Another year, another solid outing curiosity of TNA’s biggest event of the Summer; This year’s Slammiversary was another impressive show as it took place in Montreal Quebec Canada for the first time since 2011.
A night that was filled with great action, memorable spots and a few title changes to boot, TNA’s Total Nonstop Summer truly peaked with this event…Welcome to Pop Culture Sports and here are 10 Interesting Facts About Slammiversary 2024.
10. Johnathan Gresham Couldn’t Appear Due to Traveling Issues
A one before the pay per view was set to take place, the United States as well as other parts of the world were affected by a massive power outage in which everything from Microsoft and Crowdstrike computers to airlines with latter seeing one of TNA’s rising stars being unable to make it to the event.
Going into in his highly anticipated bout with Kushida on the Countdown to Slammiversary, Johnathan Gresham had undergone character change as he began to wear a Great Muta inspired black mask complete with black wrestling tights and he would have the unusual habit of coughing up black ink which caused many of his opponents, referees and anyone in contact with him to get kayfabe sick.
Kushida (one the wrestlers affected by Gresham) was looking for revenge against ‘The Octopus’ but do to Gresham being unable to make it due to flight delays, former TNA X Division and World Champion Rich Swann was substituted in Gresham’s place.
9. No X Division Match Kicking Off Slammiversary
Slammiversary 2024 officially got underway with “Broken” Matt Hardy getting his revenge of Dirty Dango aka JDC after the ‘Loose Cannon of the System’ helped in putting Matt’s brother, Jeff and his real life wife, Rebecca out with kayfabe injuries.
The match was a serviceable bout and the crowd was in for it including the post match beatdown by Matt who hit a couple of more Twist of Fates on Dango.
What some might not realize is that this is the first time a Slammiversary event kicked off without the X Division title or an Ultimate X starting off the proceedings; The last time this happened was at Slammiversary 2020 when Trey Miguel and Zachary Wentz lost an open challenge match to the returning Chris Sabin and Alex Shelley.
Speaking of the Rascalz…
8. Wes Lee’s First Slammiversary Since 2019
Thanks in large part to WWE and TNA starting up a partnership in early 2024, numerous wrestlers from the NXT and TNA brand have criss crossed on each others shows, plus it open the door for some never before seen interactions and reunions.
Wes Lee (better known to TNA fans as Dezmond Xavier) teamed up his friends Trey Miguel and Zachary Wentz as part of the Rascalz and soon got into a feud with Charile Dempsey, Myles Borne and Tavion Heights of the No Quarter Catch Crew leading to a six man tag match at Slammiversary.
This match became Xavier/Lee’s first match at Slammiversary since he and Zachary Wentz took on Santana and Ortiz as well as Ethan Page and Josh Alexander for the IMPACT World Tag Team Titles in 2019…However unlike their matches in 2019 and 2020, the Rascalz came out on top this time.
7. Eddie Edwards Hold the Most Slammiversary Appearances (Of the Current Roster)
While he and tag partner, Brian Myers failed to retain their TNA World Tag Team Titles against the ABC, Edwards did make history as part of this event.
Eddie Edwards first competed at Slammiversary in 2014 as one of many participants in the exciting ladder match for the X Division Championship. Speaking of the X Division, Edwards would reappear at Slammiversary again in 2016 to once again wrestling in the opening contest for the X Division but this time he actually won.
From 2018 until the present day Edwards has continued to compete at this event meaning that Edwards hold the record for having the most apperances at Slammiversary with his current total at 10 with his win-loss record seeing Edwards have six wins and fours losses.
The second most appearances by an active member of the TNA roster is Frankie Kazarian who has nine appearances at Slammiversary starting from 2008-2013 and resurfacing at TNA’s biggest event of the Summer in 2022, 2023 and 2024 with Kazarian have three wins and six losses; The third wrestler with the most appearances is Moose with his eight appearances at Slammiversary from 2017 onward seeing him have four wins and four losses.
6. A.J. Francis Wasn’t the First Choice to be Digital Media Champion
Although no one is going to claim that A.J. Francis (aka Top Dolla in WWE) is a ring general in between the ropes, the man can certainly put on a good performance and combine this with his ability to talk on the mic, his previous time in the NFL, and his work in the music industry and it’s easy to see why TNA put the Digital Media Championship on him in June of 2024.
Even though Francis’ work in using social media to promote himself and carrying the belt around with him in interviews makes him one of the better title holders of the DMC from a media perspective, it almost didn’t happen.
According to Francis during an interview before Slammiversary, he mentioned that the company’s original plan was to put the Digital Media Championship back on Swann thus making him the first person in company history to be a two time Digital Media Champion.
However Swann shut that idea down (presumable because Swann’s previous reign with the belt was one of the worst in that belts existence) and instead suggested that A.J. become the new DMC…a smart decision to be quite honest.
5. It Marked the First Title Change of the CIHC in Nearly Four Decades
PCO might just win the title of TNA’s Summer VIP in 2024 as he and Mike Bailey helped to sell out the Verdun Auditorum and his on-screen relationship with fellow wrestler, Steph De Lander is one of the best storylines going on in wrestling.
At Slammiversary, PCO defeated A.J. Francis in a Montreal Street Fight to become the new TNA Digital Media Champion as well as the brand new Canadian International Heavyweight Champion, a title that was reactivated after Francis bought the title and named himself the new champion.
PCO’s win of the CHIC makes him the first wrestler in 37 years to have won the title with last person to do so being Abdullah the Butcher who defeated Puerto Rican wrestler, Hercules Ayala at the Lutter Internationale or the International Wrestling promotion which was the home company of the CHIC before company shut it’s doors in 1987.
4. Grace Has Only Had Three Appearances at Slammiversary
Considering how much of a major player she’s been apart of the company since her debut in late 2018, it’s quite surprising to discover that ‘The Juggernaut’ has only been on TNA’s biggest event of the Summer…Three times.
Her first match at Slammiversary saw her and Deonna Purrazzo putting on a barn burner of a match for the Knockouts Championship in 2020, sadly this happened during the pandemic so this didn’t take place in front of fans for obvious reasons.
She wouldn’t take part in 2021’s edition of Slammiversary, but did compete at the 2022 event where she won the first ever Queen of the Mountain match to become a two time Knockouts Champion. Grace wasn’t signed with the promotion by the time of Slammiversary 2023, in fact she would return and re-sign with the promotion in September of that same year.
Jordynne’s title defense against Ash by Elegance will indeed marked her third time competing at Slammiversary and stands as her only successful title defense of the Knockouts Championship at the event.
3. Ali’s First Televised Singles Defeat (Post WWE)
When former WWE superstar, Mustafa Ali was shockingly let go by Vince McMahon’s promotion in late 2023 fans expected great things from the former leader of Retribution and Ali has certainly made the best of it with his politician inspired gimmick as well as a massing one of the best undefeated streaks in modern pro wrestling.
Ali’s debut with TNA in early 2024 not only saw him becoming the new X Division Champion in his debut match, but he would continue his undefeated ways as he had 34 matches in TNA from February until August with the man suffering only two losses in singles matches.
While his second loss would end up being his last match with the promotion as he failed to capture the TNA World Championship from Nic Nemeth on the August 1st edition of IMPACT!, his first occurred at Slammiversary when “Speedball” Mike Bailey defeated Ali in the semi main event to become a two time TNA X Division Champion.
Last time Ali suffered a loss in singles action you’d have to go back to his match with Axiom on the August 8th 2023 edition of NXT, meaning that for almost an entire calender year the man who “Made the X Division Great Again” never got pinned or submitted in one-on-one action, but Speedball was the man to do it.
2. Joe Hendry Changed TNA’s Plans
That’s right…TNA’s most over talent (not named Jordynne Grace) wasn’t even suppose to take part in main event at Slammiversary…Well, at least not at first.
During an interview he did with Wrestle Zone with Bill Pritchard a few days before the event, Hendry mentions that the original plans for the TNA World Heavyweight Championship at Slammiversary didn’t initially involve him, but he was informed just several months ago that his growing popularity between his theme song hitting the music charts coupled with his work in TNA and appearances in NXT lead to the sudden change.
Although it’s unclear what the world title match would’ve originally been or what the plans for Hendry at Slammiversary could’ve been…But thankfully things turned out the way that they did.
1. The Event Did Good Business for TNA
In the previous article I made about the 10 Interesting Facts About Slammiversary 2023, I mentioned that event saw a fan attendance of 1,500 people and a PPV buyrate of 4,400…Well it turns out that things go even better for TNA the following year.
According to Dave Meltzer on the Wrestling Observer Newsletter and other reports, the 2024 edition of Slammiversary did an estimated 21,000 PPV buys which if true means that between last year’s Slammiversary and this year’s event the buy rate increase by 16,600 which is the second best number the company has done this year since Hard To Kill which did around 66,000 buys.
When you factor in that TNA also sold out the venue for this event ending up with around 4,100 people in attendance (which is one of biggest sold out events for the company post the SPIKE TV era) then you have a promotion that is not only succeeding but thriving as well as…Slammiversary 2024 will go as one of best shows for TNA especially from the business side of things.
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