GFW Impact Review - October 5, 2017

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

GFW Global Champion Eli Drake Addressed the Audience

I've said it countless times before, but Drake plays the part of world champion to absolute perfection. From how he dresses to how he carries himself, he is the complete package and I always enjoy his promos because they give off a Ric Flair vibe. Here, he discussed his (tainted) victory over Johnny Impact from Turning Point before basically saying no one was a threat to his title reign.

Chris Adonis def. Garza Jr. by Disqualification

Drake put Adonis in an impromptu match, hence why he was wearing his street clothes here. Garza kind of came out of nowhere as a championship contender, and while it's nice to see some fresh faces in the main event scene, he was just teaming with Laredo Kid not too long ago and broke off on his own without explanation. This was a good little match and the disqualification finish due to Impact attacking Adonis and then brawling with Garza successfully set up next week's GFW Global Championship No. 1 Contender's match between the two.

GFW World Tag Team Champions oVe def. Jon Bolen and Trey Miguel (Non-title)

This was essentially a showcase match for oVe following their recent tag title victory, and while this was exactly what it should have been, I can't shake the feeling that they weren't ready to capture the championship yet. They are gradually getting over with the audience, which is an encouraging sign, but they didn't debut too long ago and we still don't know too much about their characters other than how they like to visit stripper bars while searching for LAX, or something like that.

Karen Jarrett Announced Sienna vs. Gail Kim vs. Taryn Terrell vs. Allie for the GFW Knockouts Championship at Bound for Glory

These types of segments where everyone interrupts each other one after another are usually pretty predictable and this was no exception, but at least it served a purpose in building toward the Fatal 4-Way match for the GFW Knockouts Championship at Bound for Glory next month. No one's promo in particular stood out, but everyone did play their role well and I'm glad Karen's mic work was kept relatively short and sweet in announcing the title match. I would assume this means Rosemary and Taya Valkayrie will face off in a singles match at the event.

Matt Sydal, Petey Williams and Sonjay Dutt def. X-Division Champion Trevor Lee, Caleb Konley and Andrew Everett

When the hell did Everett turn back heel and make amends with the man he turned on in the first place, Trevor Lee? Did I miss something? At any rate, the X-Division is loaded with tremendous talent at the moment, but they aren't always being allowed to go all out in their matches. This should have been crazier than it was, but it was still a fun albeit brief bout with the babyface trio picking up the victory and all wanting a shot at the strap.

Texano and El Hijo del Fantasma def. Impact Grand Champion Ethan Carter III and James Storm

Main events on Impact have been given much more time recently, which I would typically appreciate, but this match did not need to last as long as it did. It simply wasn't necessary, but that aside, this was a well-wrestled matchup with the focus mainly being on if Storm and EC3 could coexist given their checkered past. They weren't able to emerge victorious and it was smart to give the invading heels the win in order to cement them as a force to be reckoned with.

Overall Show

With Turning Point out of the way and Bound for Glory less than a month away, it's time to start hyping up the card for the event and the company did a solid job with that on this show. No matches except for the Knockouts title bout are currently confirmed for the card, but it's fairly obvious what will be added based off what we saw on this show and what's being advertised for next week's episode. There wasn't anything too memorable about this edition of Impact, but it did lay the groundwork for BFG nicely.