Impact Wrestling Presents: TKO - A Night of Knockouts (April 24, 2015) - Results & Afterthoughts

With this special edition of Impact Wrestling, TKO: Night of Knockouts, TNA is set to deliver what WWE fans have demanded of late and not received: a proper showcase of women's wrestling.

Wrestling fans, especially supporters of women's wrestling, have been clamoring for women to be given a chance and TNA ALWAYS delivers in that department.

Broadcast opens with an in-ring segment between Kurt Angle and Eric Young

Kurt and EY exchange words, hyping up a possible title defense later tonight between the two as Kurt has reached EY's better nature. Feast or Fired holder, Austin Aries, interrupts and names himself the challenger to Kurt Angle's TNA World Heavyweight Championship tonight instead as he's cashing in the briefcase. EY doesn't seem too happy with this turn of events...

Let's hope he can keep his cool...

Fatal 4 Way for #1 Contender to TNA Knockouts Championship - Brooke Tessmacher def. Madison Rayne, Gail Kim, and Angelina Love

Angelina Love and Madison Rayne work together, showing shades of their former Beautiful People companionship before Rayne turns on Love to work alone. Remember that all of these women are multiple time former Knockouts Champions.

Insane 4-way submission spot between all four women before Rayne broke the hold. Slow start to this match, but definitely had a lot of great spots once the action picked up. Finish occurs after all four Knockouts hit their finishers before Brooke rolls Rayne up into a school boy to a near-fall. She quickly recovers and hits her finisher on Rayne to pick up the win.

The Rising vs. BDC - Micca (formerly WWE's Camacho) def. Kenny King

Pretty average match. Nothing to rave about here. The post-match brawl was pretty sweet though. I figured this was filler until the next Knockouts-related match on the card.

Gimme the BDC over the New Day ANYDAY of the week...

I thought it was pretty irony that MVP was assaulting Drew Galloway with the same lead pipe that Scott Steiner was beating people up with while he was a part of the Main Event Mafia faction many moons ago.

(Laughs) I guess that's Steiner's way of "passing the torch"...

Laura Dennis (Cherry Bomb) def. The Dollhouse (Jade & Marti Bell) via disqualification

Most of you should remember Jade as Mia Yim (former SHINE Champion and ROH alumni as part of The Embassy stable) and Marti Bell (or rather Belle) from Knockouts Knockdown from last year.

(Whistles) The match itself wasn't half bad, but the exclamation point was how Marti Bell got involved after attacking the referee, forcing Christy Hemme to end this match via disqualification. This sent the Dollhouse over the edge and they attacked Christy Hemme viciously at ringside, ending with a ruthless slam into the steel steps.

Excuse me while I mark out that Marti Belle, Mia Yim, and Cherry Bomb are all
competing in a TNA ring...

It makes me wonder with the signings of these two that they could be considering the return of the Knockouts Tag Team titles... In singles or as a tag team, I'm anxious to see more from this group. Marti Belle was phenomenal with her antics on Knockouts Knockdown last year while Mia Yim is a welcome asset in terms of in-ring ability. I'm proud to see these ladies as part of the Knockouts roster. If Cherry Bomb is sticking around as Laura Dennis then that's another welcome bonus as well.

Seriously, these are all women who I thought WWE would have picked up for NXT by now. Oh well. WWE's loss is TNA's gain - as always.

Mickie James' Special Announcement 

Mickie James announces her retirement to become a full-time mother to infant son, but the leader of the Revolution, James Storm, convinces her to change her mind with a rather VERY babyface motivational speech that ends with Mickie James agreeing to one more match. Magnus doesn't seem to be too happy with this turn of events. 

I'm all for this if it leads into a James Storm vs Magnus feud with Mickie James and a returning Havok as the newest addition to the Revolution. I don't take credit for that idea as one of my Twitter followers mentioned it during tonight's broadcast. 

Besides, it's about time that the Revolution recruited a Knockout to their ranks. 

Plus if we were serious here... Mickie James is FAR more qualified for a Hall of Fame spot than AJ Lee is. Just saying...

Davey Richards def. The Revolution's Manik

Pretty standard fair for these two guys. Much like Josh Matthews mentioned on commentary, Davey should consider a run in the X-Division after a high-octane match such as this. 

It's 15+ years since their debut and the Hardys are still showing people how tag team
wrestling is done...

After Davey picked up the win, the rest of the Revolution assaulted Davey in a post-match beatdown where Abyss chokeslams Davey onto the ring apron. The TNA Tag Team Champions, the Hardys, came to make the save with a double neckbreaker on Manik to send the Revolution running backstage with their tails between their legs. 

Ethan Carter III nominates himself as the NEXT TNA World Heavyweight Champion

I approve of this message.

EC3 names himself the next TNA World Heavyweight Champion in a political-style campaign segment. Mr. Anderson interjects which results into a brawl (read: physical political debate) between 

the two Superstars.

I don't know about the rest of you but I'm all for a EC3 World Heavyweight Championship title run. The guy is a superb heel. He deserves it at this point. I don't see why he would need to be feuding with Mr. Anderson at this stage. It's more like Anderson is feuding with him to stay relevant.

TNA Knockouts Championship Match - Taryn Terrell (c) def. Awesome Kong to retain

After making the match a no disqualification match, Taryn puts up little defense again Kong's ongoing assault until the Dollhouse come to watch the match at ringside. After assaulting Kong with kendo sticks, they assist Taryn with a powerbomb out of the corner and through the table in the ring. 

Afterwards, Taryn takes the mic and decrees that she is the leader of the Dollhouse. 

Taryn reigning supreme with the Dollhouse

My reaction? OH. MY. GOD. I remember Taryn showing hints of going heel a few weeks ago but it was brushed underneath the rug rather quickly. Who knew that TNA would pair up the Dollhouse with Taryn to make another heel dominant stable? This is interesting stuff indeed. I'm anxious to see how the other Knockouts rise up against this new threat. 

I read some tweets with people groaning in disgust at another heel stable forming in TNA, but I look at it this way. The more stables/groups in a promotion, the more opportunities you have to make those said factions cross paths. Plus, it makes more interesting television than everyone trying to stop the evil boss/owner in just about every other promotion today in wrestling. Also, let's face facts. There's not many female heel factions in mainstream wrestling anymore.  I see this as breath of fresh air. 

Sure, it's not SHINE's Valkyrie stable, but it's better than nothing. Don't hate on it before it even gets good. Hell, the Shield even needed time to pick up traction before all of you marks were tossing your panties and jizzing your shorts off everything they did.

TNA World Heavyweight Championship Match - Kurt Angle (c) vs. Austin Aries

This match didn't transpire as an enraged Eric Young raced down to the ring and assaulted A Double with two deadly Piledrivers before the match could actually start. Kurt Angle tried to reason with EY, only to receive a similar beatdown with EY focusing his assault on Kurt's surgically-repaired knee. I've said it once, I'll say it a million times but the best Eric Young is a heel EY. I'm glad to see that TNA are remedying the mistake they made with promptly switching him back babyface when he was the heel leader of the World Elite stable after the arrival/signing of Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff. 

Closing Thoughts

Night of Knockouts? Hmph, tonight's episode of Impact Wrestling should have been dubbed "Night of Crazy People" instead. It started with Eric Young declaring that he wasn't right in the head and ended with him going bat-shit crazy on Kurt Angle and Austin Aries when his TNA World Heavyweight Championship opportuniy was pulled out from underneath his feet.

From top to bottom, I was satisfied with tonight's card, but I was a little bummed at the lack of Rebel to say that tonight was about putting on all of the TNA Knockouts on display. I thought Rebel would have came to the aid of her best friend, Christy Hemme, being attacked by the Dollhouse. Speaking of the Dollhouse, they are going to be a great addition to the Knockouts division. In their debut night, they already made an impact (no pun intended) by aligning themselves with the reigning Knockouts Champion after her rather brilliant heel turn. Seeing Taryn abandon her squeeky clean babyface tactics is a breath of fresh air as it gives the other Knockouts room to change things up as there's a TON of heel Knockouts with only Gail Kim and Brooke recently switching back to being babyfaces/fan favorites.

Last but not least, I love that Impact Wrestling takes the time to highlight their women's division on a level such as this. I swear, if you can't give TNA props for the little things that they do right (such as tonight's show) instead of focusing on everything that they do wrong, then I can't respect your opinion as a wrestling fan.