?Reported by TJ Siloski of WrestleView.com

On Thursday, February 17, 2005 at 8:23 AM EST

Have to be honest... I'm ashamed to come back here after my Royal Rumble predictions. I won't announce the score, let's just say it was somewhere between abysmal and "made young children cry". Still, I have to face you all again, break through the shame...

No Way Out is this weekend, but I won't be predicting on it. Not because of my poor predictions last time, but because the card, as of this column's writing, is terrible. Big Show and JBL are slow enough and with a cage keeping them from going outside, I'm losing interest. Oh, but it's a barb wire cage! It'll be more hardcore! ...It's a wrap of wire on top, how fixed does a spot have to be in order to give those barbs any attention? It's the only reason Big Show is in this match, he's the only one that can reach the damn things without making some idiot spot where someone tries to escape this barb wire cage over the top. Even JBL, the Million Cent Man, isn't dumb enough to intentionally climb up to those barbs, and if he is, I will lose all remaining faith in Smackdown. The only reason to watch this Pay-Per-View is John Cena vs Kurt Angle. Angle in interviews has been quoted saying he wanted to wrestle John Cena again but with roles reverse. Last time, Angle was heel and Cena was face, and obviously they're better at the opposite roles. This will be match of the night, no doubt about it. After that, I check the WWE No Way Out website, and the only other match announced is... Undertaker vs Luther Reigns... Woohoo... This is written wednesday night, might be a little late in the game to only have 3 announced matches, 4 if you include the one announced on Smackdown. They're banking on this barb wire cage match to make up for this poor showing so far, apparently, and as it stands now this isn't a PPV I'll be buying, I'll download indy matches if I want to see barb wire matches where they actually use the damn wire.

What gets me more is that with Angle starting a feud with HBK, which should lead to one of the all time best matches, the results are obvious. John Cena will get the shot at Wrestlemania 21 since they've buried everyone else on Smackdown, JBL will beat Big Show cause we've seen Cena and Show, and somewhere Cena has to drop that custom belt of his. If they were smart, they'd treat it like the smoking skull belt of Stone Cold, have Orlando Jordan win it, but don't go back to the old belt, he'd keep it as is, with John's name and catch phrase on the spinner included. JBL would basically be in control of that belt and he could mess with Cena's mind with it, eventually destroy it just to piss him off. The days of the dual champion are done, they'll want all their belts up for grabs at the big show so someone's going to have to get that US Title. Question is, who? Bigger question is what happens to the custom belt? Does everyone get their own US Title? That would be frightening. Renee Dupree wins the belt and the plate is two croissants stuck together at the ends... Charlie Haas wins it and it becomes clear cause you never see him on Smackdown... Oh, but the fun is when Kenzo Suzuki wins it and the belt transforms into a robot! That's when you worry, when the japanese-engineered belt is walking down to ring beside Kenzo and wants to be refered to as Optimus Bling-Bling.

Now, I haven't mentioned it in a while, so let's talk TNA. Company's still not turning a profit, and like rats from a sinking ship, we see new wrestlers announcing that they have been released, have quit, or have requested a release from TNA. The biggest so far is Frankie Kazarian, former X-Division champion and one of the best athletes they had on their show, X-Division or otherwise. Rumor has it there's already a WWE deal waiting for him, but really... is that such a good thing? On one hand he'll most likely get stuck in the sesspool that is the Smackdown Crusierweight division, might have one feud against Funaki or whoever the current champion is at the time, and then off to Velocity. Not the brightest future but hey, it is the big time. At the same time, this works the opposite way. If the WWE signs him, it kind of acknowledges TNA in a way they haven't done before. They'll be making it well known that they have talent the WWE is interested in and their athletes are in every way as good, if not better, than a lot of their own talent. The same happened for ECW and WCW, I didn't take either seriously until I saw WWE faces on WCW TV and vice versa, same for ECW. Something in my head said that unless they want each other's wrestlers, and were getting them, they weren't in real competition. TNA's been doing this one way so far, BG James and Ron Killings from the start, most recently Billy Gunn and Dustin Rhodes. WWE has yet to aquire any TNA talent despite rumors of interest in Abyss and AJ Styles. And I find it ironic they haven't until now with how mirrored the two products are now. Every match of the weekly Pay-Pew-Views in TNA had some significants and something unique, they came up with new matches and stipulations constantly. Now a lot of it's being faxed in, local wrestlers jobbing to bigger names in 3 minute matches and feuds out of nowhere. Worse is things like the recent title match, Kevin Nash had one big match in TNA, him against DDP and Raven in an elimination match and he was the first one out. First one to lose in that match and he's the number one contender on the next Impact? Suddenly he's against Jarret with no explination? Please explain that one to me, someone, anyone. And title matches so badly rigged it's sad, Jarret has helpers every match he's in even after the ones that recently helped him had betrayed him. The Elite Guard, who have vanished despite still being on TNA's website, the Kings of Wrestling, and now The Artist Formerly Known As Billy Gunn is his lap dog. People call Jeff Jarret the Triple H of TNA, but as I see it, he's worse. Triple H is at least smart about how he does it, when something happens that lets him keep the title another month, it makes sense. Jarret has people jumping in helping him for no reason, the guitars hidden all around the ring, now he's using other instruments when the guitar is illegal, always a way out that comes from nowhere. And he isn't even booking the show anymore but remains champion, which is pathetic. TNA needs to show they can expand and develop into a competitor to the WWE, if we see the same old thing all the time, especially when they should be desperate to show something new while they're still being funded, they won't survive to 2006.

That'll do it for this edition.