TripleG

Ah Lockdown 2005. I remember trashing the show before seeing it because I thought the idea of an All Steel Cage PPV was absurd and stupid, but TNA has made it into a very nice annual tradition and God bless them for it.

The first Lockdown was a damn good show and definately worth picking up.

- 1st match was Siaki & Apolo vs. Hoyt & Candido which unfortunately turned out to be Candido's last match due to his leg injury and subsequent death only a few days later. Its actually very hard to watch this match for those reasons, but I'll give credit where credit is due. Siaki & Apolo are two guys I am usually critical of and Hoyt was still a little green at the time, but they managed to put together a respectable match where most young guys would fucked the whole thing up after Candido was removed.

-Dustin Rhodes vs. Bobby Roode in a 2/3 Falls Prince of Darkness Deathmatch inside of a Steel Cage - This is quite simply the most over gimmicked match I have ever seen. ANd people get on Russo's case?!?! Dusty had a hard on for gimmick matches. Hell this whole PPV is nothing but gimmick matches and then he added gimmicks on top of that!!! But all things considered, this match actually turned out well. This was the first singles match I saw Roode in and felt like he had some potential to make it on his own, and well look at how well he's doing now. Even the blindfold portion of the match was entertaining. This match could have been ALOT worse.

- Sabin vs. Bentley vs. Shocker vs. Sonjay Xscape Match - I have one major problem with this match. If its an elimination match, why were they trying to break up each other's pins? I mean if I were in that match and somebody hit their finisher on somebody else, I'd let them take the damn pin. One less person for me to deal with. But for pure action, this match was alot of fun, so I won't be hard on it. Trinity got her big spot in which was cool to see. And there were alot of really cool moves, which is to be expected from X Division guys. Very fun match.

- Hardy vs. Raven in a Tables match inside of a Steel Cage - Once again I have to ask "And people get on Vince Russo's case?!?!" But this match was actually one of Hardy's better showings in TNA. He was pretty out of shape and probably drugged out of his mind during that run, but Raven was able to lead him to a really good hardcore match here.

- AMW vs. Team Canada in a Strap Match inside of a Steel Cage - The gimmick in this match didn't seem too over the top so no need to comment on that. Under regular circumstances, I think this match would have been considered awesome, but this is the point in the show where the crowd seemed to die down a little bit (keep in mind they had just seen 4 cage matches already) But AMW & Team Canada did a great job in this match. I liked the bit where Harris was kept out of the cage for most of the match which gave it a nice old school story to it.

- Daniels vs. Skipper for the X Title - Another match that probably would have been amazing under regular circumstances, but when on a show with 7 other cage matches, it doesn't quite standout. However, this was a nice pure technical match and they did a great job of selling the fact that both men were partners. I also like that they teased Skipper walking the cage again. That was cool.

- Team Page vs. Team Jarrett: Lethal Lockdown - This match SUCKED. Worst match on the show by far. Waltman looked out of it, and his opening exchange with Jarrett is five of the most boring minutes of wrestling action I've ever seen. The only one who added any kind of excitement to the match was Monty Brown, but unfortunately the finish was botched. And the whole bit with Nash being replaced by BG James was just lame. I know they were going for the whole Outlaws reunion thing but couldn't they have just named BG James as the third partner before the match because making him a mystery just made it a big disappointment. This match was just bad, but I'm happy to say that TNA has done much better with Lethal Lockdown since then.

AJ Styles vs. Abyss Contenders Match - This match was awesome and IMO it was the match that put Lockdown on the map. AJ & Abyss have always worked well together and I personally think that this is their best match. Very violent, but it also told a great story with AJ having to fight through everything and pull all the stops to defeat the Monster.

So out of 8 cage matches, only one of them was bad, so I'd say TNA did a great job of putting on a really good PPV despite the fact that this show just had everything going against it.

Match Rankings:
1) AJ vs. Abyss
2) AMW vs. Team Canada
3) Daniels vs. Skipper
4) Hardy vs. Raven
5) Xscape
6) Roode vs. Dustin
7) Siaki/Apolo vs. Hoyt/Candido
8) Lethal Lockdown