all of the company’s top names are looking for their chance to beat him for the title. And all of those combustible elements collided in the main event of Thursday night’s episode of Impact Wrestling.

Match 1: Mike Santana vs. KC Navarro (w/ AJ Francis)

This match came about because Santana rebuffed the offer to join First Class.

The story early on was Navarro using his speed to deke and move to avoid getting in Santana’s clutches. But then he got too cocky in celebrating a move and Santana caught him, blasting him with a series of huge chops that slowed Navarro to a stop.

A distraction by Francis on the floor let Navarro take control, and he rocked Santana with a series of quick moves, including a Running Stomp, a 305, and a High Cross Body for a near-fall. But Santana caught Navarro in another aerial assault attempt and hit a huge Reverse Flapjack, a Sit-out Powerbomb, and finally a huge Spin the Block (Spinning Lariat) for the pin. Fun opener.

Winner: Mike Santana

In the back, Ryan and Nick Nemeth were with Gia Miller. Ryan takes on Joe Hendry tonight, while World Champion Nick faces Brian Myers in a non-title match. The Nemeths predicted they would win their respective matches. Nick defends against Eddie Edwards at Turning Point on Nov 29th.

They showed the clip from last week where Trent Seven shockingly turned on “Speedball” Mike Bailey and viciously attacked him after Baily lost the X-Division Championship to Moose.

Cut to backstage where Gia Miller was with Ace Austin and the Hardy Boys. Trent Seven barged in and the Hardys and Ace questioned Seven on what he did to Bailey. This led to Hammerstone and Jake Something running in and they and Seven attacked the Hardys and Austin. Director of Authority Santino Marella ran in and told the dastardly trio to get out of there.

Match 2: Jake Christ and Alan Angels vs. The Rascals (Trey Miguel and Zachary Wentz)

The Rascalz are looking to get back on the winning track, after they visited their Treehouse last week.

Early on, the Rascalz used some dizzying-speed moves in tribute to the Motor City Machine Guns and the the injured Chris Bey. But Angels cooled their momentum and he and Christ isolated Miguel for a bit. A nifty springboard move allowed Miguel to escape and tag in Wentz who was on fire. But some cheating by Christ and Angels allowed them to take over, and they nearly got the pin on Miguel after some Power and Glory action.

After a bit of back-and-forth, the Rascalz put Angels away with a double-team Codebreaker-Stomp hybrid move that they call Freedom For the Lions. This was another quick-paced fun match.

Winners: The Rascalz

A pre-taped promo from Spitfire (Dani Luna and Jody Threat) aired. They don’t care for Ash and Heather By Elegance. Threat has a match with one of them later, but she isn’t worried.

A hype video aired for the next TNA PPV event, Genesis – taking place on Jan 19th.

Match 3: The Northern Armory (Judas Icarus, Travis Williams, and Josh Alexander) vs. Steve Maclin, Eric Young, and Jonathan Gresham

The thread in this match was that Alexander wanted nothing to do with Maclin, so instead Maclin just beat the tar out of the other two. And then so did Gresham and Young, while Alexander just stayed on the apron. Until he was able to get in a cheap shot on Maclin, after which Alexander beat him up for a while.

When one of Alexander’s teammates allowed Maclin to break free, Young came in and he had a bit of an extended skirmish with Alexander, hitting his Youngblood Neckbreaker for a 2-count. Everyone got a chance to throw hands as the match picked up speed. Gresham suffered a speedy double-team assault by the Armory, and despite his attempt to fight back, he ate a Sudden Silence (Dropkick-assisted C-4 Spike) and would have been pinned but for the save by Young.

Young and Maclin used their past tag team chemistry to hurt Alexander, but Maclin’s zeal to hurt Alexander led to some miscommunication between him and Young; as a result, Maclin accidentally sent Young off the apron and to the floor. After that, Alexander was able to hit Maclin with a C-4 Spike and get the pin.

This was really good, especially in the last couple of minutes. The action got really quick to call at times, and even though he wasn’t instrumental in the finish, Gresham in particular had some great moments.

Winners: The Northern Armory

In the back, Frankie Kazarian complained about TNA showing footage of him being on the wrong end of a GORE! GORE! GORE! by Rhino, and noted that he beat Rhino to win the Call Your Shot trophy at Bound For Glory. Kazarian said that Rhino’s Hall of Fame induction should go to him instead. Rhino stormed in and threatened Kaz.

In the back, Steve Maclin approached Santino Marella and basically demanded Santino give him a chance to get his hands on Josh Alexander. Maclin then went up to Eric Young and complained about their miscommunication in the match. Young said that Maclin should have stuck to the gameplan and not gotten so wound up by Alexander and that’s what led to the issues. He said that Maclin should just trust him more. Gresham didn’t want to get in the middle of the debate and said he only cares about taking out the Northern Armory. Young said that the loss was all on Maclin, and they both left it without resolving things.

Match 4: Ryan Nemeth vs. Joe Hendry

Before the match, Hendry cut a promo, noting that Nemeth didn’t like the music video that Hendry had done about him last week because it minimized all of Nemeth’s accomplishments. So Hendry said he had a team of people find all the footage they could of Nemeth’s successes to make a Director’s Cut of the video, featuring all of Nemeth’s accomplishments. Of course, it was the same video as before, the joke being that Nemeth has no accomplishments to feature, other than being Nick Nemeth’s brother.

Hendry replayed the video, but then Nemeth attacked him before the bell.

Hendry is at risk of looking like a liar. Because Nemeth is doing his best to dethrone Brian Myers as the least charismatic and least interesting wrestler alive. Myers has still got him beat, but Nemeth is certainly in the running.

The match itself was pretty garden variety, made better by the huge reactions that Hendry gets from the TNA faithful. They really do believe. Hendry won with the Standing Ovation.

Winner: Joe Hendry

Match 5: Rosemary vs. Jada Stone

How much of a squash match was this going to be? They didn’t even turn the lights on for Jada Stone during the ring introductions, so her glamour shot was in complete darkness.

Rosemary physically dominated Stone for a few minutes before hitting As Above So Below for the easy win.

Winner: Rosemary

The commentators threw to a video package of The System celebrating their dominance after last week’s show. They are all now wearing rings that commemorate that dominance.

Cut to Alisha making her screechy entrance, during which she talks about the rings and then compliments Brian Myers and runs down Nic Nemeth. She then trash-talked Knockouts Champion Masha Slamovhich, which brought the champ out to the entrance ramp. Masha took the mic away from Alisha, and then offered Alisha a title match next week in a No-DQ contest. This brought out Tasha Steelz who joined Alisha in trying to intimidate Masha. She was followed by Jordynne Grace who said that she has a title match at Turning Point against whichever of the two win the match next week.

In the back, Nic Nemeth was checking in on Ryan, who was in pain and being tended to by the trainer. Santino Marella ran up and told Nic that he had to get to the ring for his match. Nic told the trainer to take care of Ryan, and then Nic headed for the entrance ramp. But blocking his path was Kazarian, who sarcastically wished Nic good luck in the match, and told him to not get too distracted, as he teased his Call Your Shot trophy.

Match 6: Nic Nemeth vs. Brian Myers (w/ Alisha Edwards and Eddie Edwards)

Before the bell rang, Joe Hendry’s music hit and he made his way to the commentary table.

Nemeth tried for a Superkick as the opening move, but Myers scrambled out of the way. The commentators noted that this was a callback to the first and only other time these two met in the ring (it was a match at WWE Survivor Series in 2016, where Nemeth – then known as Dolph Ziggler – hit Myers – then known as Curt Hawkins – with a Superkick immediately after the bell, to beat him in under 10 seconds and retain the Intercontinental Championship). And in the time it took you to read that match, that’s how long Myers stays interesting.

So now we’re into his normal boringness, as Myers took over, bullying Nemeth and throwing him around the ring and in range the Edwards’ who took cheap shots from the floor whenever possible. Until Nemeth came back and started beating on Myers.

At one point, Eddie got caught by the referee when he took a shot at Nemeth, and the ref ejected Eddie from ringside. But Alisha was still there, and she was still enough of a distraction to allow Myers to throw Nemeth hard into the ring steps and take back control.

A desperation Dropkick let Nemeth start a comeback and he had Myers in trouble with his Ten-Pack Elbow Drops, which earned him a very close count. He got another one after hitting a huge DDT and a Famouser, though the crowd thought that the ref’s hand should have hit the mat a third time.

As Nemeth looked to finish things off, behind the referee’s back, Alisha whacked Nic repeatedly with a Singapore cane. This prompted Hendry to get up from the commentary desk, pick her up, and carry her to the back. As Myers frantically reacted to that turn of events, he walked into a Superkick and a Danger Zone (Zig-Zag) and that was all she wrote.

Winner: Nic Nemeth

After the match, Eddie Edwards ran into the ring and attacked Nemeth from behind. Eddie and Myers put a beatdown on Nemeth until Joe Hendry ran in with the Singapore cane and swatted them out of the ring. IN the heat of the moment, he nearly hit Nemeth, but checked himself. This led to a bit of a tense staredown between Nemeth and Hendry, before they both cooled off and the show came to n end with the closing graphic.

But it didn’t. Because after the graphic aired, cut to Steve Maclin walking out of the building. He got in his car, and some melancholy music played as he drove away.

The words “To be continued” appeared on the screen, and then the show faded to black.

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