Basebrawl: Another Perspective

Teaching Kurt Angle a new set of I's...

By Chad Smart

Kevin wrote about his experience with TNA’s Basebrawl event last week. In a bid to be as repetitive as possible, I thought I’d throw in my 1-2-3 cents on the event.

This was my first TNA show since they stopped during weekly pay per views in Nashville back in 2004. It was also my first house show since a WWE show in February 2007. I think because all the shows I’ve been to in the last 4 years have been either pay per view or independent shows, my expectations for the wrestling was too high. While the matches weren’t bad, they were very basic. No real high impact moves, or anything more advanced than a flying body press. The main event of Jeff Jarrett and Kurt Angle was a lot shorter than I expected. From my perspective, this was a bit of a disappointment.  However, I realize I am more critical than the average fan.  Watching the fans in attendance, they seemed to really enjoy themselves so I can’t say the show was bad. It served its purpose and at the end of the night, that’s all that matters.

Chad & Jared having fun

Even though the wrestling wasn’t the best, I did have a good time yelling and screaming random insults and whatnots with my friend Jared. Anytime I can call Kevin a bum in front of 1000 people it’s a good night. Would have been better if we were closer so we could have tried to get a reaction from the wrestlers. We got a few laughs from the people sitting around us.  That was satisfaction enough.

Now, mark the calendar I’m going to compliment TNA Impact Wrestling. TNA does a good job of fan interaction. As Don West said, if you left Basebrawl without meeting the wrestler you wanted to meet, it was your fault. Everyone with the exception of Matt Hardy, Bully Ray and Scott Steiner did a signing at some point throughout the night. Well, to be accurate, Matt Hardy showed up backstage at the end of intermission and signed autographs for about 4 minutes. In this regard, I would recommend a TNA show over a WWE house show. Even when they had multiple signings going on at once, the signings were run in such a way that everyone had the chance to hit up each signing. Fans didn’t have to pick which signing they wanted to hit and which one they didn’t want.  While watching the wrestlers during the interactions with fans, it appeared the wrestlers were happy to meet the fans and weren’t there simply because they had to be there.  Kevin and I have had the experience of meeting some WWE guys over Wrestlemania weekends and there have been wrestlers who seemed like they couldn’t care less about meeting fans. If you want fans to come back next time, it’s always good to make them feel appreciated.

Broskis of the week?

Overall, the show was a fun time and if I had it to do all over again, I’d probably still plan my trip so I could have hit the Chikara show in Chicago on the 24^th, but I’d also go to the Basebrawl show as well. Hopefully the crowd was good enough for TNA to consider bringing another show to the area. Southern Illinois doesn’t get major wrestling shows that often, so it’s an untapped market. I think the TNA show was good enough that another show should do good business.

After writing this, I realize how repetitive this was. Sorry. After tomorrow when I get back to Los Angeles, hopefully we’ll get back to a more structured schedule and I’ll have more time to write.

One last thing, it was good to meet some of our loyal fans at Basebrawl. Without you, Kevin and I would still be writing emails to each other instead of these blogs. Thank you for your support. Now go tell friends about Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter.