TNA house show
Baton Rouge, La.
Report by Dot Net reader Thaddaus Perkins

I went to WWE Extreme Rules back in June. Well, I can say that now I've lived on both sides of the ring after going to the first TNA house show in Baton, Rouge. About 1,500-2,000 people were there. All the ringside seats were sold out and the second level seats were filled up. Believe me, it looked filled, especially with that black curtain. Their house show ring is small - not too small but if you've seen the ring on TV and see the one at a house show you can definitely tell. But I digress......

I've read plenty of other TNA reports and it's true, Jeremy Borash is a damn good hype man. He got the crowd pumped with the offerings of backstage passes and whatnot. He also took care of the ring introductions. Right before he got started, apparently the M.E.M. sent word that no one was allowed backstage. JB calls B.S. and does it anyway. Gotta love the Hype-Man!

1. Suicide beat Shark Boy. The lights went out and about 20 seconds later Suicide showed up on the top rope. Shark Boy came out to, um, heel heat, if you wanna call it that. A decent X Division match. Suicide won in about 8 minutes. My friend, who loves all wrestling, asked me if Suicide always does the gun point to his head. I said yeah. He pointed at the little kids running around acting like they were pulling the trigger on their head. So if the Suicide rate goes up (yea pun intended), don't be surprised. You heard it here first! After the match, Suicide made nice-nice with a fist bump and Shark Boy did the whole "Austin" routine.....with bottled water. i've heard fish out of water, but that was ridiculous.

2. Awesome Kong and Raisha Saeed beat The Beautiful People.
When I say ALL the warm-blooded males (and a few females if you catch my drift) ran to the rail to get pictures of TBP, I mean ALL the warm-blooded males (and a few females if you catch my drift) ran up there. Good match with Kong getting the hot tag and hitting the implant buster for the win on the champ Love. What a way to showcase your champion.

At one point, I couldn't see the match because Kong was standing in my sight. Did I scream for her to move? HELL NO. I value my life. My friend said that his sister works at Subway and four women walked in there and said they worked for TNA. The description was "three chicks that looked like porn stars and one black woman that looked like she'd eat the other 3 for a midnight snack." Yep. That was them. Sky got on the mic and screamed. All I understood was "Baton Rouge" and "never coming back". Yeah right...

JB comes out and read a "text" from Foley saying he's going to be there tonight. The crowd goes nuts.

3. Homicide defeated Daniels and Consequences Creed to retain the X-Division Championship. A damn good match. Homicide was the real babyface. Daniels needs to get pushed like now. At one point he had Creed in a Boston's Crab. Creed was on top of Homicide, and Daniels reached down and put a Camel Clutch on Homicide. VERY cool spot! Homicide won when he hit his "Cutter" on Daniels to retain. Good match.

4. Hernandez defeated Eric Young. Young cut a decent heel promo on the fans before TNA's new main eventer came out. Good back and forth with Hernandez getting the win. He played to the crowd for a bit before returning "backstage."

JB comes out and send us to intermission. Man, I love Louisiana food (sorry).

5. Beer Money defeated Kiyoshi and Shiek Abdul Bashir.
Elite came out first and cut a promo. All i got out of Bashir was "TNA." Let me say this, if Beer Money goes through the same routine every night at house shows then TNA will really have a household name. Out came Beer Money in LSU jerseys (the home town top college). Place. Goes. Nuts. They had us chanting Beer Money and LSU. (For the record, i was pulling for Texas in the College World Series.)

Beer Money won with the DUI? or DWI? At one point, they fought on the floor with one set of wrestlers to each side. Roode dumped Kyoshi in the garbage can. We have the saying, "Keep Louisiana Clean" Corny, I know. Storm had Bashir down on his knees holding him while he beckoned for some kid to come up and slap him. Sweet. Oh, and some guy was shadow boxing with Bashir right before that. Probably a TNA plant. After they won, they played up the crowd a bit more with beer and jerseys. And, yes, Storm does take random beers out the crowd and drinks them for his Popeye strength.

Mick Foley came out and did his usual schtick for the "cheap pop." It sounded FAR from cheap. He said he'd be the special ringside enforcer for the main event.

6. A.J. Styles defeated Samoa Joe. Joe got a pop at first. I also noticed that his "face tattoo" was only partially there. The bottom half really. Styles got the second biggest pop. Too bad he didn't wear a Saints jersey. A very good match that would remind you of their X-Division matches from back in the day when Joe was undefeated. It really disappointed me when I realized that AJ should really be the TNA Champ. He really SHOULD be the face of the company. Styles won and Foley ran off Joe.

As Foley was ready to send the crowd home, Young came out wearing cowboy boots and cut another promo. Foley clowned on him and the shoes before challengeing Young to a match. Young backed out and Foley turned his back. Young ran in with the boot and started to beat Foley before a "Mrs. Socko" came out. It looked like a girl if you ask me. Foley cleaned house when the rest of the World Elite ran out. Foley issued a challenge for them vs. him and JB. Funny as Borash got all tough.

Notes:The show ended and the crowd seemed really happy as JB said they would return and maybe do a PPV here. Good stuff. We hopped in line to get in the ring with Foley for the $20 picture. The ring ropes are hard as hell! No wonder wrestlers get a running start! It's really something to take a picture with a wrestling legend! Creed, Beer Money, Hernandez, Daniels, Kong, and a few others were all doing autographs.

All in all, a great show. I really hope they come back. It was TNA's first time here and they really put on a good card! I did WWE Extreme Rules and now I've done TNA Live. It's really amazing. I highly recommend you go a TNA show. I didn't even know what the matched were going in!

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