IMPACT! Wrestling Review - March 22, 2018

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Alberto El Patron Called Out Impact World Champion Austin Aries

While I largely stopped caring about El Patron long ago, I think he's a logical first feud for Aries as Impact World Champion. I'm sure they'll work very well in the ring together, and so far their verbal exchanges have been excellent, including this one. Both men brought their best on the microphone and it actually got me more excited for their upcoming encounter at Redemption than I was before.

Trevor Lee def. Fallah Bahh

I like The Cult of Lee, but I guess this unofficially confirmed that they're done in the Impact World Tag Team Championship picture for now? Anyway, this was a nice little match that mostly consisted of Lee trying to dodge Bahh's offense. Bahh's matches are designed to be comedic filler, and the crowd gets a kick out of it, so I didn't mind. The important thing is that Lee won as he should have to pick up some much-needed momentum.

Impact X-Division Champion Matt Sydal def. Rohit Raju

I'm not sure what Raju did to earn himself a title shot, but whatever. The guy is barely on TV, so although fans had zero incentive to believe he had a chance of capturing the championship, he had an impressive showing and they produced a well-wrestled match. They actually received more time than I thought they would, but they filled it out well. I'm still not sold on the Sydal and Josh Mathews alliance, but at least Mathews wasn't a focal point here.

Impact Knockouts Champion Allie def. Sienna

Similar to Raju, what did Sienna do to be put in championship contention? She's been gone for months! That said, there have been established issues between these two dating back a year and a half, so I liked the attention to detail with Sienna immediately attacking Allie as soon as the bell sounded. The actual match wasn't much of note and it ended rather abruptly, but the post-match was interesting with Braxton Sutter confronting Allie and the debuting Su Young ambushing her from behind. I'm not familiar with her work at all, but her gimmick feels a little too similar to Rosemary's.

Kongo Kong def. Abyss in a Monster's Ball Match

Monster's Ball matches are usually hit or miss, and while this was far from terrible, I'd argue it fell in the latter category. Abyss is a shell of what he once was and Kong just isn't that good, so I can't say I was surprised that this was pretty slow and boring. Even the big spots with the table and the thumbtacks didn't pack much of a punch because we've seen it done countless times before. If nothing else, Kong was the right winner considering IMPACT is pushing him as the "next big monster."

The Feast or Fired Briefcases Were Revealed

Jeremy Borash hosted this segment, which is funny because he has been in NXT for a while now (that's why he was taken off commentary a while ago). He wasn't the only one involved in this segment currently in NXT, as Ethan Carter III has been there as well since late January. Thus, it was expected he would be "fired." His final promo was glorious as he recapped all of his accomplishments in the company and how he's a Carter, and therefore IMPACT needs him. Cage hitting his finisher on him was a fitting way for EC3 to go out. Meanwhile, Eli Drake ended up getting the tag team title shot, Petey Williams got the X-Division Championship shot, and Moose got the world title shot.

Overall Show

An angle was also filmed where Sami Callihan followed Eddie Edwards' wife Alisha Edwards back to her hotel before launching an attack on Edwards, so that was a cool way of furthering their feud. Unfortunately, the rest of the show wasn't too exciting on the whole in my opinion. The opening segment was solid, but Monster's Ball was a bit of a dud and the other matches were fairly forgettable. However, this edition of IMPACT! is notable for featuring EC3's last appearance with the organization.