T.N.A. Cheap Shots

[TheOneBigWill]

Both of these were found on the Main Wrestlezone page.

- It was Dutch Mantell's idea to have Sharkboy injured on nearly every show. He's apparently mocking the fact that a lot of WWE stars keep getting injured.

- Kaz's rat which he stole from Black Reign is now called Marlena. This is a shot at Dustin Rhodes ex wife Terri Runnels, aka Marlena in her early WWE days.

So the general question I have is.. is this a good or bad move on T.N.A.'s part? Whats the point of taking a cheap shot at your competition? W.C.W. used "low blow" tactics & it worked to a degree, but in the end, only fired Vince McMahon & the W.W.F. (then) up more to ultimately put on a much better show & in the end, win the war.

So I ask, is T.N.A. playing with fire? I personally think they're being stupid with this, as neither storyline is worth anything. Kaz is such a great Superstar, with outstanding talent, so why stick him with a "rat" & have him run the gimmick of it being a mockery of Dustin's ex Wife?

Also, while Sharkboy isn't exactly highly used.. wouldn't this storyline/angle only hurt T.N.A. by showing that they can come up with nothing better than something stupid like this?

What are everyone's overall opinions on the situation with T.N.A. lowering themselves to a sub-standard of nothing more than mockery? Again I ask, Good or Bad?

 

[Derf]

I don't think they're doing a very good job of these two things inparticular, but this isn't the first time that TNA has taken a shot at WWE. I think one of the biggest shots is the "VKM" stable, we all know what VKM stands for. Or how about when both Rhyno and Spike Dudley publicly rejected their newly offered ECW contracts? Or just about every new superstar that goes from WWE to TNA saying how much better the morale level is (although it works both ways). I can say that there are MANY more shots taken at WWE from TNA, but WWE takes a shot or two once in a while as well. I don't think of these at lighting fires, I think of it more as extended ribs to the other company. I don't think either company is expecting the next Monday Night Wars anytime soon, they're just out there having fun, excluding the few individuals that hate one company or another.

 

[wwenba]

I don't think this is a big deal at all. The Sharkboy story could easily be false. There isn't anything to make me solidly believe this has anything to do with wwe. Also, there is an ecw wrestler who gets hurt every week that some think is a rip off of sharkboy's angle.

The fact that the tna "cheap shots" aren't apart of any important angle should mean that it wouldn't fire anybody up and cause them to do better cause kaz's rat and sharkboy don't stand out at all on tna impact.

WWE has done the same thing and its been much more obvious. Umaga is a blantant rip off of Samoa Joe. This is way more likely to fire a company up to try and out do the competition. The VKM angle was a much more blantant cheap shot at the WWE and it didn't motivate wwe cause there shows are just as bad as ever.
WCW was truly considered competition so the WWE cared. They dont see TNA as competition so they dont care. They wouldn't even know about the sharkboy angle because its not obvious and maybe not even true. Not to mention, at this point and time wwe probably doesn't even give a damn about "Marlena". It is a shot at Terri not the wwe.

 

[awesomecactus]

Personally, i always think that tna functions better when i focuses on itself rather than the competition. The aspects that i find most enertaining are the ones that area an alternative from wwe...........like the x division, i guess now the knockouts, pre-russo longer tv matches, less segments. IMO the recent decline in tna has been because of a shift towards a more wwe-like approach (ie, shorter matches, more ridiculous stories)

But hey, if a rat helps the talented kaz get over, more power to em

 

[mautaker]

I have always think that when a company shot at other, you are just turning the attention to the other company. You want to see how the other company react and respond. TNA has to focus to improved themselves as a company. To get all the attention on themselves. The best way to show you are better is having good ratings and buyrates, so you have to focus in your own way to achieve it. Nothing's worth those cheap shots. They don't help, and they could to something more helpfull with that time.

 

[Katie Vick]

i disagrre with the Umaga copying thing, jus coz hes a samoan, if u think about it, Samoa Joe, is way faster and more athletic than Umaga, plus the most obvios reason is that Samoa Joe talks an Umaga doesnt, i myself didnt see the Shark Boy thing, isnt that his gimmick anyways, to get beat up, i actually thought the bandage thing made his gimmick better and more real, about the Marlena issue, does th WWE actually giv a hoots, lol that is one sexy rat if its called Marlena, with the VKM thing i think that the WWE prolly wanted to say something, but didnt so that they cud make TNA look like idiots, which they did, n one remember the Kennedy thing wi the fake Razor Ramon, i reckon the WWE is only havin a laff, and it creates a bit of tension between trhe 2 which is great 4 us fans

 

[SpiralHands]

When you look at the tatics done by WCW it was at a time where WCW was big time competition to WWE hence why they did it, TNA is no way near ready to compete that bad with WWE. To WWE TNA is just no more than an indy promotion making some noise bit like ECW back in the day. The cheap shots used by TNA are ok and can be quite funny but when they dont work eg the VKM shot it just ruins the credibilty of the company to be able to pull off angles like that well. TNA needs to make much more noise and be in much more competiiton to the WWE before taking cheap shots, at this time TNA isnt big enough to start taking shots at them WWE just flick them off and say pft who cares? And no one does! Perhaps TNA should start turning thier attention on themselevs not giving credit to WWE by cheap shots and mentioning them all the time.

 

[blackhart07]

I think TNA should worry about there product before they can take shots at the WWE. It amazes me that the WWE i think has a better product (not by much). And TNA has so many better wrestlers. The whole thing with Shark boy is stupid if this is even true because there burrying one of there wrestlers in the process. The Marlena thing is pointless and wont do anything. Im surprised Black Reign even aproves of this. The thing with WCW they had bigger names (Hogan, Flair, Savage, Nash, Hall) the list goes on and on. They could afford to take shots at the WWE because they had the talent to back it up. TNA looks dumb because Kurt Angle and maybe Booker T they dont have many wreslters that main stream wrestling fans know about. The WKM thing i thought was the worst. How they made fun of HBK and HHH of being old and doing this stuff. I mean both member of VKM are 40 something and have never really been good in the ring. HHH and HBK and way ahead of them and this is coming from a guy that hates both HBK and HHH. One thing i did like was how Rhyno threw down the title. That was a huge shot. It gained alot of peoples attention. TNA should first get there producut better than WWE and take real shots at them. Look what WCW did giving away scripts, Eric trying to fight Mcmahon,stealing quality talent. And WCW almost broke them. TNA cant excpect little ribs and promos like having 2 middle age men wanting to fight guya that one has turned his life over to god, and the other one probally has never seen TNA.

 

[Mike1517r]

Basically both of these so called "cheap shots" are stupid. First of all how many people actually know that they are making fun of WWE with these two things, the VKM making fun of DX was kinda funny, but still crappy considering it ended the DX humor which was hilarious. All this does is show how horrible TNA is, they can take time out of there show to put this stupid mockings of WWE in it, TNA should worry about how horrible there product is, the fact that they continue to bring in ex WWE stars and there ratings remain the same, and the fact that its a matter of time before they become extinct like WCW and the original ECW. TNA can mock all they want, you dont see WWE mocking TNA, maybe when Scott Hall no showed, but very rarely, WHY?, cuz WWE knows TNA is not competition. This just goes to show you how bad TNA is.

 

[mikeRC]

these particular cheap shots mean absoloutely nothing. you'd have to be some over obsessed wrestling freak to make the connections. i dont think the marlena thing is in any way a shot at WWE. its a shot at Dustin Rhode's ex wife but not WWE.

if TNA were gonna take a shot at WWE they'd do it on a much bigger scale like VKM did or like cookiegate. And WWE has taken a few hard to notice shots at TNA like HBK making a reference to Kurt Angle jumping ship or like Austin did on WWE.com in the David Arquette interview basicly saying that TNA has no majour talent

 

[the_phenomenal1]

I personally like seeing the interbrand competition stuff, however it does give the impression of the little fish trying to cling on to some of the Big Fish's name to increase popularity. It shows that they need the other show.

However, what's the difference in the VKM stuff, and WWE sending DX in a tank to WCW??

I agree that the Marlena thing is not a shot at WWE at all, although the Shark Boy thing could be, but it's by no means effective or going to "strike fear into Vince McMahon"

 

[blackhart07]

The difference was the WWE was actually at the WCW level. TNA is not even a threat to the WWE. TNA dosnt even draw a 1,000 people.
-VKM mafia looked like a bunch of babies doing this. You didnt see The Dudley boys rippinng in to the WWE, you didnt see Kurt Angle, or Booker T. Another thing VKM would just say how DX is old. If you think DX is old go look at VKM. Both those guys are like 40, so they look even dumber. And for them to say they drew money when they were in the WWE is completey stupid how many WM did they headline?, then go look at the ones HHH ad HBK headlined.
-TNA's prodcut has already fell off from its peak point, and instead of trying to make there product better they want to take shots at a billion dollar company. Maybe TNA should just change there whole show to former WWE wrestlers doing parody of the WWE.

 

[Freedom 35]

See this represents the whole problem with TNA, they dont have an Identitity. when TNA started they started off with good intentions but them bringing in anyone who once had a WWE contract of any sort is taking them downhill fast, TNA was originally and still should be about bringing an Indy style program to a larger scale, instead theyve become a WWE style program on a smaller scale, theyve gotten away to what made them Unique and they need to get back and stop obsessing over Vince and the WWE

 

[Y 2 Jake]

TNA frequently has wrestlers mention WWE. It's sad that a company like that trys to use another companys name. It's mostly the Dudleyz that do it. Fair enough but they could just say that they've wont every tag title in every company thy've ever been in. It's name dropping which reeks of desperation to me. How often do you hear a WWE employee name drop TNA?

How does taking the piss out of WWE benefit TNA? They should keep their product as far away from theirs as possible. Don't fans watch TNA for an alternative? The angle wont lead anywhere but it takes up show space. It's pointless.

And why are they having an angle with a pet rat anyway? It's stupid.

 

[SweetTKO284]

- Kaz and "Marlena." I think it's fine if he wants to call the rat Marlena... I may be wrong, but I don't find it to be a shot directed towards WWE. If anything, it's just one little jab for wrestling fans to say to themselves, "Oh, I get it." Nothing more, nothing less.

- VKM. I don't know how much of their schtick is scripted and how much is up to them, but I seriously can't stand these guys on the mic anymore. They keep cutting these promos, ragging on the WWE and Michaels and HHH, but have they changed anything in their routine from what they used to do 5-6 years ago as the New Age Outlaws?!? They still do the same "Ladies and Gentlemen" bit, they still do the crotch chop and they still hold up the "X" over their heads. I think they're still just a bit upset that they weren't as big as their DX counterparts ended up being.

As far as other "cheap shots" that TNA makes towards WWE, there's no reason for them. I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with competition between the two, but TNA is a much more solid show when they focus on their own product. There's bound to be comparisons between the two, whether it be talent or storylines, but it always appears to be an act of desperation when TNA goes out of their way to make a jab.

 

[rKo0019]

First off, does anyone else remember James Storm's "World Drinking Champion" belt, which was obviously a kid's WWE Title with a beer bottle glued over the spinner? (IMO, it looks better than the real WWE Title) Just throwing that out there...

I don't think these cheap shots hurt or help TNA. I think TNA is having fun with them, or at least the writers are. The one that obviously didn't work out well was the whole VKM ordeal...they were trying to make something out of nothing, and it never caught on.
In the end, though, it is imperative that if TNA wants to succeed, they need to focus on creating their own identity. These shots lately are harmless, but eventually, even Vince McMahon can notice and grow tired of them, unless he has already.
And am I the only one who knows about WWE's shots toward TNA? I remember an issue of WWE magazine where a guy had a Kurt Angle tattoo (after Angle's defection to TNA) and the caption below it read "Skid Mark."
Or the piece on WWE.com about Umaga being "no ordinary Joe." Maybe that's a whole other thread altogether, just saying...

 

[dirtyshubb]

TBH i dont really mind about the cheap shots by TNA, i mean as long as they are just having fun with it and it isnt the only goal they have then who cares.

As stated before WWE have done the same things, i mean look at when Hall no-showed the ppv, the next night Mr Kennedy was saying to the fake razor "thanks for turning up" (to no fan reaction at all ). i think that also shows how much TNA is on WWE's radar if they are also guilty of taking swipes at the competition.

 

[747russell]

i presonally remember wwe(F) taking a lot of shots at wcw as well. mankind saying that hes not old enough to wrestle for them. gillberg. wcw did stupid stuff too like "oklahoma" and some other stupid shots which we should all know. in the end it didnt really help either brand as far as i can see. most viewers would just rather see a good show then some "witty" (a term i use liberally) shot at the competition. i personally like it when TNA mentions WWE in a non-joking manner, as it shows they are based in reality. yes we can admit that team 3d had gold in WWE, that booker just left, etc etc. WWE wants to pretend that TNA doesnt exist. jeff hardy just "went away" for a year and CM Punk just kinda showed up. but these swipes in the end accomplish nothing - smarks have already made up their minds. just focus on putting out a good product and an alternative identity. instead of making kaz call the rat marlena, drop the piece of shit story altogether and give kaz a better feud.

 

[I_TheJman_I]

I Think that the cheap shots really are helping TNA. Eventually W.W.E will have to acknowledge there shots and it will stir up tons of controversy. In the end the fans will win with both companies putting on better shows.

 

[Tomko]

I Think that the cheap shots really are helping TNA. Eventually W.W.E will have to acknowledge there shots and it will stir up tons of controversy. In the end the fans will win with both companies putting on better shows.

These shots are like swatting a fly for the WWE. WWE already has an established name I bet you 4 out of 5 people go: TNA who? I really don't think WWE will have to acknowledge TNA until TNA can beat ECW in the ratings. They've beaten ECW before, but they can't do it weekly. Until then, TNA is really no competition for the WWE.

 

[cutrer]

I Think that the cheap shots really are helping TNA. Eventually W.W.E will have to acknowledge there shots and it will stir up tons of controversy. In the end the fans will win with both companies putting on better shows.

WWE won't acknowledge them, they've spent several years ignoring the little things they do. TNA thinks there's another wrestling war but that's not possible if your "enemy" doesn't acknowledge your existence. I actually don't mind the things TNA does because they end up hurting themselves more than anything because they come off with an inferiority complex.

The reason WWE and WCW said things back and forth and it mattered to fans is because they were in a legit war that was being fought every Monday night for about 5 years. DX going to WCW in a tank was something that had never been done so fans bought into it and enjoyed it. VKM going to WWE headquarters meant nothing because it was 2 guys that nobody gave a crap about any longer doing it and it was a lame retread from 1998.

 

[gorsty2k7]

First of all, just to mention something that was posted above,

-VKM mafia looked like a bunch of babies doing this. You didnt see The Dudley boys rippinng in to the WWE, you didnt see Kurt Angle, or Booker T. Another thing VKM would just say how DX is old. If you think DX is old go look at VKM. Both those guys are like 40, so they look even dumber. And for them to say they drew money when they were in the WWE is completey stupid how many WM did they headline?, then go look at the ones HHH ad HBK headlined.

Considering the incidents you are refering to happened over a year ago, do you really have that little to use?

On to the topic at hand, who cares if TNA are taking shots at WWE or they mention WWE, do you honestly think there is anyone watching iMPACT that has never heard of WWE? They aren't advertising when the shows are on or what the shows are even called, just the name of the company which I'm sure every wrestling fan in the world knows, so how is it hurting TNA exactly?

 

[Charismatic316]

I think that the shots that TNA are taking at WWE are pointless. I mean it really doesn't make a difference, because its not like TNA is ever going to actually be on the same level as WWE. All the shots that TNA takes are pointless, really not funny, and simply show how far TNA is behind WWE when it comes to the quality of the product. If you can take time out of your program to adress another company, you need to work on your writing. TNA needs to worry about the direction of there own company, not the WWE.

 

[cutrer]

On to the topic at hand, who cares if TNA are taking shots at WWE or they mention WWE, do you honestly think there is anyone watching iMPACT that has never heard of WWE? They aren't advertising when the shows are on or what the shows are even called, just the name of the company which I'm sure every wrestling fan in the world knows, so how is it hurting TNA exactly?

It has nothing to do with someone not knowing what WWE is because obviously everyone watching knows about WWE. IMO when they mention WWE it just reminds fans that TNA is the number 2 company. I find it to be counter productive because the whole purpose of the show is to pimp TNA to your viewing audience and make TNA sound like it's the best company in the world, which should be the goal of every company. When TNA keeps throwing shots at a company that won't even acknowledge their existence then TNA looks like fools because it's a complete waste of time and TNA gets nothing out of it.

 

[NickFlair]

I am hardly a TNA fan, but I think they should keep poking the giant with a stick...at some point he (wwe) will have to respond.

VKM is just dumb. They had something going there for the first few months, but, it fizzled and died. They were doing EXACTLY the same thing they did with DX, but when they did it with DX, it was original and it was 2 equal companies, who were in actual competition with each other.

If WWE ever plainly acknowledges TNA and mentions them by name, then TNA wins...simple as that. Until then, it's a group of 5th graders who think they are cool, messing with high schoolers who could easily squash them at any moment...remember, all except for Joe, used to be WWE guys and WWE has the tape library to make them all look like idiots. Such as, Christian on the kazoo saying 'genital warts rule!'