General Ratings Discussion

[mayhem]

TNA President Dixie Carter has stated that she intends for TNA to become the biggest wrestling organisation in the world and wishes to put a TNA show head to head with Raw and compete with WWE but isn't that just absurd?

TNA probably has a better roster than WWE at the moment and many established names yet TNAs ratings have stayed between a 0.9 and 1.3 at best for a long time. Really TNA is finding it hard enough to garner ratings with no competition in their timeslot.

Isn't Dixie Carter just setting the bar way too high with TNA scoring such low ratings and if so would she back out of TNA if she thinks they can't get any better?

 

[AJAnder]

TNA President Dixie Carter has stated that she intends for TNA to become the biggest wrestling organisation in the world and wishes to put a TNA show head to head with Raw and compete with WWE but isn't this just absurd?

TNA probably has a better roster than WWE at the moment and many established names yet TNAs ratings have stayed between a 0.9 and 1.3 at best for a long time. Really TNA is finding hard enough to garner ratings with no competition in their timeslot.

Isn't Dixie Carter just setting the bar way too high with TNA scoring such low ratings and if so would should back out of TNA if she thinks they can't get any better?

Her problem is I think she is getting pressure from daddy to try and make something of this joke TNA wrestling. Panda Energy probably hasn't gotten a lot from this bad investment so its a no or never type of deal I think. I think we are seeing a lot of empty promises made by her but she won't back them up and even if they do I hardly see them being competition from WWE. I mean look at WWE they sell out huge arenas, 13 PPV's, etc., and TNA does shows at unversial for free, they do small venues, very few PPV's, and if you ask me TNA's marketing department SUCKS. What really turns me off from watch TNA is there wrestling ring I don't like the six sided ring and plus they seem to be almost rehursed more then WWE and when I watch TNA I get that feeling right away where as when I watch WWE I know it rehursed but they do a better job.

I think its a matter of time before TNA goes it alone after Panda pulls out and then you'll see them close shop or get bought out by someone else *cough Vince/WWE*. I love that picture someone on this board has of the tombstone that has the TNA logo.

 

[TellMeWhy]

To the threadstarter, Thursday night is the most competitive TV night of the week so they do have competition. People forget that TNA is worldwide. Just because TNA doesn't do spectacular numbers in the US market doesn't mean they don't do well in other markets. They're neck and neck with WWE in other places. The problem with America, is advertising from their network Spiketv. Maybe next year when Hogan debuts with TNA, they'll get more promotion and more tv slots but until that happens, it's going to be very hard for the TNA audience to grow imo.

And don't you love how the naysayers continue to wish death on TNA like the poster above? Just wow! People actually think it's great for Vince McMahon to have a monopoly on wrestling. What a bunch of losers!

 

[johnbragg]

First of all, I do think that it's a mistake for TNA to shoot for the moon now, trying to hotshot their way into competition with WWE. I would advise them to spend every penny they have and every moment of their creative team making the product they have awesome and the talent they have look good.

The road to success these days is by finding and motivating a dedicated core audience. Those people then tell people, with a gradual build. Once that process is simmering along, then you can swing for the fences by bringing in a Brock LEsnar to UFC. Err, I mean bring Hogan into TNA.

Right now TNA's audience is in a regular state of frustration. The marginal TNA fan isn't becoming a hardcore TNA fan, he (me) is drifting in and out of watch-every-week and keep-up-with-spoilers.

As for Thursday night being competitive, boo frickin hoo. TNA begged, pleaded and wheedled Spike to move from Saturday to Thursday.

Worldwide, TNA is doing pretty well. But how much money that is producing I don't know. And, the cynic in me feels that TNA is taking advantage of a WWE weak spot that they could easily fix, whoever the WWE Director of International Television or whatever is is dropping the ball if TNA has a primetime basic cable spot in Britain while WWE is on a pay channel at 3AM.

 

[Jack-Hammer]

Worldwide, TNA is doing pretty well. But how much money that is producing I don't know. And, the cynic in me feels that TNA is taking advantage of a WWE weak spot that they could easily fix, whoever the WWE Director of International Television or whatever is is dropping the ball if TNA has a primetime basic cable spot in Britain while WWE is on a pay channel at 3AM.

Oh, I dunno about that. The WWE seems to have done pretty well overall with their recent tour of Europe. http://www.wrestlinginc.com/news/wi/2009/1111/460598/index.shtml According to that link, the WWE drew somewhere around 75,000 fans for the shows they put on across Europe over a 6 day period. I'd have to call the tour a success and if TNA were able to do as well in foreign markets, I'm sure we'd hear about it. As far as ratings go in the UK for example, sometimes TNA does beat Raw but that is often due to a lousy timeslot but Smackdown often outdraws either Impact or Raw.

 

[SinCityBlitz]

To the threadstarter, Thursday night is the most competitive TV night of the week so they do have competition. People forget that TNA is worldwide. Just because TNA doesn't do spectacular numbers in the US market doesn't mean they don't do well in other markets. They're neck and neck with WWE in other places. The problem with America, is advertising from their network Spiketv. Maybe next year when Hogan debuts with TNA, they'll get more promotion and more tv slots but until that happens, it's going to be very hard for the TNA audience to grow imo.

And don't you love how the naysayers continue to wish death on TNA like the poster above? Just wow! People actually think it's great for Vince McMahon to have a monopoly on wrestling. What a bunch of losers!

I don't think anybody really wants TNA to die. What most want is REAL competition. But what we are seeing is TNA trying to pull the same stunt that WCW did without all the money and without their own network. It's going to fail before it has a shot to take off. Vince is going to chew Dixie up and spit her out.

I think it was Sidious who said he would like to see Bischoff take over/buy TNA. I would LOVE to see that as long as he keeps Hogan on a leash. IMO he would make sure the company has a future. I would feel a lot more secure about TNA's future with him running it than Carter.

As far as the ratings go, we need to have a little patience. We need to see how things shake out a little. We haven't seen Hogan or Bischoff on TV yet. Plus we have no clue on how things are going to change. Ratings are always the last thing to rise. Remember how long it took WWE to finally start winning in the ratings war with WCW even though they were putting on an excellent show at that point.

 

[Jack Tunney's Ghost]

I'm with 'Blitz on this one -- I also don't believe that very many are cheering for TNA to fold. I think the thirst for solid competition for the WWE is so strong, that when something like a TNA comes down the pike with SOOOO much potential to actually BE competition, only to allow piss-poor booking and completely messed up internal company politics along with a number of idiotic reasons get in the way of TNA reaching the promised land, it's frustrating as hell!

You can't just blindly cheer for anything or anyone that TNA is trying to put over just because it's NOT WWE.

If you hate Burger King (as an example) and everything about Burger King, and decide to have lunch at a McDonalds and if they serve you a McShit Sandwich made out of 100% real shit (aka The McRib), are you going to eat shit just because it's from McDonalds and not Burger King? No... shit is shit, and that's what TNA has been pretty much serving us for the past few years. Don't get me wrong, WWE has been serving a boatload of McShit sandwiches too, but, we're talking TNA.

Basically, people WANT to support TNA... they really do... but, as long as TNA stays in The Impact! Zone and serves us McShit booking, it's hard to get enthused whenever TNA promises us its going to the next level? They've only been promising us that for 4 years, so far. I know, Jarrett, Russo and now Hogan have been telling me so (on TV).

 

[It's Damn Real!]

I'm with 'Blitz on this one -- I also don't believe that very many are cheering for TNA to fold. I think the thirst for solid competition for the WWE is so strong, that when something like a TNA comes down the pike with SOOOO much potential to actually BE competition, only to allow piss-poor booking and completely messed up internal company politics along with a number of idiotic reasons get in the way of TNA reaching the promised land, it's frustrating as hell!

You can't just blindly cheer for anything or anyone that TNA is trying to put over just because it's NOT WWE.

If you hate Burger King (as an example) and everything about Burger King, and decide to have lunch at a McDonalds and if they serve you a McShit Sandwich made out of 100% real shit (aka The McRib), are you going to eat shit just because it's from McDonalds and not Burger King? No... shit is shit, and that's what TNA has been pretty much serving us for the past few years. Don't get me wrong, WWE has been serving a boatload of McShit sandwiches too, but, we're talking TNA.

Basically, people WANT to support TNA... they really do... but, as long as TNA stays in The Impact! Zone and serves us McShit booking, it's hard to get enthused whenever TNA promises us its going to the next level? They've only been promising us that for 4 years, so far. I know, Jarrett, Russo and now Hogan have been telling me so (on TV).

If my only choice is between Burger King (which I hate in this scenario) and McDonalds, which isn't good, but isn't Burger King? Yeah, I'm eating the McShit sandwich, I don't know what else to tell you, man.

You can't use that analogy here IMO, because there are only two restaurants in town (WWE & TNA). The other places to eat are lemonade stands (ROH, AAA, Indies).

If these guys WANT to cheer TNA, why do they constantly come in talking about how it's only a matter of time before ol' Vinny Warbucks comes in and buys them out like he did to ECW, WCW and more.

 

[Jack Tunney's Ghost]

Heh! Ok, fair enough!

I was just using a simple example and using the most well known fast food joints in North America to help prove my point.

And sure, Wendy's, Jack In The Boxes, Sonic Burgers, Harvey's and so forth do exist as well, but they haven't managed to solidify their brands as well as McDonald's and (to a lesser extent) Burger King.

And WWE and TNA (as of now and to a much lesser extent) are the two best known wrestling companies in North America as well.

I guess you could look at ROH as being Wendy's, AAA as Taco Bell and the indies as the greasy spoons of the neighborhood.

I may have perhaps oversimplified my example with McDonalds (WWE) vs TNA (Burger King).

The sad thing is though, you're right... we really don't have much of choice wrestling wise... and the other choices available out there aren't getting as much "press." But, it's kind of sad that those other choices aren't enjoying as wide exposure on TV as the WWE & TNA.

 

[mayhem]

Again the latest Impact scored just a 1.1 rating and TNA again struggles to get beyond their best. Within the last year TNA have got a new impact zone layout and brought in major names like Foley, Lashley, Taz, Mcguinness and Hulk Hogan and countless other names and introduced a knockouts tag team titles due to the high ratings the knockouts receive and still TNA is incapable of getting anywhere close to 2.0 which is a long long way off.

If TNA gets a measly 1.1 rating how does TNA President Dixie Carter expect TNA to get anywhere close to competing with the WWE like she wants to? Adding to that TNA holds their shows in a theme park with just 1000 spectators.

Hogans arrival is probably the final straw for TNA as if he can't get the ratings way higher then TNA might as well be resigned to never ever being able to compete with the WWE.

They certainly would get squashed if they went to launch a show head to head with Raw so What do you think the TNA Presidents response would be if Hogan can't get the ratings to a suitable level?

 

[Jack-Hammer]

As I've said in other posts on TNA's potential growth overall, it's going to take time for TNA to become a legitimate threat to the WWE. I'd like to see TNA succeed very much and grow, but going head to head with the WWE at this stage is foolish in my view. I'm not saying that to tout the WWE or to put TNA down, it just comes down to the numbers. It doesn't matter who thinks which company is better or who has the better matches or promos or whatever when it comes to the bottom line. Overall this year, WWE Raw has had an average rating of 3.6, their ppv buys number in six figures on a monthly basis and they sell out big arenas. Last night's Raw in MSG drew over 20,500 people and you'd have to total up nearly 6 months worth of Impact shows in the Impact Zone to match it. As far as TNA goes, they have trouble staying a head of ECW at times, sometimes they even lose to ECW, their ppv buys are rumored to be around 20,000 or so and their venues often draw less than 1,000 people.

TNA is going to have to grow exponentially if they want to compete with the WWE and that's going to take time I believe. As far as Hulk Hogan goes, I believe that ratings will spike for a bit after he joins TNA but I doubt that he's ultimately going to get TNA to the 2.0 promise land, at least not on a regular basis. I might be wrong on that, hopefully I am, but I'm not going to hold my breath. As far as TNA's overall future goes, I won't be surprised to see the Carter's put TNA up for sale sometime in the next few years of TNA hasn't reached a certain level of at least being considered serious competition for the WWE.