TNA News: Report on TNA's current financial position with wrestler pay delayed, why the issue is coming to the surface now


By James Caldwell, PWTorch assistant editor


Reports have surfaced of TNA appearing to be experiencing financial difficulties. One of the main reasons cited is payments to wrestlers have been delayed, which is not a new issue, but affects the majority of TNA's roster - lower-card wrestlers.

The issue of payments being delayed has occurred over the past few years, according to TNA sources. It has become more prevalent since Bruce Prichard was hired to an executive role overseeing Talent Relations in the role previously held by Terry Taylor, which likely contributed to why the issue surfaced now.

Last year, the issue was made public by Jimmy Yang, who noted on Twitter that it took several weeks for him to get paid for a one-off TV appearance as part of TNA bringing back X Division alumni for a series of matches.

Regular TNA wrestlers are supposed to be paid within a two-week period after performing on television. However, the main issue in the present is related to house show pay, according to sources.

The house show pay system begins with a list of pay-outs submitted to Prichard's office. Prichard approves the accuracy of the list, which is sent to the corporate office (Panda Energy) in Texas to cut checks to the wrestlers. The process has slowed down dramatically in recent months, according to sources. And, with TNA running more house shows than ever before in company history, some wrestlers will go 2-3 weekend tours before being paid for the first tour.

Not all wrestlers have been affected, as many of the 75 or so talent on the roster are paid on-time, or at least have not expressed concern over pay. However, more and more talent are voicing their concerns about delayed payments since the issue has started to affect more people.

Lower-card wrestlers and Knockouts are most affected since pay-outs go from top-to-bottom, according to sources. Top and upper-mid-card stars are taken care of first, then it trickles down to the lower-card wrestlers. The top-line stars are generally paid on time.

One source estimated that the sum of money paid to Sting per appearance is roughly equal to what it would take to cover 75-90 percent of the roster at the end of the payscale. However, since Sting is a priority, after Sting is paid his fee, TNA still has the remaining portion of the roster to pay, which can cause delays.

The result is that it makes it seem like TNA is having financial difficulties because the majority of the roster is not being paid on time. The central issue, though, is Prichard's office appearing to be slow moving the pay-outs through the TNA/Panda pipeline.

The issue adds to the poor reputation Prichard has among many wrestlers in the locker room. Ex-WWE wrestlers were sold on TNA being the opposite type of company with a lighter schedule, no politics, more character input, and a family-like atmosphere. Prichard is viewed as bringing a WWE style of management to TNA, complete with creating an environment where wrestlers feel they have to "walk on eggshells" and play political games, which is what ex-WWE wrestlers tried to get away from by joining TNA.

Overall, sources say they do not believe TNA is experiencing dramatic financial difficulty, as Spike TV continues to pay TNA to air Impact Wrestling and the recent partnership with Direct Auto Insurance has proven to be a lucrative deal. Merchandise sold at TNA house shows has also proven to be a steady, consistent money-maker. However, with more and more wrestlers having their pay delayed, it is causing concern that TNA's corporate office is taking a closer look at the

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“Be Who You Are and Say What You Feel Because Those Who Mind Don't Matter and Those Who Matter Don't Mind.” ~ Dr. Suess


Nice Guys Finish Last

Thank you,and have a nice day !

Former TNA Employees Voice Their Thoughts On Vince Russo
By Daniel Pena
Apr 2, 2012 - 1:08:12 PM


Four new chapters from Barbaric Wrestling Radio host Brett Buchanan’s free TNA e-book The Genesis of TNA have been released on BarbaricWrestling.com and TNAbook.net. The new chapters are about Sting, Kurt Angle, Vince Russo, the possibility of TNA being sold, and the Knockouts. Also check out free shoot interviews with Christian, AJ Styles, Chris Sabin, Rob Van Dam, Samoa Joe, Rampage Jackson, Jay Lethal, Devon, and many more to come on Barbaric Wrestling Radio’s YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/user/BWRofficial. Below is an excerpt from The Genesis of TNA ‘Chapter 22: Russo’s Return & The Knockouts’ about Vince Russo’s return to TNA in fall 2006. You can read the rest on BarbaricWrestling.com:

Kurt Angle coming to TNA may have been the biggest story in TNA in September 2006, but there was also a massive creative team overhaul which coincided with Angle’s signing and TNA’s new primetime timeslot. Scott D’amore and his booking committee were out of power, and Vince Russo returned to TNA after two years to work on creative with Jeff Jarrett and Dutch Mantell. Russo had previously left TNA in 2004 to explore his newfound religion. He launched a short lived religious wrestling promotion called Ring of Glory, but otherwise he stayed away from the wrestling business. Russo returned in 2006 because he felt Jarrett needed his help, especially with Jeff’s wife Jill beginning to enter the final stages of breast cancer (Jill later passed in May 2007). Russo’s return was met with mixed reactions backstage.

RUDY CHARLES: That was a time where they’d had that booking team in play [with Scott D’amore]. It’s one of those times where all the sudden there is Vince up at the office, I’m not sure what’s going on. I come to find out they had kind of had a shake up and the creative team is now Jeff, Dutch, and Vince. I had always liked Vince, I was glad to see him back. I thought he in a lot of ways breathed some new life back into the product you know. Each guy has their own philosophy so he kind of took it in a different direction. It was interesting and exciting times.

SONJAY DUTT: I thought okay obviously it’s going to be different I knew that the concentration that Scott had on matches was pretty much going to be done with that regime just because of what they favor over what Scott favors. But I didn’t think it was bad, I didn’t know what to expect. I really didn’t think this is going to be a negative or a positive I just thought hey this is different and maybe this could be advantageous to me, maybe it could be advantageous to X-Division guys because this regime is a little bit more character driven, more personality driven, more vignette driven shit like that so maybe this is good for us. Ultimately you could say that it was, we all got characters, we all got personalities, and we were all presented in a much different light than we were in the past regimes that were in power.

BILL BEHRENS: There’s always been a pocket in the industry that have difficulty with the Vince, and the basic difficulty that people have with Vince is that some of the beliefs he has are inconsistent with what a lot of us believe to be true. With that said Vince also has good ideas and is a talented man, and coming in to help write the show with Dutch and Jeff, and I learned a good bit about what little I know about booking from Dutch Mantell having worked with him in the earliest part of my booking experience at USWA when he took over for Mike Samples. So I always had great respect for Dutch in general as a booker, and Vince really was the guy that was writing the show Dutch and Jeff were more booking the show. Vince really, and Vince will say this point blank, until July [2009] he never was booking. People were on the committee and called the booker whether it was Jeff or Scott D’amore.

DAVID YOUNG: Actually we were all happy about Russo coming back at that point because most of the young guys were getting pushed when Russo was there so we had [dealt] with the D’amores and everybody else so we actually had high hopes when he came back in.

LARRY ZBYSZKO: The politics always kept changing, and then all of the sudden out of the blue Russo is back. Half their friends were back then everything got weird so I played golf and took a break…When Russo came back I just kind of shook my head because I realized TNA wasn’t going to go anywhere quick, because I know what their philosophy is.

PETEY WILLIAMS: At that point there was so many booking changes, like Jeff was in, then Dusty was in, then Scott was in, then it’s like okay now who is in charge? Okay Jeff’s in charge again, oh and Dutch. And now they’re not in charge, and Vince is in charge? It [was so] different all the time, at that point I was like alright somebody would hand me a sheet of what I got to do for the day and I was like just get it done.

Once the creative team of Jeff Jarrett, Dutch Mantell, and Vince Russo took over the product went in a different direction, based more on gimmicks than the wrestling based product Scott D’amore and Mike Tenay championed. One thing that happened that surprised many fans was that immediately after taking over booking Jeff Jarrett removed himself from television and never was in the world title picture again. There were many controversial storylines and gimmicks at the time including the former New Age Outlaws going under the name VKM, Voodoo Kin Mafia. VKM are the initials for Vincent Kennedy McMahon. VKM would trash WWE and their new version of DX and many fans thought TNA came off as desperate for attention with the storyline. Chris Sabin and Alex Shelley formed the Motor City Machine Guns in 2007 and became a fan favorite tag team, despite never holding tag team gold until 2010.

Sting and Abyss also began a feud which involved many infamous gimmick matches and a storyline where Sting said he knew Abyss had shot his own father in the back three times, sending him into a coma. Then Abyss’ manager brought Abyss’ mother to the Impact Zone and said Abyss’ mother had actually shot his father and that Abyss was just trying to protect her by saying he did it. Mitchell later brought in his “son” Judas Mesias to feud with Abyss. Before researching this I actually thought Mitchell was Abyss’ storyline father, but I got that confused with the Undertaker, Kane and Paul Bearer WWF storyline. At some point Sting and Abyss were having a match at a PPV which prompted the first “Fire Russo” chants. Despite Russo’s infamous reputation in the business many wrestlers noted how open he was to working with talent on their characters and storylines.

RUDY CHARLES: I sat in on every creative meeting for three and a half years. I think people were quick to blame too much on Vince, it was a three member booking team. Ultimately Jeff had the veto power, but if Vince felt passionately about something or Dutch did they would explain their side of the story. Sometimes Jeff would say okay let’s try it that way, sometimes he’d say no I really think we really need to do it this way.

PETEY WILLIAMS: So Team Canada broke up and we did our first PPV in Detroit [Bound For Glory 2006]. So I was in a battle royal match, no big deal. I asked Vince, I had just moved to Orlando, I think he had just got the book again, I said hey Vince what have you got for me am I on TV’s [or] whatever, he’s like oh yeah stop by The Impact Zone and we’ll talk if we got time. I was like oh great, I just moved to Orlando and now it’s like I’m getting the cold shoulder, so I’m like whatever. So then I’m the last man in the 20 man Battle Royal, and I come out the place goes nuts. I get in the ring and I do the [Canadian] Destroyer, the place goes nuts. I get eliminated and I come to the back, I’m watching the next match and Vince comes up to me and he says hey Petey good stuff out there, he’s like hey man I have a great idea for you, listen stop by the Impact Zone on Monday or whatever it was tomorrow, he’s like I want to sit down I want to go through some ideas with you, and then he leaves. I’m like is that what it takes, he saw that I was over and that the fans liked me, and that’s when he tried to turn me into a United States character, you know he spent a lot of time with me trying to work on that character and it didn’t go well so he stopped fighting for the character and stuff. A year passes by and at the next Bound For Glory Vince was like you know Petey, we’ve got to come up with a character for you. It was kind of like this is it, if this doesn’t work I don’t know what to do with you. So then that’s when we came up with the Maple Leaf Muscle character, I pitched that to him and he loved it. He gave me some promo time and then he loved the backstage promo and he was like hey Petey listen, he’s like this character that you are doing back here in this promo, if you don’t portray the same character in the ring this isn’t going to work. I’m thinking like man I have a match tonight this is the only time I can do it, so I go out there it was like a four way match Scott Steiner was in there I had some interaction with him. I get backstage and Vince is standing there with a straight look on his face and he goes hey Petey, come here. I’m like oh shit, he goes why didn’t you tell me that you could do this earlier? Oh my god this is great, we could team you with Scotty down the line, and I’m like oh thank god.

SONJAY DUTT: They asked me what I wanted to do character wise and I presented them the character I always wanted to do that Bollywood superstar, I wanted to come to the ring and do a whole dance number like Bollywood movies and this and that and they told me that at the time Ron Killings was imitating Hollywood movies or something and it was too similar, I don’t know. They had some ideas for what they wanted to do with me and Russo personally asked me my opinion what I thought what I felt, from there the Guru [character] was born and we worked very closely from that point on.

CODY DEANER: [Russo] was very open, and very willing to talk with you. It was refreshing for me as a new talent coming into a big company. I’d never really worked extensively with a national company before and I was kind of expecting to have to pitch ideas to a middle man or have to go through somebody but that wasn’t the case. I would talk with Vince Russo himself backstage, I would correspond with him through e-mails. He was very approachable and very willing to be acceptable of creative ideas from talent. He was excellent to work with.

RUDY CHARLES: It’s funny because some of the stuff [internet fans] blamed Russo on was a Dutch idea or Jeff idea. You can’t win sometimes.

PETEY WILLIAMS: Russo used to make fun of [Steiner] right to his face. He’s like you know what we’re taking one take whatever you say, we’re taking it. [Scott] is like no no no, I don’t want to stumble with my words. Vince is like no man that’s good. He’s like you have all this pent up frustration you want to release it. [Scott] is like I don’t want to look stupid! [Vince] is like no this is good this is great.

CODY DEANER: We were handed, I don’t want to call it a script, we were handed a format a quote on quote, with what was the gist of whatever we were trying to accomplish but I was told specifically numerous times from Vince Russo himself that the things that were written down were not my lines I had to memorize and do. He wanted me to be myself, get the same ideas across but in a creative way in a way I thought Cody Deaner would do it. That was really nice because I’ve heard horror stories from the WWE, you know you’re handed a script. I’ve seen [WWE scripts] and I’ve been there because I’ve done work with the WWE and been backstage and seen guys being handed a script, and seeing them walking around backstage and memorizing their lines. TNA is not like that.

RUDY CHARLES: There was definitely some memorable stuff going on at that time, some good stuff I thought some of it wasn’t so good. I think for the most part, Vince’s philosophy I guess has always been kind of throwing an arrow and seeing what lands. I think a lot of stuff was pretty good back in those days, as the ratings were kind of going up and up at the time.

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“Be Who You Are and Say What You Feel Because Those Who Mind Don't Matter and Those Who Matter Don't Mind.” ~ Dr. Suess


Nice Guys Finish Last

Thank you,and have a nice day !

--TNA has released Scott Steiner, although he is still with Ring Ka King.

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More on the Deal Between TNA and Spike, Both Hoping for 2 Million Weekly Viewers
By Marc Middleton
Apr 9, 2012 - 3:20:58 PM


- As noted last week, TNA Impact Wrestling will air on Spike TV through October 2014 after TNA and Spike signed a new deal. The current deal was set to expire this October. A lot of people in TNA are relieved right now because the deal was signed and signed as early as it was.

One of the topics discussed in negotiations was UFC's Ultimate Fighter, which left Spike for FX as a part of UFC's big deal with FOX. Ultimate Fighter is only doing around 1.2 million viewers while TNA brings in around 1.7 million for Spike weekly, most of that being the coveted Males 18-34 demographic. The goal for TNA and Spike with the new deal is to bring the viewership up to 2 million per week.

The new contract is only for Impact Wrestling but if other TNA TV projects come up, Spike is interested in discussions. Another possibility is live Impact specials but there was no talk of those happening during negotiations.

The new contract also does not cover episodes of Impact being taped on the road but TNA and Spike are planning to hold more tapings outside of Orlando this year.

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“Be Who You Are and Say What You Feel Because Those Who Mind Don't Matter and Those Who Matter Don't Mind.” ~ Dr. Suess


Nice Guys Finish Last

Thank you,and have a nice day !

Spike and TNA signed a two year contract extension through October of 2014. A lot of people in TNA are breathing easier because it had been openly talked about the idea that Eric Bischoff and Spike would start their own promotion in the time slot, with the idea that TNA wouldn’t be able to get any TV, or at least TV that would pay them enough to survive, and then the promotion would end up by default getting all the talent they wanted. There was a lot of fear that there are people who Bischoff wouldn’t have kept, plus, Bischoff is so universally disliked, it’s one thing if he’s got power and all in booking but it’s another if he’s actually the guy running the company for Spike. There are probably a lot of reasons it didn’t happen, including all the lawsuits that would likely go back-and-forth, how Spike would be viewed in such a situation and that if TNA went under and everyone became a free agent, who is to say that WWE wouldn’t then sign most of the talent up and leave Bischoff with a stripped down version. In the press release, they claimed TNA has gone from 700,000 viewers to 2 million in its nearly seven years on the network. Actually, TNA debuted with an 0.8 rating in an 11 p.m. Saturday night time slot, and now it’s been doing 1.0 and 1.1 ratings for two hours at 9 p.m. on Thursday. I think just the time slot difference alone should have been worth more when it comes to growth. They probably did 700,000 in their worst week on Saturday night going against a big UFC PPV. They did hover around 2 million viewers the show after Bound for Glory, but are nowhere close now. An interesting note when it comes to people comparing stats from even a few years ago is that with the old ratings of a few years back, they only measured live viewing, even though every home had a VCR. However, now they include DVR viewership, which is pretty much the same thing. Besides, once ROH with no promotional budget, stars or publicity showed up on Saturday nights, a far worse night, doing 1.0s, that really exposed just how unimpressive a 1.0 for pro wrestling really is. There were hints of adding new programming on Spike with the new deal.

At this point there are no tapings on the road on the schedule. The inability to move ratings at all with those shows, which were far more expensive to produce, has left them doing all Impact TV tapings in Orlando.

This week’s Kurt Angle story is that he tore his hamstring (which is why he wrestled Jeff Hardy in a TV match a few days later without limping or anything) and claimed it’s 50/50 he’s going to the Olympic trials. In other words, he’s going to kill himself in the Lockdown cage match and be unable to go. He said he wants to go to the trials but if his hamstring injury gets worse he can’t. Yeah, one would think resting a blown hamstring for the Olympic trials would take precedent over working television matches three days later. He said his TNA job is his No. 1 priority. First off, if doing TV matches on a blown hamstring is a bigger priority, why is he even wasting his time and everyone else’s time talking about Olympic training other than it’s this year’s version of him going to UFC. Anyway, this situation is exactly what everyone predicted going in and Kurt is not competing in the Olympic trials no matter what he may or may not be saying publicly.

For Lockdown on 4/15 in Nashville, we’re still not sure if the tag title match will be Samoa Joe & Magnus vs. Chris Sabin & Alex Shelley (as it is currently billed), or a three way also involving Mexican America. Considering how easy Mexican America lost on TV two weeks in a row, you’d think they wouldn’t be added, but on the go-home show, they were in the angle. Devon vs. Robbie E for the TV title has been added. In the Team Garett vs. Team Eric Lethal Lockdown match, if Team Garett wins, then Eric has to leave TNA forever and can never use the name Eric Bischoff in any endeavors. Somehow I don’t see Eric living up to that one when it comes to TV show production, or Facebook account. If Garett loses, he has to leave TNA forever. Obviously that’s not happening either, although he could always comeback as the Midnight Garett.

Lars Ulrich, the drummer of Metallica, was on Howard Stern on 4/10 and asked about the story that Hulk Hogan was asked to join the band when he was younger. Ulrich started laughing at the story, saying he heard it two or three months ago and had no recollection of it happening. He then joked that anything is possible between 5 a.m. and 7 a.m. when your noses are bleeding. Ulrich said he wasn’t much of a wrestling fan, and said perhaps Hogan auditioned under his Christian name.

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The idea of Bully Ray as world champion has been broached. There was the feeling that he’s not world champion material, just because six months ago he wouldn’t have been. But internally they feel he is the best heel in the business right now. In some ways he is. The thing is, there is that mentality of world champion being the classic worker doing the 15-20 minute world title style match and looking like the athlete in more traditional ring wear, like Roode or Angle while Ray is more the street fighter brawler who usually isn’t world champion. Really, this isn’t ten years ago or 20 years ago where it even matters. I can’t imagine Ray doing any worse (or honestly, any better) than they are doing right now. The problem is if you put Ray as champion, then who does he defend against? Sting? Hardy? Storm? Sting isn’t the answer as the last buy rate showed, and Ray vs. Hardy and Storm has already been done to death, not that there is going to be a fresh match-up for Roode, and if Storm wins the title, it’s Ray and Angle, who he’s already wrestled to death, and Roode who he hasn’t but will in short order.

Adam “Pacman” Jones, who briefly worked here while suspended by the NFL, has said he wants to come back to wrestling, likely once his NFL career is over. NFL contracts now make it difficult to do pro wrestling when you are an active player because you aren’t allowed to do anything your team considers dangerous. Jeff Jarrett trained Jones and I can recall him saying that he’d never seen someone who caught on as fast, but Jones was not allowed to do anything by the Tennessee Titans, who he was playing for at the time, so we never got to see it.

I don’t have an answer for this, but it is really weird how when Bellator wasn’t running shows, how there were constant mentions of them on TV and even product placement stuff, and now that they are on weekly, it’s never mentioned. Ditto, last season on almost every Bellator show, they would plug TNA, and this season it is never mentioned. What makes it weird is that Spike didn’t own Bellator last season and now they do, and when the bought it they specifically talked about doing more cross-promotion with TNA.

Bruce Prichard was not back at TV this past week after suffering either one or two heart attacks.

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--Matt Morgan did an interview with PWtorch.com and noted that his contract is up in October. He said he was loyal to TNA but he's a businessman first and is not ruling out a return to WWE. "To say I wouldn't go back would be dumb on my part and it would be a lie. But at the same time, I really am, I know people don't like this answer who are pro-WWE and not so pro-TNA, but that's the truth, I am loyal to those who are loyal to me. The minute, the day TNA stops being loyal to me as I feel I am being to them, that's a different discussion all to itself and I definitely would weigh my options a lot differently if and when that day ever came." He said he's happy with TNA and how he's been treated.




Sunday is TNA's Lockdown from Nashville, the company's traditional No. 2 show of the year:. All matches in a cage

Bobby Roode vs. James Storm for TNA title

Team Eric of Eric Bischoff & Gunner & Bully Ray & Kazarian & Christopher Daniels vs. Team Garett of Garett Bischoff & RVD & Mr. Anderson & A.J. Styles & Austin Aries - Either Eric or Garett, depending on which team loses, has to leave town

Jeff Hardy vs. Kurt Angle

Samoa Joe & Magnus vs. Motor City Machine Guns for tag titles

Matt Morgan vs. Crimson

Gail Kim vs. Velvet Sky for Knockouts title

Devon vs. Robbie E for TV title

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I was listening to Meltzer talk, and he thinks we could get Hogan-Flair at Bound for GLory and the original thought was it to be at last night's ppv.

Getting a second and third TNA show....?

http://www.prowrestling.net/artman/publ ... 4888.shtml

TNA president Dixie Carter comments on going live, the new time slot, Open Fight Night, competing with WWE, Garett Bischoff, Ric Flair's WWE Hall of Fame inductions, why she's proud of Jeff Hardy
Apr 30, 2012 - 04:00 PM

Busted Open satellite radio show with Dixie Carter
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Visit Facebook.com/bustedopen for more information

On “Open Fight Night”: "I’m excited about where we’re gonna go with it. I think it will just continue to get better week after week. I love the concept. As we’re continuing to grow our developmental league, this was just a great opportunity for us to take something that we do on an ongoing basis and let the people see it. About six or seven months ago, we were having some guys try out, and somebody was literally going to get a shot at being on the show that night, and a couple of guys really impressed.

"And two of the guys that were part of that were Anthony Neese and Jesse Sorensen. It was like real-life drama being played out backstage; they were literally fighting for their lives and their match was unbelievable! We were sitting there watching them in this empty arena. It just had such a great vibe to it. So it’s just something that we thought people might want to see a real glimpse of what we do. And this is real; these guys are people that we’ve had our eyes on that we’re looking at. And it’s a tremendous amount of pressure when that red light goes on to put those nerves in check and get out there and perform like we know those guys can do."

On New Time Slot: "There’re more viewers available in that time slot. There’s a younger audience that’s available. When the kids are not in school, we have really really high younger numbers, and that fluctuates depending on what’s going on with school year all the way up through college even. So I think it will be interesting to see what happens. Spike thought it was an exciting opportunity for us to try and we’re going to, and we’ll see what happens.

"I think what we’re trying to do is be more consistent with the bleeping of the language. I mean, we can all go see the movie Shrek and we get one thing out of it, our kids get another thing out of it. That’s the line that we have to walk: to provide something that is going to be an edgy product, but do it in a way that is not going to be offensive. And we just have to stay consistent at it."

On Hogan On TNA: "I hear all the time from people, Hulk Hogan is on my television screen all the time! And I think if people put a clock to what he does on TV and then if I put a clock on what he does for our company, it’s just a misconception amongst a small percentage of viewers. If you like Impact! Wrestling, then you should love Hulk Hogan because that man is working his tail off for us and he’s expanding our brand and growing our perception and awareness level out there in ways that it would take us so long to accomplish. He’s really rolled up his sleeves, he shows up to work if he’s not on television. He is there to help build the next generation of stars. I’ll fight anybody who tries to take that away from him, and that’s a big frustration to hear it stated any other way. If you like Impact! Wrestling, he’s doing nothing but helping us on every level.

"If you look at who’s getting the air-time on our show, it’s definitely not Hulk Hogan—he wasn’t even on for six months. It’s not the Stings, it’s not the Ric Flairs, but those guys add something that few other wrestlers can add. But it’s the Bobby Roodes, it’s the James Storms, it’s the Bully Rays, it’s now the Austin Aries, it’s those people that, if you look at the minutes of match time and promo time, far exceed anybody else. All the people that are holding the belts right now: Chris Daniels, Kazarian, Joe and Magnus. There are so many new faces. And I think for the first time in our history, we have really been consistent and given that focus and push to this younger roster of people, and I think that they’ve really stepped up and done a great job with the opportunity that they’ve been given.

"What Hulk does the most of now is he truly is talking with these younger guys and working with them on their matches and the psychology of their matches. On-screen and off-screen, he’s backstage talking with these young guys when they go out, when they come back, in the agents’ meetings… It’s just on every level, he’s helping these guys. He’s trying to help define and develop the next Hulk Hogan. And that’s hard to be, but just even the process and potential of that…when you’re in my shoes, that’s a great opportunity to be given."

On Jeff Hardy – Sting Disaster: "I’m so proud of Jeff Hardy. His potential is so unlimited, he’s never known how good he really is, he’s an incredibly humble man, and he has turned his life completely around. I feel blessed to have been a small small part of that in supporting him and helping put the structure in place. He’s just been amazing. He’s a father, a wonderful husband, and he’s got his priorities right and his health. Therefore, I think we’re seeing the best work from him he’s ever done.

On TNA’s Growth Plan: Those things don’t happen overnight, and you don’t stay in business unless you make really good business decisions. Touring is an incredibly expensive proposition. It’s almost a half-a-million dollars a night, and if I were playing a major arena, the cost would only go up maybe ten or fifteen thousand dollars, twenty thousand dollars. So it doesn’t matter where we play, it’s very expensive, and we’ll play those when we feel like we’ll have the ability to sell more tickets. The growth plan is to grow not just Impact! but grow TNA Entertainment in a variety of different ways.

"We’re really breaking out into some areas worldwide and having some great global success. Our rating in the United Kingdom (we’ve only been on four-and-a-half years there, going on five years) we are the highest-rated wrestling show in the United Kingdom. We are selling out big arenas there, and it’s an exciting thing. The time will happen in the United States as well, but it’s tough getting that kind of popularity when you only have a two-hour show with so much talent. We need to grow that, we need to have more programming and be seen in more places and in different ways, and that’s one of the things we’re working on.

On Competing with WWE: "We wanna be the best company we can be. If you haven’t watched TNA in a long time, there’s no better time to come back and give it a try. I don’ think we’ve ever turned out better stories, the in-ring action has been fantastic, the focus on the younger talent...it’s exactly where it needs to be for us to grow. And we had to do that to really see being able to take that step forward and growing our company with a whole new crop of stars. We had to give them this kind of focus to be able to take it to another level. In the United Kingdom, we have multiple shows, our pay-per-views air for free, so we have a lot more exposure over there and the end result is our ratings are significantly higher and much more competitive to the point where we beat our competitor."

On PPV Buys: "Our focus in the past has been growing our television brand. And, again, when you only have one show to try to drive people to it, it’s too many pay-per-views for only having one show. It’s very difficult to try to do big arching pay-per-views once a month with only one two-hour show. If we had two shows, it would be much easier, three it would be much much easier. But I think the pay-per-view business is a declining business and we’ve gotta stay current with new technology. People are not even watching television the way they did twenty-four, eighteen months ago. All of the headlines today are about the shrinking ratings. It’s not that the viewership is down as much, but people are watching differently: they’re watching on their phones, their iPads, they’re DVR-ing, and it’s gonna change. Things in the next twelve to twenty-four months are gonna change as well."

On a Second Show: "I think you’ll see something second of ours and maybe even third of ours. Whether it’ll be on Spike or another network, it’s definitely part of our plan. We just need to become more mainstream, have more exposure in different ways and with different shows—a top priority for our company."

On Ric Flair’s 2nd WWE Hall of Fame Induction: "It was the easiest decision in the world! Why would I ever consider keeping a man who is so deserving of that second award from being recognized? I am not completely selfless—and there may be something coming up here pretty soon that might get people’s eyebrows raised—but regardless of anything, I would never have stopped Ric from receiving an award that is so deserved."

On Garret Bischoff: "He’s a very very talented kid. I told him from the beginning, Look you are going to have to be better than the next guy because people are going to be so much more critical of you than they would anybody there. And I think because of that, it’s a really difficult position to be in, and I respect his guts because it does take a lot—quite honestly—to be able to face that and all these critics. But the kid’s got talent, he really really does. Just like others, he’s been cycled into a solid storyline, and there’s ebbs and flows to kind of keep people in the limelight. But he’s no different than a Crimson who’s on a great winning streak or a Magnus. There’s a handful of other guys that we have who are new that we are trying to break. And I think it’s unjust to give him that criticism when no one is saying that about a Gunner, or a Crimson, or a Magnus. And his in-ring abilities are equal to those guys."

On Kurt Angle: "There will never be enough words to describe what Kurt has done for TNA. It’s one thing to be a Ric Flair and a Hogan for us on this level. Words will never describe what he has meant to this company. We’ve had some great icons joining us, but for him to be in the ring, absolutely the greatest wrestler of all time. And to be the ring general, to make so many matches look so great, to help so many talent grow and become better…there’s no one like him. And his dedication to the company to me has been just unbelievable."

On Going Live: "I would love to be live, I really would! Some people don’t think that would be the difference, some people think being out on the road more. I don’t think if we knew what the answer was, we could move there a lot more quickly.
It’s definitely cost. We sell a couple of shows back-to-back. Part of it is a cost-issue, and the other part is Do you stay in the Impact Zone and go live? I think you’re gonna see a lot of changes in the company to the end of this year and hopefully beyond. We’re looking at a lot of different ways to do business and shake some stuff up. I’m excited about the things we’re talking about."

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Well I was just reading that for the TNA Spoilers on May 10, Kazarian and Daniels will have pictures of AJ Styles and Dixe Carter making out.

That should be a winner.

"If I love TNA I love Hulk Hogan because blah, blah, blah." No, you don't get to dictate terms to me, as in, I hate seeing Hogan so I must by extension also hate TNA...

Let's just say, every second I see Hogan on the screen is one less second I see the talent performing. Same for Flair, same for Bischoff, same for "Immortal" and whatever dumbass factions/overwrought angles they want to delay the show with.

"We would get more PPV sales if we had more than one weekly show." No, you bint If I don't want to watch TNA, its equivalently easy for me to avoid one show a week versus two shows a week. My TV isn't locked onto Spike. That being said... I tune in for a PPV for quality matches; quality storylines. If these guys produce 2x the product for weekly viewing, they'll dilute what their current creative staff can deliver.

Travelling costs so damn much... Well, don't do it, then. The indy's seem to do it fine... Kiss goodbye to that revenue stream, though.

But you got to get out of Universal. Go back to Memphis and run out of the old... (state fairgrounds?) Get an audience who actually want to be there, not shmoes who think this is a theme ride. Universal sucked the life out of WCW; it sucks the life out of TNA.

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Middle Aged Crazy, like Uncle Terry

The company announced this week that Impact would be moving up an hour starting on the 5/31 show, and would air from that
point forward from 8-10 p.m. Eastern time. That will hurt them from June through August when more people are out from 8-9
p.m. The decision was made in response to the NFL expanding its Thursday night coverage on The NFL Network. Those in
TNA, as noted here, have talked about this as being a big issue come the fall. Going from 8-10 p.m. in the fall gives them a
small jump on the NFL games, which start at 8:20 p.m., and also allows them to end before “Jersey Shore” starts, if that show
will even be a factor come the fall. As far as whether this will be good or bad, it won’t be good in the summer. In the fall, it’s hard
to say because it’s good both good and bad points, but the NFL clearly hurt and Impact numbers are noticeably lower now
going into the summer than they were at this point last year. Dixie Carter was on Busted Open on Sirius and said the new time
slot will allow them to reach a younger audience and she claimed when kids aren’t in school, they have a high number of young
viewers but it fluctuates based on what is going on in school. So that’s the reason. She’s also pushed the idea that they need a
second or even a third television show, saying that they are doing too many PPV shows for only having two hours a week to
promote the shows. Hey, she said it, not me. She also said she thinks PPV is a declining business. I think it is for rank-and-file
shows, although I’m not even certain of that. Even in TNA a lot of people think the declines are running off the purchasers
constantly for years, and that WWE declines are based on having too much free television with main events, so most PPVs feel
like events you can skip, plus the repetitive nature of the main events with the same guys in top positions forever. With UFC, the
declines were also expected due to weak marquee main events and overexposure. But boxing has also shown major declines
for everything but the big fights. When you have a major event, PPV for everyone but TNA seems to be between a stable and
slightly growing business.

Carter did an interview where she said she would have never denied Ric Flair going into the WWE Hall of Fame a second time,
and that they did get something in exchange that would become evident, and then said she had said too much. Based on what
we were told, TNA was asking for Flair to be mentioned as being with TNA or as appearing through TNA, both of which were
turned down via call by Vince. The other thing they asked for was for a WWE performer to come in for one day and be a talking
head for interviews that would air on TNA home video releases. The last we had heard of the story was the wrestler requested
was Christian, who didn’t want to do it. HHH, who was involved in making the deal since he was the impetus in the Horseman
going in and knew if Flair wasn’t there it would be empty, pretty much made it clear that he was not going to screw up the deal.
Now all that may have changed because that was where things stood before the deal was made and were the two points being
haggled.

She also, when asked about the Garett Bischoff push, said that he’s a very talented guy and he has to be better than the next
guy because people are going to be more critical of him than anyone else. I think that’s half right. People are going to be more
critical of him but he’s not better than the next guy. But he does have a look and there may be potential with him. She said that
people don’t have the same criticism for Crimson, Magnus and Gunner and he’s equal in ring skills to all three of them. Again,
she said it, not me.

Hulk Hogan, through his legal team, has threatened to sue the web site TheDirty.com for publishing black and white stills from
the Hogan sex tape that Hogan said was filmed without his knowledge. At last word, they had not listened to the legal threat and
kept the photos up.

Hogan did an interview with the New York Post about TNA. He claimed that it has taken WWE ten years to make John Cena a
star (actually Cena debuted on television in 2002 and was a main event star by 2004), and tried to push TNA being different
from WWE in that it focuses more on the in-ring product. Well, it’s different because it talks about focusing more on the in-ring
product. He kept pushing they have a new idea that will change the business, but wouldn’t say what it is. “You can have a
wrestling idea, but you need to have these momentum shifting moves. We had the Hulkamania movement, then it shifted to be
beer-drinking Stone Cold ear, we reinvented the business with growing the black beared and becoming the bad, guy, what’s
that next level? I have this huge monster idea that I am going to throw out there that I really think is going to change the
business.” “We are going to give more power to the fans, make them more involved and more important. I can’t say much more,
but I can say this, I’m either going to be really right on this one or really wrong. If I’m wrong, you probably won’t see me again
because I’ll be hightailing out of here.” He also said that if you wanted a quick fix to company problems you’d put the title on Jeff
Hardy (of course they’ve done that in the past and it fixed nothing), but he said right now the belt needs to stay with Bobby
Roode, and said he’s a volcano ready to explode. I wish he was, but Roode really is an Arn Anderson, a guy who should have a
really good career and end up very well respected across the board, but will never be the catalyst for a boom period. He claimed
WWE is worried about him and TNA because Will Sasso did that skit making fun of him a few weeks ago, and they showed
footage of Lesnar beating him two weeks ago. He said that he doesn’t think he should be wrestling after seeing himself on
tape.

Scott Fishman, who has been Spike’s liaison with TNA, was promoted to Senior Vice President, Executive Producer with Spike.
He will continue to oversee the production of TNA, as well as assume the same duties with Bellator in 2013. He’s been with
Spike since 2003 and besides TNA, served the same duties with Spike from 2005-2011 with UFC.

Anarquia of Mexican America (Matt Barela, 38) was cut this past week. The Angle match that aired on TV was his blow-off. He’d
gotten a rep for not being a good worker some had categorized him as not safe to work with.

The “Longnecks and Rednecks” song that is James Storm’s entrance music is performed by Serg Salinas, who is the
husband of Dixie Carter, who has been featured a few times on Impact.

Hogan’s ex-wife, the former Linda Claridge, who still goes by the name Linda Hogan, was on the Wendy Williams show this
past week and said that she didn’t really think Hogan and best friend Ed Leslie had an affair. She had gone on a podcast when
asked about that and said how a little birdie had told her. In Hogan’s second autobiography, he claimed Linda’s mother had
claimed to her to have walked in on Hogan and Leslie making out, but Hogan said it was actually a blond woman. Granted, one
would think from behind Hulk Hogan could hardly have been mistaken for a blond woman, unless Leslie was fooling around
with a 6-foot-4 woman who weighs probably 270 or more and is bald on top. Linda, who Hulk had sued for defamation of
character, which is likely why she is changing her story, said that what she said was taken out of context. Not sure what part of
being a gay lover of Ed Leslie would be out of context. “When you’re mad and you’re going through a divorce, you say things you
just don’t mean.” She said she was just going with the banter the hosts of the show were going with. She also changed her
tune, saying, “I miss him and I miss the family. I miss the family unit. It was a good time with him.” But she did say she wants to
marry Charley Hill, her 23-year-old boyfriend. Hogan filed suit against her last year, charging her with both slander and libel,
both in the gay affair charge and in her charges while promoting her book that he was prone to violence and threatening and
violent outbursts during their marriage.

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TNA

TNA competing with the NFL

Yes, I'm going to watch the WCW circa 1996 over the NFL



What a bunch of fucking morons

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WCW circa 1996 was nWo era.

TNA is WCW2000.

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It doesn't matter

TNA sucks.

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Well that's a given.

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They can't get out of their own damn way.

Decent Scott Steiner interview. about 17 minutes.

http://fightnetwork.com/news/31265:inte ... -may-2012/

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Confirming Scott Steiner's recent tweet, TNA Wrestling has announced, via TMZ.com, that the company has signed Brooke Hogan to a deal. The following has been reported by TMZ:



TNA President Dixie Carter tells TMZ ... Brooke is NOT going to be a wrestler ... but rather an executive who will be tasked to develop female talent.



We're told Brooke's duties will help up and coming she-wrestlers develop their characters, help with backstage promos and even consult on entrance music.



Carter tells us, "Brooke is such a great talent who's really sharp and will make a great addition to the TNA family."

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I haven't watched TNA wrestling in years. I bet the same people are still there.

lol

Brooke Hogan. Really, just what that show needed.

Somewhere, Jerry Jarrett is laughing his ass off. I've joined him.

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Middle Aged Crazy, like Uncle Terry

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I've discovered that while I rarely pay attention to the product due to average at best sucking, I'm rather obsessed with TNA. Bankroll, national TV slot, and the ability to not be PG. Notice I didn't list talent this time. The talent in TNA is put over so much. "Oh, if only the people booking knew what to do with all this talent." Let me ask this section a question. Who on that roster over the last ten years strikes you as a total breakout star? Don't get me wrong, there are a ton of talented guys. But these young, supposedly hungry guys, have had every opportunity to be The Rock, Stone Cold, Mysterio , Flair, etc. If you look at much of the booking in the late 90's, it sucked. The talent makes us long for the good ol' days. Seriously, watch some of the late 90's RAW shows. Hot crowds, unbelievable talent, and half the show would be at least a page on this board ripping it per night. How's your Beaver Cleavage? Mine was a couple mountains of bad. By cracky.

So, to the AJ Styles', Samoa Joe's, Anderson's of the world, what have you got for me? Decide to want more. I guarantee creative didn't come to The Rock and say they had nothing for him in 98'. They did in 1997, when they stuck him the The Nation because they dropped the ball and he was black. Stop playing a roll. Stop complaining about what is given to you. Take it. Does anyone have any extra soap boxes? I've been on this one for a while and I think it's getting some cracks.

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A.J has potential to be great if given the chance.

Austin Ares- Dude has it all. He looks like he should. Has great mic skills and can work. If he was in the E he would be a top contender for US or Intercontinental. Just think of the matches he could have with Rhodes.

Rob Terry- Say what you will but when they where booking him as a monster he was tops. He lacks a little in the mike dept but if he was in the E he ,Vince would be all over pushing him

Finally, Matt Morgan. They can never seem to get him running long term. Starts and stops. The guy has the look and he is good on the mike.

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When I am stuck and need to figure something out I always remember the Immortal words of Socrates when he said:"I just drank what?"

Again, this is the same conversation we've had on this board for six years. Aries does have it all. He's maybe the one exception, as he's seized his opportunity. He also knew this was his last shot. Exactly what I'm talking about. Once and for all, Rob Terry absolutely sucks. He makes the Ultimate Warrior look like Ricky Steamboat. A.J. is an awesome in ring performer. Questionable mic skills. If everyone knows you're great in the ring, add something to your character.

Back to my narrative. While guys like AJ and Morgan have obvious talent, they don't make me want to pay to see them wrestle. I enjoy watching them work, but I'm not buying a PPV to watch A.J. wrestle oddly shaped Daniels for the 1,987th time. I'm not suggesting AJ die his hair blonde, roll with Flair, and sleep with Dixie. All while having his kids tattoo'd on his side. Why do I care about you? You've been here the longest? Cool. What else?

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TNA
In what is actually a much bigger story than it would appear on the surface, Don West, 48, who has been with the company from
its inception in 2002, has given notice. He will be taking a job as the General Manager of the Wenatchee Wild of the North
American Hockey League.West had been going on the road and running the merchandise stand, and with his hard sells, the
company’s merchandise business is huge which is how it remains profitable even when house shows draw less than 1,000
people most of the time.West announced from 2002 to 2011 with Mike Tenay, until the company signed Taz. The story is that
West was looking for something new, and had fallen in love with Washington the last time the company toured there. He was
also burning out on the travel associated with his TNA job. His new role will be more of a promotions oriented General
Manager. He won’t be in charge of players, building the roster and those aspects one usually associates with that position.
He’ll be in charge of marketing. He’ll be in charge of ideas for promoting the team and marketing and merchandising the team.


Dixie Carter in an interview on The Fight Club Chicago, when asked about Angle’s constant talks of going into MMA and the
Olympics, said, “He reallywanted to fight. He started training for it. But I said, `Look, if we can’t get the right deal with the right
organization to do it with, it’s just not worth doing if we can’t do it at the very top level.’ So, that’s why he decided to make a run at
the Olympics at his age. And I’ve got to tell you, if it hadn’t been for that last-minute injury, I think he was just pushing himself so
hard, working for me and training, I really feel like he had a good shot of making the team.” Please.

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BREAKING: In an attempt to boost ratings, TNA is considering bringing back the six-sided ring. Current creative plans are to have the traditional four-sided ring win the heavyweight title, setting up a feud. TNA is looking to accomplish two things. First, add heat to the ring feud. They also realize they screwed up by making Roode a credible champion, which goes against company policy. This was not a botch of the Shawn Michaels flip, but rather the subtle start to this epic, literal ring battle. More as we have it.

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I have not seen anything online. Who faces Crimson Sunday?

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When I am stuck and need to figure something out I always remember the Immortal words of Socrates when he said:"I just drank what?"

Gillberg

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I don't know how the Styles-Dixie angle will play out, but after Thursday, it looks like they had an affair and even her husband Surg punched Aj.

Dixie Carter did a press conference to promote the live show. She noted that right now Spike has given them a commitment of 12 live shows, between now and 8/16. She is trying to get it stretched until 8/23 based on it making sense with the previous taping schedule and not having to fly people in for a singular taping on 8/20 for the 8/23 show, and instead being able to tape two weeks worth on 8/27 and saving money.

Among the things she spoke about were that she thinks 12 PPV shows per year is too many and said they would be better off doing six to eight. She talked about possibly doing a live special on Spike in 2013. Why you would need a live special when you’re already doing two hours of weekly TV with main event caliber matches is beyond me. The whole deal of the live specials in the past was because the TV in those days were squash matches, so putting main event matches on were special. Plus, today is a creature of habit deal. In the days of Clash of Champions, which this would be modeled after, the Clash would do a much bigger rating than the regular TV show. Now, your TV audience is used to watching you at a certain time, and no matter what you put on, doing a show in a different time slot (or even heavily promoting on the same night an hour early) is going to do worse ratings.

She mentioned the idea of being interested in doing an outdoor PPV from Cyclone Stadium in Brooklyn, where they’ve drawn some of the biggest house show crowds in company history. Carter on the show this week announced that at Slammiversary, they would induct the first person into the TNA Hall of Fame. If they had a class of eight, it would be way too funny if they did John Cena, but obviously that’s not happening. To me, my feeling is the first thing I’d want to do is have a better Hall of Fame than WWE and you can’t out-produce it, but you can make it more credible. Unfortunately, to get it established you’d really need a dozen or so people the first few years as opposed to one, and it doesn’t look like the direction. It sounds more like the WCW Hall of Fame that they did at Slamboree every year in the 90s that nobody remembers past the fact Gordon Solie quit over it (not just that but it was the straw that broke the camel’s back) and it ended up being forgotten. The one thing WWE has to a degree is they are the name brand and they do include non-WWE guys. For TNA, I could see them doing Don West, since he’s leaving, but then it becomes something very different. A.J. Styles is too new unless they are using this as part of the Carter/Styles storyline. There’s no point in doing Hulk Hogan on his own as the first person, not that it isn’t a possibility. Jeff Jarrett was the founder, and perhaps that can be a way to bring him back since his "firing" angle, although we’ve heard nothing in that direction. If it was me, I’d open with a class of several, and have Randy Savage, Bruno Sammartino and Lou Thesz as part of the class, because that would immediately make a statement it’s not a family and friends Hall of Fame.

It’s been reported in some places that Chris Sabin will be leaving when his contract expires in August. I do know that he has discussed doing so, but that’s not 100% and a lot depends on the lay of the land over the next few months. There are a lot of different factors including if TNA does anything with him as a single, whether WWE will freeze any hiring of TNA talent due to the lawsuit, and the economic status of New Japan that would all likely be factors.

The one thing about Sabin possibly leaving, and Alex Shelley leaving, combined with A.J. Styles and James Storm both turning 35 in recent days is that TNA needs to start signing talent in their 20s and groom them. One of the reasons TNA was able to develop its own stars is they started a lot of guys in their early years when they focused more on the X Division, and then the guys grew out of the division. Now the division is basically Aries and Aries’ opponent of the month, and right now, there isn’t even an opponent of the month out there. TNA also had an advantage because years ago, WWE looked down its nose at independent stars, but with the success of Punk and Bryan, combined with the fact that most of the best guys in their developmental system (Rollins, Cesaro, Ohno, Ambrose) all came out of the indie scene, they have a very different view. All of those guys were people TNA could have had a shot at had they pursued them and passed. And when you’ve got guys like Styles whose athletic ability is his calling card, when you get near 40, that’s going to decline. The OVW deal was needed, certainly a step in the right direction, but there’s a warning sign for 3-5 years down the line if they don’t address it now. For all the talk within WWE of their own talent depth issues, and it’s not really talent depth but star depth, people have considered guys like Styles and Roode as young guys for so long that they don’t realize that’s no longer the case.

The Joseph Park/Abyss angle and the Carter/Styles angle, while they may not have been his original thoughts in the sense he first came up with them, they are both credited to Eric Bischoff and he’s the one who okayed them being pushed prominently. Both are at this point considered major successes, especially the latter because it’s the first TNA angle which has shown the ability to move ratings, even if it’s just quarter ratings.

-----

Regarding the big surprise debut on the 5/31 show, it didn’t happen. It was pushed until the 5/17 show, and then on 5/24, it was dropped completely. Either who they were working on fell through, or more likely, it was Brooke Hogan, and Spike and TNA decided it would be better off to promote her being there than introduce her as the big surprise. Plus, I think people would have groaned at her as the surprise. Since the main storyline each year involves the Hogan authority figure angle (vs. Sting, vs. Dixie, vs. Eric), the obvious Hulk vs. Brooke direction is there, particularly with the storyline that it was Dixie, not Hulk, who brought her in. It’s a tricky one, because if she isn’t really good, the angle can fall flat. My impression is this is not a direction they are locked into, but it’s the obvious direction if things fall into place.

Another change, and this stems from the ratings for the Daniels/Styles segments, is that they are now sold on longer arching stories. Even a few months ago, Hogan would talk about how in the old days they’d do stories for months, but now because of attention spans, you start a story at the beginning of the show and build it for two hours later.

-------

Matt Morgan is set to return from his worked injury at house shows the weekend of 6/16, for more matches with Crimson, after it on two different occasions on TV it being said about matches being their final match.

The Gut check segments with Taz, Bruce Prichard and Al Snow are not exactly shoots, but are closer to shoots than most of what is on wrestling television. In a lot of ways, they are like stuff from another era where everyone has bullet points but nothing is scripted in the modern sense of the word. The talent itself, Alex Silva the first time and Joey Ryan the second time, is not clued into what is happening and in a sense it is like contestants on a reality show or Tough Enough or Diva Search in WWE. With Silva last month, the actual original plan was for Silva to be turned down, which kind of made no sense when it comes to establishing a concept. I believe it was to come down to Ric Flair, who would turn him down. However, Flair, on the fly, "changed his vote," and then Prichard, who was supposed to go second, say "No," and leave it to Flair as the decider (the idea is to split votes and have it come down to a decider for dramatic purposes), also said "Yes" because at that point, why not? When Flair was asked why he deviated from the plan, he said because he was told to treat it as a shoot and the guy’s promo was so good he changed his mind. The feeling when it was over is that Silva’s promo after Flair told him to, "Stop talking to the marks and talk to me," was a home run and nobody had any indication Silva could talk at that level. As it turned out, Silva didn’t have a working visa. So he had to go back to Canada for two months to get it taken care of. He disappeared from OVW right in the middle of a angle right after doing the Gut check. He’s been back in Montreal. Silva has been legitimately signed to a TNA contract pending the papers coming through.

With Joey Ryan, it was the same situation except the feeling was Ryan didn’t deliver that promo to make them change their mind. But Ryan himself would not have been clued in. To me, I’d bring the guy back to TV one or two times just because there is a little interest in him and do a small story with him being mad about being bounced. I’m skeptical it’ll be long term interest, but if he gets over, I wouldn’t be close minded on him. The fan reaction was negative to Ryan being bounced because Ryan was so much more polished in the ring than Silva, but Ryan did nothing on his promo to change anyone’s mind. All the stuff said by Taz, Prichard and Snow was not scripted, but it’s not like they don’t go in there with a general direction of where they are going. The idea is to do more segments like this where it would simulate what goes on behind the scene with the idea fans would see a more realistic backstage version of wrestling. But it’s obviously not real backstage. The idea of Snow and Prichard splitting votes and leaving everything to Taz to be the star and decider was obviously not a coincidence. Taz was really good in the segment as well.

Another positive on the show is that they didn’t beat you over the head with the social media stuff to where it became a turn-off, which I was expecting on a live television show. If anything, it was probably far less than anyone expected, but that turned out to be a good thing because it never got in the way of the show.

Cliff Compton, who was Domino in WWE, got a tryout on 5/31, losing to Gunner.

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