I think it's unfair that people are making this argument basically a company vs. company argument. It is possible to make an argument without taking a side per se. What i mean is simple.
Part of the wrestling business is about returns and recognizing faces and such. That started with Ric Flair appearing on WWF TV in the early 90s as "the real world champion". Shocking moments often improve the quality of a show. However, a trend that is developing since Hogoff (the combined title of Bischoff and Hogan since they share a brain) came to TNA is using returns and "shocks" for the sake of shocks. If there is absolutely no purpose for it, it's just putting a face out there. Take Jeff Hardy. The dude was HUGE in WWE and had a ridiculous fan following. He was used to attack a guy after a meaningless match and hasn't been seen since. I'm not saying it's plausible to put him on a PPV with very little storyline, but generally, it makes sense to explain why it is you returned to Impact for the first time in years and attacked a guy who wasn't even there when you left. And you probably would want to do this before people forget that it happened, so the next show would be best. Now, that opportunity is gone. So problem one is producing "shock tv" with seemingly no direction.
The second issue is Hogan being completely and utterly full of shit. This is a guy who has gone on radio and done interviews saying he sees young talent and hopes to help those guys. The statement sounds great, but then how do you explain Sean Morley going over Chris Daniels? I understand bringing in former MAIN EVENTERS to put over future ones, but Morley was never more than a midcarder and his peak was TEN YEARS AGO!!! I'm not downing his talent, but his star power is not very high. There is another issue with him but I'll get to that later. The point here is, you just put a minimal star over one of the original stars and biggest original names you have, and you put him over clean. I know it's possible that Daniels will return the favor but at this point in time, he seems like a very poor decision. I mean, if they plan on pushing Morley, great, but does anyone really think he will draw?
Issue 3 is teleivision time. TNA currently has 2 new hours of television each week. For a pretty large roster, that is not a ton of time and certainly not enough time to incorporate everyone. The issue here is that the last 2 tvs have had a lot of TV time revolved around new guys, whether important or not, while potential stars like Eric Young have been pushed to the backburner. I'm not one to understand how someone IN the business judges talent, but I do think it's a shame when a company puts all their stock in 2 men to fix their product and one thing they do is completely leave off some intriguing names from TV and PPV. Also, I would appreciate if the older talent was there to feud on TV and PPV with young talent, but when you put the Nasty Boys and 3D together in a feud for "fattest 40 something no talents", you're not doing anyone any favors, especially not young talent who could use the TV time. By the way, what happened to the World Elite?
Issue 4 is living in the past. Again, it's one thing to bring in talent with name value, but it's another to reprise 90s gimmicks and think they will work again. Here's where the "wait til later" part comes in. Sean Morley is reprising his original Val Venis gimmick, "the band" is a piss poor recreation of the NwO with no actual direction, Mr. Anderson is doing his Kennedy schbiel (which if Vince trademarked his gimmick, he might get sued for), etc. It comes off to me like Hogoff's plan was to recreate the 90s by actually pretending it's still the 90s. Unfortunately, there is only so far nostalgia can take you before you realize that something like "the band" is no longer a cool bunch of rebels, but an old bunch of drunks. I think this is where you start to realize that Bischoff is and was overrated as a wrestling mind. He cannot let go of his one idea that worked and come up with something new.
The conclusion here is that it's not so much being sick of former talent, but being sick of SO MUCH new talent in such a short period of time. Also, in regards to the total roster, almost half has debuted in the last couple of weeks. There's really not too much more you can do to keep the product interesting if you keep relying on "shock" tv in the form of simply bringing back old faces. It has a finite ending because there's only so many faces that any fans will care about. The thing that gets me the most though is that TNA marks are backing up this move even though for years they talked about how cool TNA was to have great matches with their originals. You can't have it both ways. Either you prefer TNA as a fast paced, undersized wrestling promotion focused on lesser named talents, or you like WCW part 2. You can't have it both ways and if you are supporting this new way and knocking WWE for the same things, you are being unreasonable. I think the answer lies somewhere in the middle. For TNA to right the ship and actually utilize this influx, a bunch or writers need to meet and come up with stories for wrestlers and utilize everyone to their full potential or close to it. The old guys need to minimize their stay and hopefully put over some people and the ones who can hack it can compete. I dont' have all the answers, but I do know that TNA right now is overkill and a clusterfuck with little direction. That comes from way too many debuts and returns, and the only solution it to hopefully see it worked out over time to create a product that makes a little bit of sense.
