Posted in: Sports, TV | Tagged: impact, wrestling

Impact Wrestling Report Part 1 – Impact, Fix Your Damn Twitch Stream

Published Tue, 11 Aug 2020 22:15:15 -0500

Ric Flair fired the opening shots for this week of wrestling, delivering with Randy Orton the best segment WWE has produced in ages at the end of Monday Night Raw. Impact has to follow that, which won't be easy. Maybe they can throw on the Ric Flair/Jay Lethal promo in the Impact Plus Flashback of the Week.

The official logo of Impact Wrestling.

Actually, Impact had a really great promo to end their show last week, with Rich Swann "retiring" and then being brutally attacked by Eric Young. Holy crap… did Raw rip off Impact?! Impact even has its own version of Raw Underground: Wrestle House. It's gonna be an interesting night…

Impact Wrestling Report for 8/11/2020 Part 1

Impact opens with a brawl between Eric Young and Willie Mack. Mack is looking for revenge on Young for the aformentioned attack on his friend. They battle all the way to the ring where referees and security guards break up the fight. Young backs up the ramp, but Mack grabs a mic. They were scheduled for a match later tonight, but Mack wants to do it now.

Willie Mack vs. Eric Young

Unfortunately, Young doesn't, so Mack has to fetch him and bring him back to the ring. As I mentioned on Monday, I'm trying to be less wordy with these match recaps, so here are the bullet points:

Mack is fatter, and yet more athletic, than Young. Normally the smaller guy is the one to try to use his speed to gain an advantage over the bigger guy, but here it's the opposite.
Young is definitely meaner, though. And he's willing to cheat.
I usually watch Impact on SlingTV, but I've recently switched to YouTube TV, and they don't have AXS.
So I'm watching on Twitch instead, cast to my TV, and the quality is definitely worse. The sound is weaker, and the feed freezes periodically.
Except for a flurry by Mack, in the beginning, Young controls most of the match.
On commentary, Madison Rayne tries to claim there are limited slots on the Impact roster, and all the guys have to fight for them, even though Impact just hired like a dozen WWE castoffs a few weeks ago.
Eric Young clotheslines Mack, then he gets down on one knee and stays perfectly still for like five straight minutes.
Oh, wait, no, my feed is frozen.
It turns out this often happens, as the people in the Twitch chat are complaining about it.
"I bet retribution is behind this…" — one of the comments in the chat.
Impact finally comments in the chat and says they're working on it.
I switch over to Sling, which is still paid for another week…
…just in time for Mack to turn the tide and hit a stunner.
Instead of going for his finisher, Mack grabs a chair and wants to get some revenge on Young, but he takes too long.
Young wins with a piledriver.

That may have been a five-star classic. I wouldn't know, thanks to the Twitch stream. I'm starting to regret my decision to move to YouTube TV.

Josh Matthews asks Madison Rayne, who will accept Eddie Edwards's open challenge tonight. She has no answers. Matthews starts to shill for Emergence, but Rayne interrupts to promote Locker Room Talk tonight with Katie Forbes and Rob Van Dam. Then Matthews talks about Good Brothers vs. Ace Austin and Madman Fulton at Emergence. It just so happens these guys are backstage right now, looking for Austin and Fulton. What a coincidence! Impact goes to commercials.

I check out the Twitch comments during the commercials. The steam is still out. People are saying it's happened three weeks in a row. At one point, some guy posts a link to a bootleg stream, which gets immediately taken down by mods. You'd think they'd be putting more effort into getting the stream going, but modding the chat is good too, I guess.

Okay, Impact is back (on AXS at least, Twitch is still out of luck). Time for Wrestle House.

Wrestle House

Taya Valkyrie gathers everyone together for a viewing of Taya Valkyrie's greatest hits, which she says everyone voted on.
Kylie Rae accuses her of rigging the election, but Taya brushes her off Trump style.
One of the Deaners and Susie are missing. It's implied they're off having sex. Alisha Edwards and the other Deaner also sneak off.
Taya makes John E. Bravo rub her shoulders, which makes Rosemary jealous.
Johnny Swinger notices that Crazzy Steve is checking out Rosemary, and he calls him out. Steve goes to sit next to her and chat her up.
She offers to make out.
But Steve can tell she's just jealous of Taya and Bravo and looking to get back at them, so he's not into it. What a gentleman!
It turns out Susie and one of the Deaners aren't f**king. They're getting ready for a date. The other Deaner and Alisha Edwards are helping them.

Backstage at Impact, Reno Scum assaults Rhino and steal his money.

Kimber Lee vs. Jordynne Grace

Kimber Lee comes to the ring. Then Jordynne Grace. They get right down to business.

Last week, Lee offered to take out Grace as a favor to Deonna Purrazzo. In exchange, Purrazzo will give Lee a shot at the Knockouts Championship.
Unfortunately, Lee didn't consider the fact that she'd actually have to beat Grace. That's easier said than done.
There's a commercial in the middle of the match. I check the Twitch stream.
It's just coming back online, but then immediately goes offline again.
People in the comments are pretty pissed. Is this how I'm going to spend my Tuesdays from now on starting next week?
Someone recommends another Twitch streamer that's doing a watchalong. No, I won't say who. I ain't no rat.
I check it out. Three guys with beards are yapping over the show. Well, it's better than nothing. I give them a follow, just in case I need it next week.
But I'm gonna finish watching the show on AXS because it looks like even if Impact does get their stream back up, it will be starting from the beginning.
Oh yeah, there's a match going on.
Lee gets her ass kicked. She taps out to a choke by Grace after Lee tries a swanton but lands on Grace's knees.

Madison Rayne is hosting solo since Johnny Swinger is trapped in Wrestle House. She talks about how badly everyone wants to advertise on Locker Room Talk, so they have their first sponsor. It's Heath. He bought thirty seconds of time to try to get people to get the #Heath4Impact hashtag trending. Then Rayne brings out RVD and Katie Forbes.

Rayne talks about their #CancelCulture detour without mentioning #CancelCulture. She wants to know how it feels to be back to normal. They say it feels good. Then they start making out on the couch. Rayne leaves in disgust.

Forbes decides to interview Van Dam. She asks him what his favorite things about her are. He says she gives everyone one more reason to wish they were RVD. He also likes her personality. Then he asks her what her favorite things about him are. Before he can answer, Sami Callahan shows up and assaults Rob. But Rob and Katie get the upper hand and beat him down.

The Rascalz are backstage, goofing around. Trey is wearing Suicide's mask. Wentz is wearing an EC3 hoodie. Moose walks past and sees it. He demands Wentz take it off. Moose hands "Suicide" an invitation to challenge for his championship. Impact goes to commercials.

I check, and Impact has finally gotten their stream back on. They're still playing the Willie Mack match from earlier. That bootleg stream seems to have taken about 10% of the viewer's Impact had before the stream went out. Impact has only gained back about 60% of its viewers. The rest f**ked off, I guess.

More Wrestle House – Acey Romero vs. Larry D

Rosemary is still looking for someone to make out with to make Bravo jealous. Unfortunately, it's slim pickings here. She eventually decides on Larry D.
Meanwhile, Alisha Edwards sends Susie into the date room with whichever one of the Deaners she's dating. That's all I'm gonna say about this because it's way too Deaner-centric, and you know how I feel about Deaners.
Acey Romero and Larry D get into a fight because Larry is acting so weird. Tommy Dreamer makes a match.
Everyone goes to watch the match, making Taya mad.
The fat one wins.
Impact goes to commercials.

It's the top of the hour, so it's time to switch over to part two of this report. Who will challenge Eddie Edwards? Will Susie f**k a Deaner? Will Impact ever get their twitch viewers back? Click below to read part two of this report.

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