The Rise & Fall Of TNA | Wrestling Timelines
32. January 29, 2003 | What Are We Doing Here?
This isn’t the first time that this question will be posed by the wrestling fandom. As a matter of fact, the question will be asked on a near-weekly basis until around 2014, when most people stop caring. In a match that TNA has for some reason decided to book for a second time, AJ Styles takes on fifty-something Larry Zbsyko.
Zbysko - who is for all intents and purposes retired, and whose last memorable run saw him standing up to the New World Order in 1997 when nobody really asked - literally takes AJ Styles to the limit.
The mini-feud began the prior week, with AJ taking the show hostage and demanding a shot at the title. Zbysko played the old vet who is pissed at AJ for selling his soul to Vince Russo and sports entertainment.
AJ Styles is out-of-this-world amazing. The man has the incredible ability to not merely execute the most incredible, never-before-seen moves, but, in the case of his moonsault DDT, set them up in a process that can only be compared to teleportation. He is lightning fast, spectacular, precise at a level not witnessed since the Dynamite Kid. He can throw a trash can at an opponent from outside of the ring and nail them on the button. He is phenomenal. He is the symbol of what the best possible version of TNA could and should look like. In this scenario, however, AJ is the snotty young heel, Zbysko the honourable old man trying to beat some sense into him. There are several things wrong with this scenario.
Zbysko does not beat any sense into AJ; he instead applies an interminable series of holds, basically doing a sincere version of Cactus Jack’s intentionally boring heel gimmick in ECW in 1995. This does not earn Larry a babyface reaction in 2003; what gets fans on their feet is AJ Styles matches. AJ here wrestles Zbysko’s 1970s match.
What’s also maddening here is that, although Zbysko is the babyface, which is stupid enough, Russo mocks everything Zbysko represents. You simply can’t tell this story from Russo’s hateful perspective. The whole thing is a mess, and it ends when Styles can’t beat Zbysko within the 10 minute time limit. It’s recorded as a draw, not that match results matter in TNA, but Zbysko wins. So what are we doing here?
Well, we’re watching a show that is awful, but is at least something different in a wrestling dark age. We’re watching a rushed, sleazy show that makes less than zero sense. But it's not boring.