Falls Count Anywhere

04-25-06

Beats Crystal Meth.

SmackDown!
I watched it in fast-forward. The opening match was Matt Hardy vs. Booker T. This wasn’t a bad match at all, and with those two I wouldn’t expect it to be, but it was obvious that Booker was going over. Lots of suplexes in this one, and at one point Hardy turned a Booker Suplex attempt into a reverse DDT. The match ended with Sharmell distracting the ref so that Booker could get a low blow and a Scissors Kick for the win. Nice stuff and a first round King fo the Ring match, so Booker advances.

I fast forwarded through everything with Burchill and Regal. Regal’s a comedic genius, but this was just sad.

In a match that wasn’t nearly long enough, Paul London managed to beat Joey Mercury. I love MNM and London and Kendrick are a good team. London hit the big double stomp on Mercury. Spanky tried to help, but ended up slingshotted over the top. Mercury showboated a little too long and ended up getting rolled up to give London the win.

Bobby Lashley deserves most improved for how far he’s come. No, he’s not the best worker in the world, but Finlay is bringing him to the point where he gets how to work a match. He’s far better than Goldberg was at the same point in his career and he’s booked far less effectively.

The match was Benoit and Lashley vs. Orlando Jordan and Fit Finlay. Strangely, Lashley wasn’t as over as Benoit, who got a giant pop. It would have been fun to watch Benoit and Finlay work together more, but OJ got most of the time and took most of Lashley’s offense, which is a good thing as he made it look great. Spear and Dominator give Lashley the pin.

The Great Khali, aka Giant Singh, beat poor little Funaki. The guy just can’t move. He’s got a good look, but in these days, you have to be able to move. Hell, The Big Show’s never managed to get as big as he should have been because he couldn’t work like the rest of the locker room.

I passed up Regal and Burchill vs. The Gymini. I just couldn’t bring myself to watch it.

When did Kurt become Stone Cold?

They did a big thing where they had JBL work the mic and bring out Angle and Rey. JBL said he was going to take the title. Angle said that the title would be his. Rey said that he respects Kurt, but the title wasn’t going anywhere.

I’m terribly saddened to notice that the last Hispanic wrestler to the hold the World Title lost it to JBL. Of course it ended with JBL taking an Angle Slam and the 619 to end a show that had good wrestling. I understand that the rating was 2.5, which isn’t terrible good, but also not terrible.

TNA Impact Re-Play
I haven’t been able to watch the Thursday night TNA shows, but the replay showed that it was a good show. It scored a 0.9 rating, which doesn’t sound great, and it’s not. It also means that UFC’s The Ultimate Fighter isn’t doing well at all in its new timeslot.

I really liked the Team Canada vs. Team USA match. Petey Williams was underused in the match, but I understand that he’s hurtin’ a little bit so their limiting his time in-ring. In general I think Williams is underused and should probably find a way to get out of there and go to Japan or maybe to WWE and find his way into the mix. It wouldn’t end with him as a huge star, but he’s got a great finisher and that would help him get over.

The Team USA team featured Jay Lethal, Chris Sabin, Alex Shelley, and Sonjay Dutt. Forget that Dutt is billed as being from Mumbai (or New Delhi depending on who’s doing the announcing). The match was good, with a lot of fast work. Shelley didn’t want to tag in and kept finding ways to avoid the tag until he turned his back and Jay Lethal tagged him blind. Shelley then went in and backed into A1. He did the thing where he reaches back and sees that there’s a guy there. Lethal makes a blind tag to get back in and all sorts of action ensues, ending with A1 getting the Pump Handle Powerbomb on Lethal for the win.

They played a great promo package about the Sabu vs. Samoa Joe match. This is going to be good…or a total train wreck. There’s no in-between. They made me want to see it even more than I already did, which is impressive because I already really wanted to see the match.

That’s all I managed to see. SNL was on and I still hadn’t seen the Natalie Portman rap thingee. I nearly peed myself laughing.

NEWS and RAW

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Chris Garcia