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

Impact Wrestling – When Did Rich Swann Get So Damn Good on the Mic?

Published Wed, 16 Sep 2020 08:35:50 -0500

The Tuesday Night Wars are over! WWE NXT came to Tuesday nights, beat the crap out of Impact and stole a bunch of their viewers for two weeks, and then left. But here's a secret: Impact was actually the better show. And now it has Tuesday nights back to itself again.

The official logo of Impact Wrestling.

Impact Wrestling Report for September 15th, 2020 Part 1

So Impact Wrestling can be watched on AXS TV, but if you don't have AXS, it also streams live on Twitch. Instead of commercials, Melissa Santos hosts a pre-show and a commercial show. There are usually a few thousand people watching and chatting. It's… different. For me, I used to watch on Sling TV, but then I switched to YouTube TV because Sling TV's UI is excruciatingly bad, so here we are.

Impact starts with a tribute graphic for Barry Scott, who passed away last week. Then a "previously on Impact" video. Josh Matthews and Madison Rayne are on commentary. Knockouts Champion Deonna Purrazzo and Kimber Lee come to the ring. Susie and Kylie Rae come out next. That's enough for a match.

Donna Purrazzo and Kimber Lee vs. Susie and Kylie Rae

This feud started when Susie and Kylie Rae, along with the rest of the Wrestle House cast, were teleported back to the Impact Zone two weeks ago, interrupting Purrazzo's Black Tie Celebration. On Locker Room talk last week, they got into a verbal scuffle, and the match was made.
Impact's Knockouts division may be the best women's division in the world. For a while during the pandemic era, they didn't get to show it because not everyone was able to be there, but it's feeling pretty damn strong right now. These four have an excellent opening match.
Kylie Raw is the number one contender for Purrazzo's Knockouts Championship, so she and Purrazzo are kept apart for most of the match. Don't want to give too much away for free, right?
Susie gets the win in this one by pinning Kimber Lee, but first, she hits a couple of Su Yung's signature moves, the implication being that the Susie personality is losing its grips and Su Yung is coming out.

Matthews and Rayne run through the card for them tonight. Then, backstage, Impact X-Division Champion Rohit Raju runs into Trey, who hassles him about his attitude since becoming champ. Trey wants a shot at the belt, but Raju uses the possibility to get Trey amped to beat another contender, TJP, tonight. Impact takes a commercial break. The subject of the chat is fake eyelashes.

John E Bravo is trying to book a string quartet for his wedding with Rosemary when Tasha Steelz and Kiera Hogan accost him again. They want him to name them his best men. Bravo says he already has a best man and picks the next person he sees, which is Fallah Bahh.

XXXL comes to the ring. Please don't be fighting The Deaners. Please don't be fighting the Deaners. Please don't be… dammit!

XXXL vs. The Deaners

Well, you know how I feel about The Deaners. I made some exceptions to my rule during Wrestle House because it was impossible to cover the thing, but I can't tolerate an entire Deaners tag team match. So I'm out until this match is over. Sorry. I'll tell you who wins, but that's it. And you're lucky you're getting that!
Larry D gets the win by pinning one of the Deaners.

At least it was short. Impact takes a commercial break. The subject of the chat is Chik-Fil-A, which Melissa says she's going to eat if she wants. The Impact Twitch Zone, she says, is a politics-free zone. IMO, their chicken isn't really that good – I'll take Popeyes over Chick-Fil-A any day — but they do have good waffle fries.

Okay, time for another match.

Trey vs. TJP

Rohit Raju's whole X-Division Championship reign so far is all about working smarter, not harder. He's been manipulating everyone in the division into wasting all their energy on each other instead of him with the hope of earning a shot.
This is a very flippy match—many, many flips.
Both of these guys are ridiculously athletic. They're evenly matched, and both of them come out looking good.
But Trey looks the best because he gets the win

In the locker room backstage, Ace Austin, Madman Fulton, and The North are murdering The Rascalz. Impact takes a commercial break. The subject of the chat is: what the viewers had for dinner and foot fetishes.

An Impact official informs the Motor City Machine Guns that he can't clear The Rascalz to wrestler tonight. The Good Brothers walk up and offer to take their place in the 8-man tag later tonight. The Machine Guns don't necessarily accept, but The Good Brothers plan to go out there anyway.

Impact Promo – Rich Swann

Rich Swann comes to the ring on crutches. He calls out Impact EVP Scott D'Amore. Swann says they were supposed to talk about this backstage, but the ring is his home, so that's where he wants to talk. Swann talks about the promo he cut a few weeks ago when he "retired." But then, while sitting at home, he watched Eric Young, who injured Swann in the first place, become Impact World Champion. Swann wants D'Amore to let him get back in the ring and fight Eric Young.

D'Amore says he respects Swann, and he'd love to see him compete, but Swann's doctors say he isn't medically cleared. Swann says he'll be ready and cleared by Bound for Glory in October. He says he's the only person in the company that's pinned Eric Young and he deserves the shot. Are we sure Curt Hawkins has never pinned him?

D'Amore talks up Swann's talent and his record, but again, there's that whole injury thing. If D'Amore puts him in a match, he might be crippled. Oh my god! Eric Young is gonna pull a Benoit on Rich Swann?! Swann tells D'Amore to put himself in his shoes. If D'Amore had the opportunity to fight, he would take it, and that's why he's in the business: to give guys like Swann an opportunity. Young tried to ruin Swann's career and change his life. He doesn't give a damn if he ends up crippled. All he wants is Eric Young.

Before Swann can break into song, Eric Young comes out. He shoves Scott D'Amore. Swann attacks him, but Young gets the upper hand since, you know, Swann has a broken leg or whatever. Young says he'll literally kill Swann at Bound for Glory. D'Amore says Swann's promo moved him. He gives him the match on October 24th and tells him to "take this piece of shit out." Young is not happy with this development. They yell at each other a bunch, and then Impact goes to commercials.

Man, I don't know when Rich Swann got so good, but he's on fire with his promos lately. This segment was great. I'm gonna take the opportunity of this commercial break to switch over to part two of this Impact report, so click through for the second half of this recap.

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