TNA iMPACT's moving back to Thursday Nights.

[Ruthless-RKO]

We all knew this would eventually happen, maybe not thissoon, but moving to monday nights was a decent move and was moving them forward.

now that they have gone back to thursday, they should still go live every other week.

 

[It's Damn Real!]

I don't understand how anyone can view this as even a moderate success. I don't mean the Monday night experiment – I mean the fact they failed and are now "going home" to Thursdays "because of the fans".

They aren't going anywhere because of the fans. They're going back to Thursdays with their tail between their legs lucky to still be alive because Hogan fucked them six times sideways and because if anything, they were losing fans. "Going home" to Thursday nights again is little else but a last ditch effort to retain what little fanbase they still have.

 

[AJM]

If I was VKM I would move Smackdown to Thursday Nights just to put the final nail in TNH's (Total Nonstop Hogan) coffin.

 

[Alex]

It was inevitable going back to to Thursday's.

On Monday their best rating was a 1.5 (I think) and that was January 4th. Did they honestly think going head to head with WWE (who draw low 3s on a bad day) was going to work.

This is a clear case of looking before leaping, they didn't think of the long haul of them moving to Monday's e.g. some people who watched TNA on Thursday's watched WWE Raw on Monday's and if forced (like TNA were making them) to pick one then they would pick Raw.

 

[philbrooks]

Internet 1 TNA 0

In this case TNA demonstrated that dont listen feedback from their own fans. They continued pushing the old folk, wrote illogical, ott storylines and angles after extremely negiative feedback and even after their own market research stated the same issues. They deserved to fail just for those reasons.

 

[.]

People are reffering to this as the end to the Monday Night Wars II but the fact is there was no war what so ever! It wasn't even a close competition!TNA's best when they shifted to Mondays was what a 1.0?For one i am glad I watch TNA but when TNA shifted to Mondays I had to side with the company i loved first but now i can watch both shows.Granted i despise the idea of RVD with the title(Pope should have won) but I like other aspects of it especially Ink Inc.(what a dumb name). This is a good thing for TNA as it will get them better viewers and we don't have to hear anymore hurtful comments by Dixie Carter towards Shawn Michaels or WWE or do we have to deal with Shannon Moore whining about WWE either.(I love Shannon it is just he is such a douche on Twitter!)

 

[Pulsar]

Moving back to Thursdays was the right move. 1) It makes it so the casual wrestling fans don't have to choose between them and the more established "Raw" product. 2) not being live will enable them to edit the shows to look as clean as possible. Many of the production problems with the live showings have been glaringly obvious.

 

[Poop Master Flex]

Wow, maybe TNA isn't as stupid as I thought they were. If the last few months have taught us anything, its taught us that TNA is just not ready to make the big jump to Monday nights, truth be told, TNA IS NOT READY TO COMPETE WITH WWE and this proves it. I hope this means that TNA has realized that competing with Vince is utterly foolish and that their real goal should be to improve their product, increase buyrates and TV ratings (basically the same shit I've been saying for about a year now) not to try to keep up with WWE.

All in all moving back to Thursday's is the smart thing for TNA to do, and until iMPACT can get a rating of 2.0 or higher they should never leave that timeslot, its a very cushy timeslot and it really is the best place for TNA to be at the current time (on primetime when they don't have much competition to go against).

 

[presto]

So TNA waived the white flag of surrender for Monday Nights....

It's now time for Dixie Carter and Panda Energy to start waiving the pink slips...

Starting with Hogan and Bischoff (they promised to break the 2.0 barrier which they never did) to send the message (and a better one than the infamous 'speech" she did), and Dixie needs to hire someone else (not put Jarrett nor Mantel back in that role) and start re-reviewing all the talent because so much was promised and delivered less than the product was at the last Thursday night show before making the move to Monday night.

Before TNA defected to Mondays, they were drawing 1.3 consistently. Now we saw only one show surpass that (a 1.5 on the New Years Show) an average of 0.8? Hard to keep a show on a prime-time slot with that rating. Hard to sell outside advertisements and make money when 60 percent of your commercials are for TNA or other shows on Spike.

 

[Razor]

I've been surfing the net and a lot of sites have been saying that Dixie Carter's big announcement is that TNA iMPACT! is moving back to Thursday nights. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that this is true, but it's something that's just now beginning to make the rounds on the net. Allegedly, the announcement was made to the gathered TNA talent earlier today.

If this is true, then I've little doubt that the honchos at Spike have had enough of the horrible numbers iMPACT! has been drawing since its move to Monday night. If this is legit, then "Monday Night Wars II" will be declared officially over tonight.

This is basically all they could do. And it's a smart decision on their part.

Look at the ratings this week. They lost .24, down from .9 to a .66, once Raw started. That's almost a third of their audience that they lost once Raw started up their cameras.

It's not their fault they lost the viewers, its just that a third of their viewers don't feel comfortable missing out on Raw. There's a simple solution to losing those viewers, and that's move back to Thursdays.

Now there are 4 days of wrestling on during the week, plus a 5th during PPV weeks. Every wrestling fan can watch Raw, then NXT, then iMPACT, then Smackdown. Superstars if you really really want to. With the lack of competing with Raw every Monday you should see an easy return to the 1.0 range and a base on which to build more viewers. I know I'll watch iMPACT more often now that I don't have to choose between it and Raw.

Smart, smart move by TNA.

 

[Mike Honcho]

I think this is all about living to fight another day. The rating aren't there but the product is getting better. Let it grow on Thursdays again and wait to see what happens in a year or so.

 

[I_Like_All_Wrestling]

Was this really the "news that will shake the foundation of professional wrestling" really?

First, let's give credit to TNA (or Spike) for understanding that moving to Monday nights right now was not a good move. It's better for them to go back to Thursdays then to keep fading on Mondays. It's really a smart move for them to do this now. If you flip channels between RAW and iMPACT, TNA looks ridiculously small and low budget. They'll fall back and regroup.

In the eyes of fans I don't think this hurts them at all, especially because I don't think many new fans came over to TNA. I do think this may hurt them with potential sponsors and advertisers. Sure they can spin it any way the want it, but in the eyes of anyone on the outside they see that TNA was just defeated by WWE.

As for the potential end of live iMPACTs, yeah, that's probably done. But, I don't see why they can't just do live shows on Thursday.

 

[HellBoundPower]

I think this is probably the best move that TNA could have made. Moving to Monday in the first place was a big mistake. As good as TNA can be, they're just not ready to compete with WWE. They really need to build up their talent and establish a bigger fanbase before they try to compete. Obviously they're still growing as a company, and it shows. They really need to get their storylines straight, establish their main event players, and build interest in their product. Maybe then they'll be able to compete. But they need to give it time and not rush things, like they did with the move to Monday Nights.

 

[Kahuna Cowboy]

They should have never moved in the first place. How in the hell Hogan and Bischoff sold the idea of moving to Mondays to Dixie and Spike TV I don't know. All they had to go on was a one off 1.5 rating from Hogan's much hyped premier and promises of a WCW'esqe rise to take on the WWE. The problem is that was 14 years ago, the company that did it had bottomless pockets, the company stumbled upon one of the greatest angles in wrestling history with the NWO, and the company that did it used those deep pockets to raid the WWF roster being at the time the WWF did not lock up their talent to long term deals. 14 years ago it was the perfect storm. Those conditions simply do not exist today, even though Hogan and Bischoff have done everything to bring those same talent elements back into the fold with TNA. Those same elements are now stale, 14 years older, and frankly no one cares anymore.

Going after Raw was just a bad plan, especially when TNA looks to be "shooting from the hip" with story angles at the moment. Not to mention Monday Night Football looming they would have gotten decimated if they stayed on Mondays. Honestly I don't think tucking tail and running back to Thursdays is the answer either.

If I were a player at TNA I would advise on taking on Smackdown on Friday nights. Smackdown is wide open for a beating right now being they keep moving networks and another move is coming. It is now totally the "B" show with only up and coming talent and very few established talent left. The announcer team is horrible and the overall feel and story elements of the show are just bad. I think TNA could really sway some WWE fans from the Smackdown brand, which might bring in some of the Raw brand viewers too. Plus they could replay the previous week's show on the Thursday time slot which runs unopposed. Watch last week's show on Thursday to catch up on Friday's new show. Especially if they did this live!

 

[Mr-excitement]

TNA should NEVER come back to Monday. When Vince first went national his brilliance was NOT going head to head with anyone for several reasons:

1. It acknowledges you consider the other company is better, otherwise you wouldn't be chasing them. It also draw attention to the other company, as in Tony Schivone's comment about Mick Foley putting butts in the seat leading to thousands of people changing the channel.

2. He was busy BRANDING and establishing his company as something different. Vince was busy getting his company on MTV instead of competing with NWA shows on a national scale. Bischoff actually did this during the ONLY Monday Night Wars, he got WCW online through AOL chats and a website when Vince was still trying to figure out how to beat him, the result was great for WCW.


TNA needs to just work on becoming great Thursday night TV and establishing itself as something different than the WWE. Maybe a SATURDAY PPV.

When Vince convinced the Briscos to sell him their interest in Georgia, he failed miserably and learned a huge lesson. Stake out your own piece of the pie and put on a good product and people will find it.

 

[Dead-Angel]

but i still dont understand why they dont want to make impact live on thursday? i mean taped show sucks couze if some titles will change hands you can read it on main page even though you dont want to read it but still after reading "new champion crowned" you will know that someone won a title on taped show and here the interest for me to watch goes down... they better start live shows on thursdays couze many people will read spoilers and you lose some viewers

 

[philbrooks]

but i still dont understand why they dont want to make impact live on thursday? i mean taped show sucks couze if some titles will change hands you can read it on main page even though you dont want to read it but still after reading "new champion crowned" you will know that someone won a title on taped show and here the interest for me to watch goes down... they better start live shows on thursdays couze many people will read spoilers and you lose some viewers

One reason: cost

Spike offered to fund live shows on the premise that IMPACT would be competitive in that time slot against RAW. They werent and Spike pulled the plug it.

 

[Dead-Angel]

but still tna can get better ratings if they go live on thursday , couze thursday is the day when there is no wrestling , i still think in future maybe 3-4 months tna will go live again

 

[Crobbins]

I wouldn't put it past Vince to move Smackdown to Thursdays when they move to Syfy...

 

[Slim Pickns]

Vince moving Smackdown to Thursday would be a nightmare for Impact. WWE has a big enough following where they can change time slots and not miss much. TNA moved to Mondays and half there audience stayed watching the Thursday replay instead. I wouldn't be surprised if some of the people watching Thursday thought they were watching the premiere episode for that week. TNA's answer to that was to announce 1,000 times that Impact would no longer be on Thursdays. They obviously thought they had a large chunk of viewers watching RAW and then the Impact replay and that eliminating the replay would get these people to watch Mondays Impact. Instead they said screw it, and continued to watch RAW while giving up on Impact.

TNA had potential on Mondays if they were more patient. They didn't have the brand built up enough yet and it was clear they didn't have a direction. They have no idea what their fans wanted to see. This is evident by the fact that their jobbers and mid carders lead their fan poll while their main eventers like Abyss and Jeff Jarrett are at the very bottom. Something is wrong there. I have always been vocal about how I think HHH is overused and overrated but whenever WWE does a poll on fan favorites or who they want to see in a match, hes always at the top. Obviously, the WWE knows how to get people over far better than TNA.

TNA's agenda needs to include getting their Thursday audience back and start over. Just rebuild the brand, don't hurry back to Monday's to get spanked by Vince again.