Worth Your Wealth? 04.14.08: TNA Lockdown

Hello again, 411 readers! “The One-Man Ratings Booster” here with another edition of “Worth Your Wealth?”! The idea is that you spend your hard-earned dollars on wrestling on a monthly basis, and I want you to know whether or not you’re getting your moneys worth. So read on and see if you’re investing wisely of if your cash is going to waste…

TNA Lockdown – Worth Your Wealth?

First, as always, we start off with our super-scientific formula for calculating the projected worth of each part of the show. Keep in mind I round things to the nearest nickel, so as not to piss myself off. Oh, and for the purposes of this column, I don’t have HD and neither do you.
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PPV Price = 2(A)x + 1.5(B)x + 1(C)x + 5

That free-standing 5 bucks accounts for non-wrestling related activities, such as in-ring promos, backstage segments, video packages, etc. Aside from that, A B and C represent the different classes of matches on the card:

Class C: Filler matches with little to no solid build behind them.
Class B: Secondary, but still significant matches that were well-promoted prior to the show.
Class A: The main event, as well as other high-profile, heavily promoted matches on the card.
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The Breakdown (as I see it):

Class C: Queen of the Cage, Cuffed in the Cage, and BG James vs. Kip James.
Class B: X-Division Championship XScape Match, Awesome Kong and Raisha Saeed vs. Gail Kim and ODB, and Booker T and Sharmell vs. Robert Roode and Payton Banks.
Class A: Team Cage vs. Team Tomko and Kurt Angle vs. Samoa Joe.

The Calculation (as the universe sees it):
30 = 2(2)x + 1.5(3)x + 1(3)x + 5
30 = 4x + 4.5x + 3x + 5
25 = 11.5x
x = 2.15 (rounded)

The Result (as you will see it):
Class A: $4.30
Class B: $3.25 (rounded)
Class C: $2.15
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And now, THE GOODNESS!

Bonus Materials – Price Tag: $5.00
The excess material of the show was basically all centered around building the Angle/Joe match, and pretty much all of it delivered. Joe and Angle each cut excellent promos backstage and I thought it was cool to bring in Joe’s father and older brothers for their segment.
Overall, the only problem I really had with the backstage stuff on the show was the newest member of the TNA broadcast team, Lauren. Good God she’s terrible. Between her monotone voice and her completely obvious lack of interest, she proved to be a complete black hole of charisma and really kept the backstage material from being worth anything extra.
Overall Value: $4.50 because the Angle/Joe promo work was worth every penny but the new boring chick pulled things down.

X-Division X-Scape Match: “Black Machismo” Jay Lethal def. “The Guru” Sonjay Dutt, Johnny Devine, Stone Cold Shark Boy, Curry Man, and Consequences Creed to retain the TNA X-Division Championship via Escape – Price Tag: $3.25
An excellent choice to kick off the show and while it was enjoyable, I can’t honestly say that it delivered. I was really looking for this match to focus around Lethal and Dutt, given they’ve been spending the entire month running silly vignettes where Dutt interrupts his dates and makes off with his girl. Instead, we get Dutt as the first elimination of the match less than 3 minutes in.
There were a few interesting spots, such as Curry Daniels’ dive off the top of the cage, but overall I was not wow’d by this match like I’d expect from the X-Division. What’s worse, we weren’t even treated to any sort of match-up between Lethal and Devine and the match was over before there was even a chance for some excitement to build. Can somebody tell me why Devine, upon seeing that Jay Lethal is cutting himself free, would sit there on the top of the cage watching him do it instead of hurrying his ass to the floor? Yeah, I didn’t think so…
Overall Value: $2.00 due to a general “meh” feeling all around.

Queen of the Cage Match: Roxxi Laveaux def. Angelina Love via Pinfall (Voodoo Drop) – Price Tag: $2.15
Let me start off by saying that I was pleased to see Roxxi make it into the cage. Of all the ladies in this match she was probably most deserving of the spot inside, as well as the eventual win. I look forward to her being thrown in to the fold of Knockout championship contenders, because she mostly outmatches the rest of the participants here. Honestly I can’t really say much about the match because it was painfully short, but I will say the Voodoo Drop is something different. It ain’t the Widow’s Peak, but then, what is?
Overall Value: $2.00 because it was fine, but I was disappointed in the amount of time Roxxi and Love got once they were inside the cage.

B.G. James def. Kip James via Pinfall (rollup) – Price Tag: $2.15
Well, this pretty much sucked…as was expected. Granted I have only been watching TNA for about 6 months now, but did anybody EVER give a crap about the VKM since their debut? They make all these references in the video packages to these guys being together for the last 10 years, when all it really does is remind you that they’ve been trying to milk every last ounce of the New Age Outlaws they can.
But I digress. As for the match itself, it was kinda sloppy, kinda slow, and a whole lotta not entertaining. I especially loved the finish, where Kip charged towards B.G. in the corner and literally stopped running for a second before he jumped to give B.G. enough time to move out of the way. And oh joy! Kip makes the SWERVE after the match which means we get to see this crap again next month!
Overall Value: $0.25 because making other matches look good by proxy is worth a little something.

Cuffs in a Cage Match: Super Eric and Kaz def. Rellik and Black Reign, Scott Steiner and Petey Williams, The Motor City Machine Guns, LAX, and The Rock n’ Rave Infection via Handcuffing- Price Tag: $2.15
To me, this match was probably the surprise of the night. Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t awesome, but I think this was really the only match that exceeding my expectations. I expected this to be a giant cluster-fark and such harder than James vs James, but they proved me wrong. While I think the match would have been better had there been fewer teams involved, it was entertaining overall. I think it was a foregone conclusion that Super Eric would “save” this match from the get-go, but there was good stuff leading up to it.
I really wish Kaz’s push hadn’t been painfully aborted by the wrestling cancer called Black Reign. That Flux Capacitor on Rave was slick. Super Eric, as lame as the gimmick is, got a good reaction when he finally showed up and pulled off one of the biggest spots of the night with a dive from the top of the cage onto four guys. Overall, it was a fun little match sandwiched in the middle of the show.
Or maybe I’m wrong, maybe it’s just because anything looks good following B.G. vs Kip
Overall Value: $2.15 for actually being worth it.

Gail Kim and ODB def. TNA Knockout Champion Awesome Kong and Raisha Saeed via Pinfall – Price Tag: $3.25
With the Knockout division being one of the highlights of TNA for me, I had really been looking forward to this match. With the in-ring debut of Raisha Saeed (aka Cheerleader Melissa), this match promised to deliver an exciting performance from four skilled workers. When it was all said and done, these four ladies delivered an entertaining match, as has become the standard of the TNA Knockouts division. Saeed looked great in her debut, taking Gail to task for a few minutes and repeatedly kicking her head into the side of the cage.
Eventually, Gail nailed an awesome hurricanrana and got the tag to the fresh ODB. From there, Kong accidentally nailed her own partner with the spinning backfist and costing them the match. Overall, I enjoy the match and I look forward to seeing more of Saeed in the ring.
Overall Value: $3.25 due to delivering expected goodness.

Booker T and Sharmell def. Robert Roode and Payton Banks via Pinfall (rollup) – Price Tag: $3.25
A disappointing match overall for these folks with an equally disappointing finish. The Booker/Roode feud has actually been built pretty well, which is why I was expecting something more from this match. It’s not that it was a poorly worked match, it just wasn’t exciting to watch. The finish was especially irritating because it saw Payton Banks take the pin after suffering no offense whatsoever. I realize it was setup that way to piss of Roode so he could leave act disgusted and leave Banks in the ring, but that didn’t mean it didn’t suck. Great booking…have two guys work for 7 minutes without a tag just so both women can get in there for 20 seconds and pull a shit finish.
Overall Value: $1.00 due to boring idiocy.

Lethal Lockdown Match: Team Cage (Christian Cage, Rhino, Kevin Nash, Sting, and Matt Morgan) def. Team Tomko (Tomko, AJ Styles, Team 3D, and “Cowboy” James Storm) via Pinfall (Gore) – Price Tag: $4.30
I must confess that as a fairly new TNA viewer, I didn’t even know all the rules to this match going in. I was happy to see it incorporated timed entry, so it wouldn’t be a giant mess from the get-go. Of course, none of you care about this since you already knew this, so let’s move on…
The match was awesome from the start with AJ being a little prick and diving onto Christian out of nowhere. From there things only got better. As more and more guys joined the match, everybody got to look good on their way in. Hell, Big Kev managed to walk all the way to the ring without tearing a quad or anything! We got a bunch of great face-in-peril wrestling as we slowly added more and more guys to the match. Finally, Sting was our last man in and then the fun really started as the roof came down. How awesome was it to see Christian and AJ teetering on a ladder on the very edge of the top a cage? Although I don’t fully see the logic behind James Storm tipping a ladder while his own teammate rides it, I can’t deny it was a great visual seeing those two guys demolish a table 25 feet in the air.
Storm went on to destroy big Matt Morgan with a beer bottle shot, only to eat a GORE GORE GOOORRREEEEEEE! A damn entertaining match, especially thanks to the spots leading to the finish.
Overall Value: $4.80 because this match was awesome and delivered some incredible spots. These guys busted their asses and put on one hell of a show.

Title vs. Career – Samoa Joe def. TNA World Heavyweight Champion Kurt Angle via Pinfall (Muscle Buster) to become the NEW TNA World Heavyweight Champion – Price Tag: $4.30
I had mixed feelings heading into this match once I heard they were planning to work more of an MMA-style outing. Kurt Angle coming out to the ring with his feet taped up and without his signature singlet didn’t do much to help things, either. And so they began, with Angle throwing jabs at Joe. I have to admit, I started to get a little down. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t have any problem with MMA…it’s just that this is a wrestling show. I’m paying to see wrestling, not MMA.
And then there was Karen Angle being escorted out by security, which I thought oozed “bullshit” coming back to bite us in the ass by the end of the evening. But I dealt with it and gave them a chance to win me over. As the match progressed, I found myself getting more and more into it. What started as a pretty strict MMA presentation gradually blended-in some standard pro-wrestling action. We even saw a lengthly Figure Four spot (I miss Ric Flair already). Watching the match, I thought there were a few moments when they would once again screw Joe out of the title…which is a good thing. My biggest complaint about most matches is that I’m pretty much sure of what’s going to happen. Instead, they teased Joe having to throw in the towel on several occasions and I honestly wasn’t sure where they were going to go with it. In the end, through all the trading of submissions and close tap-outs, it was the muscle-buster than F I N A L L Y won Joe his first TNA World Heavyweight Championship. What I truly loved about this match was that it actually managed to take me from poor expectations to leaving me thoroughly entertained.
Overall Value: $5.00 due to suspence, excitement, awesomeness, and a CLEAN FUCKING FINISH.
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The Final Tally:

Overall Price Tag: $30.00

Match of the Night: TNA World Heavyweight Championship Match: Kurt Angle (c) vs. Samoa Joe – 116% Value.
Trash of the Night: B.G. James vs. Kip James – 12% Value.

Overall Value: $24.95
Resulting PPV Rating: B (83% worth)

Closing Comments:
Given the largely underwhelming undercard, it’s no surprise that Lockdown didn’t prove to be entirely Worth Your Wealth. It was really the sheer impressiveness of the main-event matches that pulled this show out of the gutter. Lethal Lockdown was a hell of a lot of fun and Joe/Angle really won me over despite my doubts. The best part? No wonky finish in the main event for the first time since I’ve become a TNA viewer.
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Year in Review:
1. WWE Wrestlemania 24 – B (86% Worth)
Match of the Night: Career-Threatening Match: Shawn Michaels vs. “The Nature Boy” Ric Flair- 116% Value.
2. TNA Lockdown – B (83% Worth)
Match of the Night: TNA World Heavyweight Championship: Kurt Angle vs. Samoa Joe – 116% Value.
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And with that folks, we’ll see you next time!