The Shoot: Professional Wrestling's Weekly Recap

Vince gets Trumped, Angle wins 9th World Title, Samoa Joe turns heel?

It was a fairly wild week in the world of wrestling.

On WWE we saw RAW get "sold" to Donald Trump and announce a commercial free week for tonight. We saw three title matches and a battle royal No. 1 contenders match in three hours on the same show. And Smackdown! continues to make interesting strides with the CM Punk storyline.

On TNA we saw the final buildup for Slammiversary. A very solid PPV. And a heel turn that raises questions marks and lost all shock value when it was leaked on Internet sites as early as Friday.

WWE

RAW is clearly stale and Vince needed to do something to shake it up. I am not a huge fan of "non-wrestling" people being involved in major angles like this, but for some reason Donald Trump is majorly over with the fans and will likely spice things up a bit.

I thought last week's three-hour special was pretty solid with a few great world title matches and solid storyline fallout. None-the-less, I think having Randy Orton drop the strap to Batista looks absolutely awful now.

I think The Legend Killer finds a way to defend against Triple H in their Last Man Standing match this week, but I am not sure where they go from there. These two will definitely meet at The Bash, but Vince and the rest of the writers have to know this feud has really run its course.

I think they got a major swerve when The Animal got hurt because it seemed they were in the market for a Trips v. Big Dave feud, but now they don't seem to know where they want to go.

Unfortunately, MVP, Kofi Kingston and the like are not yet ready for a push to the top from mid-card status.

ECW and Smackdown! continue to be the best wrestling shows on television.

ECW's roster is certifiably stacked at the moment. Champion Tommy Dreamer, Christian, Jack Swagger, Valdimir Kozlov, DH Smith, Tyson Kidd, Finlay, Evan Bourne and Mark Henry all make for a solid hour of television weekly.

The best thing about the show is that all of those guys just mentioned could legitimately win the ECW Championship any given week and it would not seem completely out of place.

The top tier feud is great and in the long run Christian and Swagger are going to be monster stars because of their work with Dreamer.

Friday night's continue to be intriguing because the fans, announcers, writers and Punk himself cannot seem to figure out if he is a heel or a face. Most of the time when a superstar is not committed to one side or the other it is confusing and annoying, but this one seems to work very well.

The CM Punk v. Jeff Hardy feud has the makings of a classic. The two should have a great match at The Bash and possibly turn right back around for something special at Summerslam.

The big question is what is WWE going to do with Edge?

As Chris Jericho and Rey Mysterio participate in a solid feud, Edge is kind of left with nobody out there on his level. It leaves me wondering if Undertaker is coming back any time soon because they always put on a good show.

I also would not hate seeing Edge do a short program with someone a little lower on the card than himself where he could help push someone to upper-midcard or higher.

All in all, a lot of solid things going on with ECW and Smackdown! and RAW has at least spiced things up a little bit to keep us watching.

TNA

Well, Total Nonstop Action provided us with its namesake in a solid PPV on Sunday. The X-Division King of the Mountain match was absolutely perfect and by far the match of the week. But the main event scene continues to be muddled, and all-together crappy.

Kurt Angle winning the TNA Wold Heavyweight Championship does not bother me in the least. Samoa Joe joining Main Event Mafia? That makes no sense.

Look, I have no problem with Joe being a lone warrior who takes out all in his path. Good guys or bad guys. But making him a lackey for the MEM makes no sense and weakens him to a point that will be very difficult to repair.

The entire swerve is just trying to tell fans they are stupid. I mean, he just beat the crap out of Scott Steiner, Kevin Nash and Booker T. He recently held a knife to the throat of Big Poppa Pump as he was working out. He had his arm shattered by the MEM. Why in the hell would he join them?

Impact! writers are going to either tell us he was in all along, which makes no sense, or that he just recently got converted somehow, which make no sense either. They could also have him turn back face after "destroying MEM from the inside out." This would of course make it look like he is so weak he couldn't fight them straight up. The whole thing is just a tough spot for the writers to make sense of.

The company will continue Jeff Jarrett v. Mick Foley I am sure, but where the hell does AJ Styles go from here? A feud with Joe because he is angry? A feud that can only end with Joe winning.

Look...nWo was one of the best things in wrestling history. When it started it was fresh and you could not look away. Eventually though, every member of the roster, good or bad was in the faction and it became a laughing stock to even mention yourself as a member because who wasn't. TNA is doing the exact same thing with MEM.

Match of the Week

As stated earlier. The X-Division King of the Mountain match at Slammiversary was phenomenal.

I enjoyed the fact that Suicide retained and I think all of the others involved continued to show why the midcard of TNA is really where its strength is.

Jay Lethal is an absolute star and they need to write him out of the Macho Man gimmick now. He could be their answer to a legitimate transformation from midcard to main event level at TNA.

Weekly Rankings

Pretty big shakeup here as the PPV results changed some things around and the busy week in WWE caused some changes. One thing stays the same. Nobody in the business right now is as over as Jeff Hardy.

WWE — 1. Jeff Hardy 2. CM Punk (WHC) 3. Randy Orton (WWE) 4. Edge 5. Chris Jericho (IC Champ) 6. John Cena 7. Triple H 8. Tommy Dreamer (ECW) 9. Christian 10. Jack Swagger

TNA — 1. Kurt Angle (TNA Champ) 2. AJ Styles (Legends Champ) 3. Samoa Joe 4. Sting 5. Suicide (X-D Champ) 6. Jeff Jarrett 7. Jay Lethal 8. Beer Money Inc. (TNA Tag Champs) 9. Daniels 10. Alex Shelley

Tag Team — 1. Beer Money Inc. 2. Team 3D 3. The Hart Dynasty 4. Motor City Machine Guns 5. Priceless

Overall — 1. Jeff Hardy 2. Kurt Angle 3. CM Punk 4. Randy Orton 5. Edge 6. AJ Styles 7. Samoa Joe 8. Chris Jericho 9. John Cena 10. Austin Aries (ROH Champ)