Lack of Impact: How TNA is Misusing Trevor Lee

When one thinks about pro wrestling’s most promising future stars, the name Trevor Lee most definitely comes to mind. At only 22 years old and trained by Jeff and Matt Hardy, Lee has already made a name for himself in a relatively short amount of time on the independent scene for such promotions as Pro Wrestling Guerrilla, OMEGA, and Global Force Wrestling.

Having been wrestling since his mid-teens, Lee has developed an electrifying style. He has kept fans entertained as he has proven time and time again that he is a terrific in-ring performer. Trevor Lee has held various titles for a number of promotions all across the USA.

TNA got its first taste of Trevor Lee back in August 2015 during Jeff Jarrett’s Global Force Wrestling invasion angle. Lee and Brain Myers defeated The Wolves (Eddie Edwards and Davey Richards) for the TNA Tag Titles in Sept 2015. Lee and Myers lost the titles back to The Wolves a week later. They had a rematch at Bound for Glory in October 2015 but were unsuccessful in regaining the titles. When the GFW invasion angle ended, TNA officially signed Trevor Lee and another rising star Andrew Everett to contracts.

Getting Trevor Lee on the roster was a huge win for TNA. With the majority of its roster being former WWE wrestlers, Trevor Lee represented a fresh face for TNA to showcase. He was without a doubt someone who would be able to revive the nearly dead X Division.

But TNA had other plans, after adding Trevor Lee to its website roster page in Oct 2015; TNA put him on a 4 month hiatus. Yes, TNA thought it would be best to keep him off TV for 4 months. Here TNA had the opportunity to showcase young talent and add excitement to the X Division but felt giving Lee a 4 month break was the better option.

Trevor Lee reappeared in Feb 2016 on IMPACT Wrestling. On this episode, he defeated Tigre Uno for the X Division title. Putting the title on him was the right thing to do, but after a 4 month disappearance, you have to wonder if any of the TNA fans even remembered who he was. It would have been much better and more beneficial to put him on TV right away after signing him. Those 4 months could have been used to build up Trevor Lee, showcase his skills, and start the re-emergence of the floundering X Division. Trevor Lee vs. Andrew Everett (who also was nowhere to found on TNA TV) would have been incredible. A series of matches between these two could have really generated interest.

After winning the X Division title, Trevor Lee defended the title only twice on IMPACT and both times against Tigre Uno. They were very good matches and delivered excellent excitement. After the second title defense though, Trevor Lee was taken off IMPACT for about 1 month. Again, I am not sure why this decision was made.

Trevor Lee made his return on the March 29^th edition of IMPACT as it was advertised that we were to find out the status of the X Division. But that segment had nothing to do with the X Division but was about Gregory Helms, who is serving as Trevor Lee’s manager, wanting to team with Eddie Edwards and go after the tag titles. All Trevor Lee did was stand in the ring and look as mean as he could while all the emphasis was on Gregory Helms and Eddie Edwards. Once again, TNA wasted an opportunity to showcase their best young star.

The following week on the April 6^th episode of IMPACT, Lee was back in the ring with Helms and again, the segment was about Helms and Edwards. Trevor Lee stood around looking like an idiot. When Helms and Lee threatened Edwards, Beer Money came to the ring and chased out Lee and Helms. Lee and Helms disappeared and the segment then turned into a Beer Money/Decay confrontation. Another chance to feature their X Division champion but again, TNA missed the opportunity.

On April 12^th, there was a backstage segment with Eddie Edwards laid out and Josh Mathews mentioning that Eddie Edwards was scheduled to face X Division Champion Trevor Lee on the show. So the Trevor Lee was set to meet Eddie Edwards in what would have surely been a tremendous match but there was not one bit of advertising for it. With Edwards out of the match, DJ Z was the replacement to face Trevor Lee in what was a non title match. I was happy TNA was giving us a match with Trevor Lee but they managed to screw that up as well. The outcome of the match was DJ Z pinning Trevor Lee clean in the middle of the ring to get a victory! What a travesty. It made Trevor Lee look very weak and made me wonder if Lee can’t beat DJ Z, how would he fare against former ROH World Champion Eddie Edwards? It also convinced me that TNA has no clue anymore about pushing new talent.

What they should have done was had Trevor Lee win the X Division title and have him defending it successfully every week on IMPACT. It would have made him look strong and a credible champion.

To the casual wrestling fan, TNA is just an organization of ex-WWE wrestlers who were either terminated or left the company. The thought process of the casual fan is, if they aren’t good enough to make it in WWE then they must not be worth watching. TNA should not want to be known as a dumping ground for wrestlers the WWE gets rid of. Granted wrestlers like EC3, Drew Galloway, and Bobby Lashley have thrived but TNA should be looking to generate new “homegrown” stars in addition to the veterans they have.  Trevor Lee was the perfect individual to begin with but TNA has totally misused him thus far. Let’s hope during the next TV tapings which are this week, we see an improvement the way TNA is pushing new talent.