Global Force Wrestling's Television Show Is Called... Amped?

Mordetzky will be part of the proceedings for GFW's first set of tapings Photo Credit: WWE.com

Global Force Wrestling's first television tapings are coming together, as they should since they'll be taking place a week from this coming Friday. The show has a name, and the matches for the first set of shows are set. However, the biggest question remains where the hell the output will be televised. It is awfully presumptuous to have a TV show with nowhere to show it, but everything else seems to be in place.

The show will be called Amped, which has drawn some jokes about whether GFW is selling wrestling or a Mountain Dew-styled energy drink. The first set of tapings for the show will be dedicated to crowning the promotion's Champions, of which it will have four: Global Championship, Next*Gen Championship, Tag Team Championship, Women's Championship. The only title that seems to need explanation is the Next*Gen Championship. Karen Jarrett said about the title, "It will be about up-and-comers, the fearless new faces... around the globe." That description doesn't really leave me with warm and fuzzy feelings about the title's place, although "up-and-comers" feels like a much more concrete description for a division than "having no limits" like the X-Division Championship in TNA.

Before Jeff Jarrett's return to TNA and subsequent capturing of the King of the Mountain Championship to Slammiversary, I might have given him and his company the benefit of the doubt. But now that GFW and TNA are going to be working together, it just feels like Jarrett's time is a flat circle. He's created a carbon copy of TNA just so he could work with and presumably usurp the first company he founded. Sure, things could be different with GFW, but all the circumstances around this partnership make it feel like a giant backslide into the same bad habits.

Still, despite the bad booking around TNA in its earlier days, it could at least be counted upon to provide entertaining and exciting in-ring action. This lineup appears solid, featuring a mix of indie standouts, WWE castoffs, and other Jarrett/TNA inner circle guys. The Global Championship tournament will feature Chris Mordetzky (Masters) taking on Brian Myers (Curt Hawkins), Kongo Kong vs. Nick Aldis (Magnus), and Bobby Roode taking on a currently unknown opponent. The Next*Gen Championship opening round matches include Jigsaw vs. Sonjay Dutt and PJ Black (Justin Gabriel) vs. Seiya Sanada. The Tag Team Championship tourney features the Bollywood Boyz vs. the Akbars, and the delightfully trolling tag team of Chris Sabin and KUSHIDA battling Reno Scum. Lei'D Tapa, Mickie James, and Christina von Eerie are scheduled to compete in a three-way match in the Women's Championship Tournament, and in non-tourney action, Bestia 666, Blood Eagle, and Steve Pain battle Zokre, Phoenix Star, and Misterioso, Jr.

It's hard for me to be too hard on a promotion putting out that slate of matches for its first television tapings on paper. But the lack of a television deal and the partnership with Dixie Carter's toxic waste-ridden excuse of a wrestling company scare me to death about GFW. I hope I'm wrong, because wrestling could use another higher payday destination for wrestlers who can't get regular tours with New Japan Pro Wrestling or a contract with WWE. But man, sometimes the frog just has to stop giving the goddamn scorpion a ride across the pond.