A Slap to the Face

In an earlier article, I wrote about what TNA will do with Bobby Roode after his Bound for Glory match with Kurt Angle for the TNA World Championship. If you haven’t read it (and you should because, not being biased, it’s a great article), the two options that I gave were for either Roode to continue on his quest and eventually become World Champion; or for Roode to go back to tag team wrestling with Beer Money Inc.

On the following Impact after Bound for Glory, TNA decided to go with a third option: completely fuck Bobby Roode over. I heard about this on Friday afternoon but I had to wait until Sunday to see how it went down.  With the company now back under the control of Dixie Carter, she appointed Sting to run the day to day operations of Impact. Kurt Angle came out to boast about cheating beating Roode, prompting Roode to come out. Sting made a match between Angle and Roode for later on that match. Unfortunately, that match was shot down almost instantly, as Angle pointed out that the contract for the match at Bound for Glory said that Roode could not get a rematch if he lost. James Storm came out and promptly challenged Angle instead, which Sting agreed to.

The match itself was a joke. It consisted of Angle continually beating the crap out of Storm in the corner and arguing with the referee. Angle put his arms in celebration, turns round and walks into a Last Call by Storm and he gets the pin becoming TNA Champion. It lasted less than 90 seconds. Understandably, the match couldn’t last long due to Angle’s injury, but I hate matches in which one man would be completely dominant and then have his opponent do just one move to win the match.

This makes no sense to me and I feel really sorry for Bobby Roode. The Bound for Glory Series took place over 3 months and when Roode won that, TNA had videos of him speaking about his family, his background and the match with Angle. I thought it would be crazy for TNA to do all that and then let Roode lose. Apparently, it was all set for Roode to become the TNA World Champion, but Hulk Hogan thought otherwise and it was changed at the last minute.

If I was Bobby Roode, who has been with the company for years, I would feel that it was a slap to the face. TNA had plenty of time to decide who was going to win the Bound for Glory Series and to see if that person would win the TNA World Championship. More importantly, Hulk Hogan had plenty of time to decide if Roode was ready or not. If Hogan thought Roode wasn’t ready, he should have told TNA a long time ago, and that way they could have arranged for someone else to win the Series. For that to happen to Roode, and then have his partner win the title a couple of days later, must be heartbreaking.

There’s no doubt that this will result in a feud between Roode and Storm. This could go one of two ways with one of them turning heel. You could have Roode slowly turning heel as he gets jealous over Storm being the champion; or you could have Storm turning heel by him becoming arrogant and saying that he doesn’t need Roode or his Fortune teammates any longer, perhaps developing his character away from the cowboy persona.

It might seem as if I’m shitting all over James Storm and I’m not. I’m interested to see how he will do as champion. However, the fact remains that Roode has been completely screwed over by one man. I don’t even get why Hogan did it as he didn’t do it in order to benefit him. Hogan, due to his success, has a massively overinflated ego, which has been damaging to other people (WCW being a prime example). If TNA want to become anywhere near as successful as WWE, they need to start building new stars and take risks. Hogan needs to realise that, otherwise TNA could end up like WCW.