Impact Replays....Good Or Bad For TNA?

[Mitch Henessey]

Ever since Jan 4th, TNA has been replaying their Monday edition of Impact. This could be a good thing or a bad thing. There are a couple of ways you can look at it.....

TNA Impact replays can be a bad thing because instead of choosing Impact over Raw on Mondays, casual wrestling fans or wrestling fans curious about TNA can just make the decision to watch Raw instead of Impact on Monday, and then tune into Impact on Thursday. This of course would be the #1 choice for die-hard WWE fans who wouldn't even think of giving TNA a chance or they just might not watch TNA on either day at all.

On the other hand, Impact replays can be a good thing because it gives TNA a chance at more exposure. What I mean by that is, the only show WWE has on Thursday is Superstars, and it doesn't air at the same time as Impact does. Also, it isn't WWE's flagship show, so when it comes to Thursday nights, people who are curious about what TNA has to offer might give them a shot. If they like what they see, they might become more interested in TNA as time goes on, and choose TNA over WWE. Think about it, TNA could grow on them.

Now WWE does replay Raw. It airs on USA at at 2:00 am on Saturdays. It's really not a full replay of Raw because it's only 1 hour long, and AM Raw really only shows the highlights of what happened on Monday. Unless you can't sleep or stay up really late, not too many people will watch AM Raw.

At the moment, I think Impact replays can be a bad thing. Right now TNA is no where near as popular as WWE is, so most likely, people will choose Raw over Impact on Mondays.Of course, things could change as time goes on. As far as the Thursday replay goes, a lot of people might choose to not watch it at all.

Can the Impact replays be a good or bad thing?

Thoughts?

 

[Notorious718]

You ask a good question, HHHKING13. At first, I thought that replaying Impact on Thursdays completely defeated the purpose of having a live show on Mondays. Why bother going live and competing against Raw when casual fans can watch Raw then watch the TNA replay on Thursday? But reading your post has me thinking differently.

Perhaps in the short term, this will hurt TNA in the ratings and be a bad thing. But as time goes on, I'm assuming that the arrival of Jeff Hardy and RVD will reach the ears of casual WWE fans via word of mouth. RVD has always been over with hardcore WWE fans and it's no secret that Hardy can easily attract WWE's younger demographic just so they can watch their hero. At the same time, TNA can showcase its other talent, put on good matches, and then slowly but gradually pull WWE's viewers to their side.

In the short term, this may hurt TNA but it could do wonders for them in the long run.

 

[Dagger Dias]

The Impact replays are honestly both good and bad at the same time. They are bad because the fans who know there is a replay on thursday won't bother to catch the monday verson and just watch Raw that night. However, they are good because it gives people a second chance to watch Impact if they could not watch the monday version.

Like with many other issues, there are two sides to this. TNA Impact was always on thursdays, that's what the fans were used to. By keeping the Impact replays then TNA can try to please both their fans who want to watch on thursday as well as fans who want a second choice other than Raw on mondays.

However, in the long run it will probably be a bad thing and TNA stand a better chance of ever catching up to Raw in the ratings if they get rid of the thursday replay and make it to where the fans "must" watch on monday during Raw in order to see Impact.

So.... the way I see it is that right now the Impact replays on thursdays are a good thing because it gives a second chance to see Impact, but in the long run it will be a bad thing because eliminating the second chance to see Impact will possibly make more people watch it on monday instead of Raw.

 

[Davi323]

It was my understanding that Spike was going to phase out the TNA replays, so Impact will only air once a week?

Although, truth be told, the fact that I can watch Monday Night Raw on UHD saturday nights, along with every other Comcast subcriber that has the HD channels, hasn't really killed their "live" ratings, so I figure its a push, TNA is not being helped or hindered much by the replays on Thursdays...

 

[maar130]

Well I as some has expose, for me the Replay is a bad thing, you might find good that if you didn't watch it on Monday you do on Thursday but in the long run it will hurt TNA, because people has the choice to wait and that does not help their cause on Monday nights at all.

A few have seen it as positive because they get almost the same rating, but 1.0 on Monday and 1.0 on Thursday does not really translate in 2.0 overall because the number that matters is the number they do on Monday.

Look with Impact been live one week and taped the other there is also the issue that affects shows like Smackdown and it show this Monday, when you read the spoilers sometimes people does not watch because already know the results and /or they didn't like about what they read on the spoilers, and on top of that you give them the choice to either watch the other show live or to catch the whole thing other day with out missing one minute of either company, well seems like someone shooting himself on the foot.

For Spike to air replays means they are accepting being affected by RAW on Mondays and if the trend continues and Spike start becoming impatience, don't doubt that Impact will comback to Thurdays permanently in a few moths, hope they don't because just for the sake of a better Wrestling TV it is good for them to be on the same night.

Also before everyone jump to the conclusions of them failing, take on account that it has been only two weeks, we need to give it shot for a few more weeks to see if they can hold theirown at least.

 

[Notorious718]

So.... the way I see it is that right now the Impact replays on thursdays are a good thing because it gives a second chance to see Impact, but in the long run it will be a bad thing because eliminating the second chance to see Impact will possibly make more people watch it on monday instead of Raw.

I'm sorry, Dagger. You had me up until this part. I might simply be misreading this so correct me if I'm wrong. Are you saying that having more people watch Impact instead of Raw is a bad thing? I only see good coming out of it for TNA if they can somehow get more fans to tune in on Monday after eliminating the Impact replays. After all, that IS what they want, right? To beat Raw in the Monday night ratings?

While it's true that doing this will eliminate the second chance to watch Impact (me being one of the people who wait until Thursday to do so) it could really benefit the company if they could draw people on Monday nights. Right now, I'm not sure how TNA would go about doing that but if they are really serious about beating Raw on Mondays, eliminating the Impact replays would be a good first step.

 

[Jack-Hammer]

If TNA and Spike insist upon having iMPACT! continue to go head to head against Raw, then the replays of iMPACT! at their old timeslot on Thursdays might be a pretty good idea. Now while things are still early in this confrontation between WWE and TNA, it's a safe bet that TNA isn't going to be pulling in threatening numbers head to head against WWE anytime in the near future. TNA's ultimate goal right now is to increase its viewers, so having iMPACT! replay at its old timeslot and night couldn't hurt. Maybe there'll be times when the replays outdraw the Monday airings.

I'm not saying this to slam TNA but it needs to be said. There's always the possibility that TNA simply isn't going to produce the kind of numbers it's going to take in order to truly be competition to WWE on Monday nights. TNA has "declared war" on the WWE and some fans have already christened this Monday Night Wars II. That's all well and good but the perception of some fans along with the hyping of TNA's product and cold hard reality are two different things at this point.

 

[Jack-Hammer]

According to Dixie Carter, there won't be a replay of tonight's iMPACT! on Thursday. I wouldn't be willing to be the farm on that at this time as I believe that plan could very well change, depending upon how well tonight's show draws in the ratings.