Leon Slater was in action this week and looking at the card it was definitely one of the more promising things to stand out considering he is (in my personal opinion) the best wrestler TNA has on their roster.
He’s fighting for a world title at Bound for Glory, so this was a chance for the challenger to put the wind in his sails before then. Nick Nemeth was on commentary and everything was set up to be angled to build reliably to the big match.
The problem arose before the bell for the game sounded or two men could make their entrance. This was a yellow card game against Joe Alonzo. For those who don’t know why that would be a problem, think of the worst parts of Sammy Guevara and Max Custer, add them to a DNA splicing machine, and the result is Joe Alonzo.
He legitimately spent minutes before entering the ring cutting one of the worst promos ever. The crowd was screaming throughout and not in a way that you might be like. It happened bad
He tripped over his words and went higher and higher, obnoxiously, while still managing to slip the most basic of Chat GPT’s on his heel. This is what a non-wrestling fan will see on the internet and show a wrestling fan before going, “You’re watching this crap.”
There are many things that compare to the experience of watching, and worse, hearing it, including being threaded with barbed wire, diving into an empty pool full of needles, or running a box scraper over your brain.
TNA is good at being bad, that’s one of its more consistent traits. But this was one of those times where it went unnoticed, and in the end it was all inconsequential as Slater beat him down in seconds and escaped Nemeth. COULD YOU DO IT WITHOUT THIS GUY?
Alonzo clearly went out there with the goal of getting over as a bag heel and satisfying the ultimate pumpkin. He managed to land himself as a promotional briefcase and was certainly running on heel power. But there was no satisfaction, and one would not go so far as to say that he was finished. In fact, this was the opposite. It was a terrible waste of time from a company that doesn’t believe in themselves to even try to book good wrestling with their best talent.
Written by Max Everett