Well, Joe has an established history of being a main eventer in TNA. Yeah, he hasn't done it recently, but the history matters and he could be thrown right back into it without any longtime fans batting an eye (Abyss is another example of this, for a non-TNA example, see the fact that we're supposed to consider Kane a legitimate threat to Cena).
Roode and Storm are both in that sort of "tryout" ME phase. Like when CM Punk cashed in on Jeff Hardy.
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