Some of you may know that I already posted this information on the wrestling website that I own at TNAStars.com. If you’ve seen this all already, then I apologize, but I wanted to share the pictures with all of my audience! Enjoy!

Source: TNAStars.com

What’s up, everybody!? Most of the time, we scour the internet looking for the best set of house show results to share with you great fans. However, for the Asbury Park house show I was actually in attendance with my roommate, my buddy, and my younger brother (and about 1,200 other TNA fans) so here are some results and notes on the show directly from me!

Attendance: I’m not the best estimator of attendance at these types of shows, but I would suggest there might have been about 1,200 fans in attendance. When I went to the Asbury Park house show in 2008, there might have been half as many people there so to more than double the amount of attendees in two years shows tremendous progress in this fan’s eyes. When the official attendance numbers come out, I’ll report them here.

Excitement: While the action in the ring was mediocre at best (the house show two years ago had more exciting action), the fans seemed into almost every big move from the start of the show through its completion. I’ve been to two TNA house shows and a TNA pay-per-view thus far and I think that this crowd (comprised mostly of younger fans and their families) were the most “into” the show that I’ve seen for this company. Frankly, they were more into the show than the people at the iMPACT! Zone ever seem to be (and why is there always a high pitched girl screaming in the iMPACT! Zone? Somebody shut her up already!)…

Acoustics: Just like two years ago, I found the acoustics in Convention Hall completely over modulated and hard to understand. For some reason, all of the wrestlers and knockouts that opted to use the sound system also opted to yell into the microphone which, to my ears, resulted in an electronic muffled sound that had way too much reverberation on the output. No one normally writes about these things, but for me it was such a pronounced pain in the neck that I felt compelled to put it on here.

Pictures: Coming soon in another post – I’m going through them (I took over 300 pictures) and weeding out the crappy ones (about half). When I have the pictures weeded out and uploaded, I’ll place a link to them right here. Update: The pictures are available below this post!

Sightings: My buddy, roommate, and I met Jeff Hardy at The Beach Bar which is connected to Convention Hall and overlooks the Atlantic Ocean and Asbury Park’s southern beach. It was about as brief a meeting as you could imagine – he walked by, shook our hands, and went on his way. In my view, he was shorter than I thought he’d be; all of these online listings show him at 6′ 1″ or 6′ 2″ tall and I’d say he’s maybe 5′ 9″ or 5′ 10″ at most. Either that, or he was incredibly slouching when my buddy, roommate, and I met him (and I don’t think he was slouching).
 
 

This match was a pretty strong show opener and it got the crowd excited. I admit that I didn’t get a chance to really watch the full match because I was looking for my brother, roommate, and buddy during this match, but I did manage to see The Amazing Red jumping around like a crazy person. Brian Kendrick also had a few good moves, too. Red took the match in the end.
Winner: The Amazing Red
 

I’m pretty sure that Angelina Love took on Sara Del Rey in this match, though I didn’t catch her name and I can’t see facial features too well. The match wasn’t so bad and in my humble opinion I think that the action in this match (and the one following) was among the best on the entire show, period. Angelina Love was quick and smooth with her moves, as always, and Sara Del Rey certainly did the JAPW organization proud in her loss. The winner of this match was awarded with a title shot against Knockouts Champion Madison Rayne.
Winner: Angelina Love
 

As soon as Angelina Love beat Sara Del Rey, Madison Rayne came out and beat the hell out of her to begin their match. Apparently, the match was “supposed” to take place later in the night, but Madison Rayne took the opportunity to beat up on a weakened Angelina Love and eventually beat her in about 5 or 6 minutes. Overall, though, it was a good match and even though Angelina Love was fresh off of her match with Sara Del Rey, she did a good job fighting back against a fresh Madison Rayne.

Earl Hebner was the referee (he received a decent reaction when announced to the crowd) and this match ended with a spot where he happened to catch Madison Rayne in a swooning position and the crowd egged him on to kiss her (which he did). Then he did this weird dance that got the crowd going. Angelina Love was laughing at it until Earl went up to her and smacked a kiss on her, too. More dancing after the kiss, of course, Madison Rayne used the distraction to roll up Angelina Love for the win and Earl Hebner did a little more dancing out of the ring area.
Winner: Madison Rayne
 

Lots of “Woooooo!” hollers from the audience for Jay Lethal, who was way over with his home state crowd. I would say that next to the Knockouts, Jay Lethal was among one of the most “over” guys on the night’s card. Lots of good back and forth action in this match that ultimately saw Jay Lethal pick up the victory. Jay Lethal did some of his Ric Flair impressions by strutting a little bit on the ring apron before the match started and chopping Desmond Wolfe throughout the entire contest. I would have liked to see these guys fight for another five minutes or so.
Winner: Jay Lethal
 

Kurt Angle came out and thanked the audience for coming to the show. He said that people in attendance may be WWE fans, but he’s here to tell everyone the truth – that TNA is better (mixed reaction from the fans, but mostly in agreement). He was holding a can of some type of energy drink in his hand during the entire promo, which he eventually tossed across the ring on his way out. Nothing major to report here.
 

The most annoying part of this match was that Jeff Hardy seemed to thank every single fan that had their hand out during his introduction. Seriously, his entrance might have lasted almost ten minutes – they had to restart his music. Abyss did a good job of playing the monster heel, which is a role that I think he is more naturally suited for than the Hulkamaniac shtick. Jeff Hardy brought some fan signs in the ring before the match started – not sure what they said but you can check them out after I post the pictures.

Not much to say about the match here. Both men did their signature moves and Jeff Hardy eventually won by hitting The Swanton. After the match, Jeff Hardy took one of the cameramen’s camera and went around ringside taping the fans (I assume this is for TNA Today on TNAWrestling.com and YouTube.com).
Winner: Jeff Hardy
 

Before the Intermission began, Don West came out and hyped his brown bag special and his super duper exclusive Ric Flair t-shirt that “you can only get here tonight and nowhere else!” During the break, Angelina Love had a line for autographs that literally wrapped around the entire inside of the arena. My buddy said that they were going for $10 each, so TNA and Angelina Love definitely made some money off of her signing autographs. There were hundreds of people in line to meet her – it was pretty nuts. My group and I took the opportunity to get up and go to the other side of the arena during the intermission.
 

Team 3D was extremely over with this crowd. After they were introduced, the “E-C-W” and “We Want Tables” chants were deafening. So… this match became a tables match. The action was crazy to start this one as Brother Ray beat the hell out of Jesse Neal in the ring and Brother Devon took it to Shannon Moore on the outside of the ring. At one point, Brother Ray ran into the back and came back with a shiny new steel garbage can, with which he promptly smacked Jesse Neal in the head. After some posing, Jesse Neal took the garbage can and cracked it over Brother Ray’s head completely bending and destroying the can.

Once the match got along a little bit, Team 3D hit their “What’s Up!” headbutt to the balls before the crowd yelled for Brother Devon to get the table, which he did. And once the table was set up in the ring, it wasn’t too long before Jesse Neal went directly through it and Team 3D picked up the win. Funny note from after the match – Brother Ray asked Brother Devon to get some kids to give pieces of the ring to and he went up on the stage to grab a kid, but the kid was horrified and grabbed his Dad. Brother Devon tried to tell him what was going on, but in the end settled for a different kid off of the stage and a kid from the front row. Team 3D posed for pictures and thanked the crowd as Brother Ray said he was heading to Bar Anticipation in Belmar to find some Jersey girl (he used other words) for the night.
Winner: Team 3D
 

Rob Van Dam was easily the most over guy on the card tonight, thanks in part to his entrance theme which encourages the fans to chant and yell for him. Both of these men looked good during the match, but A.J. Styles may really be taking his new heel role too seriously since he stalled the beginning of the match by about ten minutes (which was probably longer than the entire action part of the match). It was a bit excessive.

The match came to a head when A.J. Styles missed his flying punch from the top rope and Rob Van Dam hit his Rolling Thunder which set him up for the Five Star Frog Splash. At some point, A.J. Styles went to hit his Pele Kick and I have to tell you – it didn’t look so good. Anyway, Rob Van Dam picks up the win and the show comes to an end.
Winner: Rob Van Dam
 

After the show was over, Rob Van Dam stayed around and posed with fans in the ring with the championship belt for $20 per each group. This is the same thing that Kurt Angle did after the Asbury Park house show two years ago.

A final comment – the interwebs sometimes say how TNA’s house shows are the most profitable part of their business. Well, after attending my second TNA house show I can clearly see why. These people (led by Don West) sell, sell, sell! They are selling t-shirts, DVDs, autographs, meetings with the wrestlers, etc. TNA shows really have a type of fan interaction that you don’t get at WWE shows, but it would admittedly be hard for WWE to pull off this type of interaction with 15,000+ people at their shows. Overall, I thought it was a fun show even if the action in the ring was mediocre at best.

Because I was disenfranchised by WWE, I began watching Total Nonstop Action (TNA) which is based out of Orlando and Nashville. It’s pretty entertaining, though the writing seems to be questionable at times. This is the same TNA that Hulk Hogan recently announced he would be working for as a management consultant (in fact, he makes his debut tonight).

Anyway, I began watching TNA a few years ago and at some point during the summer of 2008 I began working on a TNA-only wrestling website. Many of you know that I began my foray into the wrestling website world with a personal website called The Balrog’s Lair, which eventually morphed into TBLWrestling.com. That website is more like a wrestling supersite with information dating back over a decade. I intended for TNAStars.com to be a different type of site – one that has news, rumors, results, and opinions, but also one that has profiles of wrestlers from the promotion. I didn’t quite accomplish my goal to have a bunch of profiles of the wrestlers on TNAStars.com, but I did manage to put together what I think is a pretty bad ass design for a small wrestling website.

Anyway, this pet project of mine is now live so if you have any interest in learning some more about TNA Wrestling, then head over to TNAStars.com and enjoy!

As a part of the grand opening of this new website (which won’t happen until late December 2009 or possibly early January 2010) I am giving away a bunch of DVDs to randomly selected subscribers to the TNAStars.com Mailing List. The DVDs include:

– The 50 Greatest Moments in TNA History
– Knockouts, Volume 1
– Unstoppable: The Best of Samoa Joe
– Best of the Bloodiest Brawls (Scars and Stitches)

You can win one of these DVDs simply by signing up for the TNAStars.com Mailing List on the front page of TNAStars.com! This mailing list is completely safe and operated out of the Google Groups system so you can be sure that your e-mail and information are protected. So go on over and sign up for the mailing list today!

As a wrestling fan, I’m excited for this news. I stopped watching World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) programming around two or three years ago. Honestly, it got to a point where Triple H was winning every single feud that he was in and where he and his wife were trying to write him into some mythical figure week in and week out. I couldn’t take watching the utter bastardization of the sports entertainment industry, so I stopped watching. Hey, there are a lot of ways for people to express their support or dissatisfaction with a company or product. With sports entertainment, I decided to vote with my dollars and my leisure hours by taking them away from WWE and giving them to TNA.

That said, it hasn’t been an easy ride as a fan of TNA wrestling. There is a strong argument to be made that these guys have spent the last few years blowing their opportunity to be the clear alternative to WWE programming. For most of the last few years, there was no way that TNA could compete with WWE on a global level. Today, even with signing Hulk Hogan, I think that fact remains. However, bringing in Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff (more on him in a minute) gives TNA a real chance to compete with WWE domestically and, specifically, on the all-important cable television medium. As a fan of TNA, I hope that they don’t blow this gigantic opportunity.

Now to Eric Bischoff. When news broke last week that Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff had signed contracts to partner with TNA, most of the people that I talked to were saying that Hogan is too out of shape and getting up there in age to make an impression on TNA. Well, that’s true. But if you ask me, the real value of this transaction is Eric Bischoff. Forget about the fact that he has connections in the entertainment industry through Bischoff Hervey Productions. And you can even forget about the vast connections that Bischoff brings as the former President of World Championship Wrestling (WCW). What Bischoff brings to the table is a unique view on the wrestling business that is not only proven to be successful, but it is proven to be profitable.

The real value of this deal is Eric Bischoff’s brain with Hulk Hogan’s instant mainstream credibility. The only misstep that I’ve seen so far in this whole thing is the fact that while Hogan was on almost every major media outlet promoting his new book last week, he wasn’t wearing any TNA merchandise. I know that this announcement was a bit last minute and that TNA doesn’t even have a marketing plan built around Hulk Hogan yet, but it would have been nice for the company’s fortunes if Hogan was wearing some red and yellow themed TNA merchandise, you know?

However, that’s only a minor hiccup. Hogan was sure to talk about TNA in almost every interview and he talked about how he has a partnership with them and that he may or may not get back into the ring. In these interviews, he was very realistic about his body and how it has broken down over the years. That’s a good sign for Hogan who, as his new book details, has been battling some mental demons lately.

Anyway, the word is that Hulk Hogan will be featured on TNA Impact on Spike tonight, so if you get a chance be sure to watch the show!

Two of the websites that we own are TBLWrestling.com and XHeadlines.com – sites that specialize in professional wrestling. These sites have three t-shirts to literally give away to the first three people who can answer ten trivia questions about the Total Nonstop Action wrestling promotion. There are two XXL Tyson Tomko shirts and one XL Booker T shirt that we need to send off to the first three entrants who get the most questions right by the deadline (this Sunday, January 4th).

So, if you are interested please feel free to head over to this link and submit an answer sheet for consideration. Hey – it’s a free t-shirt!

The first comment that I have about the show is that the crowd was HOT! They were going bonkers over every back body drop and punch that was offered by the wrestlers. I’ve never been in a wrestling crowd like that before and I’ve been to RAW, Smackdown!, WWE’s ECW, SummerSlam, and a variety of independent shows. One of my roommates who was with me commented that the crowd was very similar to an old ECW crowd. My only complaint is about the trio of morons sitting behind me who felt the need to let everyone in the immediate vicinity know their wrestling knowledge. For example, at one point one of the wrestler’s threw on the crossface and the dopes behind me immediately started chanting, “You’re not Benoit!” Yes, dummies. We know that Benoit used the crossface. Congratulations, you know a wrestling fact.

It only got worse when they started chanting “Joe can’t sell!” during the Booker T./Samoa Joe bout. Yes, idiots. We understand that Joe has been working hard to make his opponents look better in the ring. Congratulations, you read websites like mine. I wouldn’t have been so upset about these guys if they weren’t sitting directly behind me screaming the worst chants ever at the top of their lungs for the ENTIRE night. My right ear was ringing all day Monday because of them. Speaking of people sitting around us in the stands, my roommates and I were pretty sure that the guy sitting next to me was asleep the entire time or that he had one eye (probably the latter). The poor guy jumped square out of his seat during the opening pyro which, I admit, was incredibly loud. The kid sitting at the other end of the row was from Brooklyn and came to the show with no ride home. His first question to us as we sat down was if we could give him a ride home (no way!). Also, this kid was a major WWE fan (complete with replica spinning belt) and hated on a bunch of the TNA guys. He was comical because whenever a “TNA! TNA!” chant broke out, he would quietly speak-chant “WWE. WWE.” Weird.

By the way, would you go to Trenton from Brooklyn to watch a wrestling show of a promotion that you don’t even like…with no ride home?!

Final comment before the match reviews – Ice T. was advertised as appearing with F.I.L.T.H.E.E. and he was no where to be found when the rap group opened up the show.

TNA X-Division Championship
Petey Williams def. Consequences Creed
– The crowd was hot for Williams in this one, which may have surprised the TNA folks as Creed had been billed as the face and received huge love from the crowd two days earlier in Asbury Park. Williams is an amazing wrestler and Creed has a great future ahead of him. This match featured lots of chants of “Let’s go Petey!” and a great cheer/boo segment with both competitors trading blows. I don’t do “star” rankings because I’m not that pretentious, but this was a great opening match. To show you the fickleness of a wrestling crowd, as soon as Abdul Bashir came out, the fans were behind Consequences Creed. Don’t you love it?!

6-Knockout Match
Gail Kim, ODB, & Taylor Wilde def. Awesome Kong & The Beautiful People
– Unlike a WWE Women’s match, this was not a throwaway event. ODB has enormous crowd support, but Awesome Kong had just as much. By the way, even though we weren’t too close to ringside you can tell that The Beautiful People really are quite stunning. Gail Kim performed pretty well, but I thought that Taylor Wilde could use a little bit more time rehearsing some of her spots. All in all this was a good match that the crowd was into for the entire time.

At this point there was some type of vignette with Team 3D in the rafters (these were all pre-recorded because the thousands of us in attendance kept looking to the rafters during these segments and saw no one). The only comment that was audible in the arena was about a black bat, though not Brother Devon’s black bat. Thanks Brother Ray.

TNA Tag Team Championship Match
Beer Money, Inc. def LAX
– Though I was surprised by the outcome of this match, I found it enjoyable. At one point the crowd was slowly wavering away from the match, but when Hernandez threw Homicide over the top rope on to Beer Money, Inc. the place erupted. The beer bottle shot to the head was heard crystal clear throughout the arena. Good work on everyone’s part. I didn’t particularly care for the LAX entrance with F.I.L.T.H.E.E. It was a bit much, though watching Salinas dance around was sweet.

Tuxedo Chain Strap Match
Jay Lethal def. Sonjay Dutt
– Well, if you watched this on pay-per-view I’m sure the “Fire Russo” chants were as clear as day. What an abomination. On the one hand, I admire Lethal and Dutt for putting up with this crap, but on the other hand it might be time to get Russo in check. A tuxedo strap match? What a waste of two incredible talents. Early on the crowd wanted to get excited to see these two go at it, but the stupidity of this match was clear and present. There were also loud chants of “Boring” which is a shame because I think these two could really tear the place apart if given the opportunity.

Jersey Street Fight
Rhino & Christian def. Team 3D
– This is the match where the internet reviews have pissed me off the most. Not only was this a good hardcore match, but the crowd was completely into it for the entire duration! The comedic spots went over well live and the high spots went over even better. When I read dummies on the internet write about how the crowd fighting got boring after a while I cringe because it definitely was not boring. The crowd was electrified to begin with – this match only turned up the juice a bit. Christian Cage is an even better wrestler in person, though Rhino may want to hit the gym a little bit. The Abyss run-in went over huge with the live crowd, too.

Last Man Standing Match
AJ Styles def. Kurt Angle
– I want to say that this match was perfect, but there was one problem – the Last Man Standing rules! Most of the people in the crowd were confused about the pin/submission followed up by a standing 10-count. Does WWE own the rights to a generic 10-count Last Man Standing Match? One of the kids sitting next to me made the point that it should just be a 13-count. Why not? In any event, this was the match of the night complete with high spots and great technical wrestling. The dopey online writers may not give this match the kudos that it deserves, but this was the best live match that I’ve ever seen. Crisp movement in the ring, a hot crowd outside of the ring, two of the best wrestlers in the world fighting it out – you can’t go wrong. The crowd popped for Sting before realizing that he took out AJ Styles.

TNA World Heavyweight Championship
Six Sides of Steel with Weapons
Samoa Joe def. Booker T. w/Sharmell
– I don’t think I’ve ever seen a cage match live before so this was sort of special. As a quick aside, did you know that they hold the TNA steel cage together with zip ties? Amazing, huh? Both of these men put on a good show, though it felt a little anti-climatic to not have a Sting appearance at some point. Anyone can see that Russo is going for a Sting vs. the new generation of stars type of angle – or at least that’s what it is now. Knowing Russo he’ll change the entire thing next week if he reads that one person has figured out his angle. Booker T is really a lot better in person than I thought he would be (I’m not a big fan). Samoa Joe did a good job of keeping up with Booker, though I thought that we would see more of an aggressive side from him. The guitar shot at the end of the match was alright, but I can think of better ways to bring Jeff Jarrett back into the show.

As I said earlier, this was the best live event that I’ve ever attended. The next time TNA is in your area I encourage you to go and check them out – the next time they’re in New Jersey, I’ll be there!

For 162 pictures from the show (including some of the people sitting around me), click here. Enjoy!

The show wasn’t too highly attended, but the fans that were present were passionate. The convention Hall can hold a few thousand people and I’d say there were between 400 – 600 people at the show.

Johnny Devine vs. Curry Man vs. Kaz
Winner: Curry Man

Abdul Bashir vs. Consequences Creed
Winner: Consequences Creed
* The crowd LOVED Consequences Creed, by the way.

Roxxi & Traci vs. Velvet Sky & Jackie
Winer: Roxxi & Traci

LAX vs. Team 3D
Winner: LAX
* After the match, Brother Ray thanked the crowd for coming out and dedicated the match to Bam Bam Bigelow.

Intermission

Rhino vs. James Storm
Winner: Rhino
* Rhino didn’t move around too well in this match – he needs to hit the gym.

Kurt Angle vs. AJ Styles
Winner: AJ Styles
* Amazing match with Styles performing all of his signature moves. Excellent!

After the show was over, Kurt Angle posed in the ring for pictures with the fans. Also, Curry Man, Earl Hebner, Traci Brooks, Consequences Creed, and Kaz came out to the ringside to give the fans free autographs. You’re not going to get that in WWE, folks. I was very impressed with the show and even though the place wasn’t packed, I hope that TNA strongly considers coming back to Conventional Hall in beautiful Asbury Park!

For pictures from this show, click here!

Total Nonstop Action is the alternative brand of professional wrestling to the worldwide leader, World Wrestling Entertainment. The production value isn’t as good (they tape from the same location every other week and produce two weeks’ worth of shows from one setting) and the weekly television show is sometimes burdensome to watch, but the action in the ring is amazing. They have a guy named AJ Styles who does the most ridiculous stuff that I’ve ever seen. See for yourself:

Pretty amazing stuff, huh?

TNA will be in New Jersey at Convention Hall in Asbury Park on Friday, August 8th and at the Sovereign Bank Arena in Trenton for their annual “Hard Justice” pay per view on Sunday, August 10th. Lucky me – I bought tickets for each show.