TNA Leaving Impact Zone Again

[klunderbunker]

http://www.lordsofpain.net/news/tna...stling_from_Universal_Studios_Once_Again.html

So they're not going to be able to tape there anymore because other acts have it booked. They'll be in Huntsville for a few weeks worth of shows soon then off to England for some more tapings and then.....that's up in the air.

On top of that, word on the street is Spike might be interested in picking up Smackdown, meaning Impact would be needing a new network.

http://www.wrestlezone.com/news/442...to-acquire-smackdown-for-friday-night-line-up

They know they can't afford to be on the road full time and from what I've heard, it's too expensive to tape in Vegas full time. This could be very bad if things don't go TNA's way. Thoughts/predictions?

 

[It's Damn Real!]

Thoughts? Not good. Especially if the Vegas option, which I've come to understand was something of a fall-back, isn't viable either. It's pretty clear they couldn't afford to remain on the road, so I get the sense there may be quite a bit of scrambling going on in trying to stabilize this whole thing.

Predictions? This thread will be littered with the worst kind of wrestling fans there are — the ones who want to see companies other than the ones they like go out of business, all so they can beat their e-chests over an "I told you so" they've been hanging onto for years.

 

[hatehabsforever]

I know the TNA fans on this site won't like to hear it, but if (and it's a big if as I'm not really buying it at the moment) Spike TV opts to pick up Smackdown as part of their Friday night schedule, which would likely spell the end of Impact on Thursday night, that would be catastrophic for the organization. Not having a "major" network upon which to air their programming, I'm not really sure how they could recover from that, again assuming there is any validity to the reports.

Combine that with the lack of a home base, and the news gets worse. They tried going on the road, but the financial situation unfortunately didn't allow that to work out. If their former home base is no longer available, and if their fallback position is not in the cards either, I'm not really sure how they can recover from that too.

Major uncertainty on both fronts. I hope this is not considered me "beating my e-chest", or producing an "I told you so" because I've rarely posted apocalyptic posts about TNA and I've never wished for them to fail. But they had better hope they can work things out in terms of finding a location and firming up a TV deal. And we all better hope that the whole AJ Styles scenario is part of the biggest swerve in history. Otherwise it may, unfortunately, be strike three, and you're out.

 

[It's Damn Real!]

I know the TNA fans on this site won't like to hear it, but if (and it's a big if as I'm not really buying it at the moment) Spike TV opts to pick up Smackdown as part of their Friday night schedule, which would likely spell the end of Impact on Thursday night, that would be catastrophic for the organization. Not having a "major" network upon which to air their programming, I'm not really sure how they could recover from that, again assuming there is any validity to the reports.

Combine that with the lack of a home base, and the news gets worse. They tried going on the road, but the financial situation unfortunately didn't allow that to work out. If their former home base is no longer available, and if their fallback position is not in the cards either, I'm not really sure how they can recover from that too.

Major uncertainty on both fronts. I hope this is not considered me "beating my e-chest", or producing an "I told you so" because I've rarely posted apocalyptic posts about TNA and I've never wished for them to fail. But they had better hope they can work things out in terms of finding a location and firming up a TV deal. And we all better hope that the whole AJ Styles scenario is part of the biggest swerve in history. Otherwise it may, unfortunately, be strike three, and you're out.

Criticizing a product, even as much as you have TNA, is not the same as wanting the company to fail. In fact, to my recollection, you've always done so out of frustration with the company not providing a better alternative product.

But I do agree, on paper, this does not look good, at all.

Shame is, it's not the TNA fans that should be upset. It's wrestling fans, period. Competition is always a good thing.

 

[lil steroid meat]

I was going to make a thread about Spike's interest in Smackdown but my post count stopped me. Not good for TNA . . . a lack of a TV deal killed WCW and ECW.

A lack of a TV deal, plus your biggest "stars" (I say that in quotations because no one in TNA is THAT big of a draw) leaving, plus being low on money . . . doesn't look good for TNA's survival.

I want TNA to succeed because there's a lot of talent there and there just needs to be a good wrestling mind to come in and revamp the company's management and storylines.

The only way TNA survives is if someone buys it. I hope Viacom gets it and puts it on MTV or MTV2 on Saturday nights, 9-11. MTV Tres already shows iMPACT in Spanish. After they buy it, they have to quickly find a wrestling mind to operate the day-to-day of the company.

Outside of someone buying it, it seems as if it's shutting down soon and Vince will go after the video library for more DVD profits and maybe Sting, Hardy and Angle (who are on the way out anyway), and that will be that.

 

[Cereal Killer]

I must say, I'm disappointed and a little concerned. If Universal Studios (who have had them since 2004) let them go I'm not really sure on who will take them on. Somewhere which is cheap and has a lot of wrestling fans (Northeast) perhaps. They'll need to assure their new partners that they're worthy of being there. Not having a network is one thing but nowhere to tape your events? That's a little worrying. I hope they find somewhere to tape their events and also a permanent somewhere. They can't afford to travel so staying put is the only move to make here.

As far as the network dropping them goes, it actually seems likely Spike TV will take on SmackDown! instead of Impact Wrestling and I doubt Vince will want one of his shows on the same network which airs TNA's flagship programme. I believe they aired RAW sometime in 2005. However, there were also reports on Spike being confident with TNA and are feeling OK about their ratings. After RAW went back to the USA network, Spike tried to compete with the USA network by airing the UFC on the same time as RAW. I'm sure that lead to a little tension between Spike and WWE.

Who knows what'll happen? Assuming they do get cut off Spike, they'll always have the Internet to place their footage on, but of course, only if they have somewhere to tape their events.

 

[das1234]

as for my POV, i dont even watch wwe anymore, only tna. its been hard to watch for the last weeks though, and it feels really low-tier watching it for some reason, maybe its the long taping pause and them pushing a 12 month storyline that is spoiled to have been a waste...

i think everyone can agree that their management is their biggest problem. we saw it many times, roodes contract, aj now, devon, and so on and so on.

i think someone was overly impressed by hogan and bischoff and now they have to reap what they have sown, as can be seen by the downsizing, which i think has reached comical levels in the last few weeks. the thanksgiving episode in particular felt as if there were 5 guys present, it was weird...

as for smackdown coming to spike, tna can just go somewhere else, it isnt like their only market is the usa, they are doing fine in the uk, so who cares if they do 1 million on spike or 0.5 million on whatever network? them firing about (a felt) 75% of their active roster during the last few months should help keeping them afloat, because the big money wastes are gone.

also, i think the next step they should make is allowing their guys to work indy tv again, that would massively open up contract negotiations and short term talent pool... however, i think their name (tna) has been irreparably damaged by years of horrible booking, pushing supremely old guys and making horrible decisions, even if some of these are totally gone now.

i mean look at the talent pool, basically all of the washed up old guys are in wwe (where they draw because people remember them there) or gone completely by now.
also they build young guys - after all the guys that could have pushed them are gone, only sting remains, its sad to watch.

The sound stage i think is just another example of their management screwing up, they can easily find another place, but going somewhere without preparing for being kicked out is really dumb (again), as is doing so without apparently knowing how long they can stay there

 

[Cereal Killer]

also, i think the next step they should make is allowing their guys to work indy tv again,

I believe they have been more lenient about their talent going to indies. Besides, the only ones they weren't allowed to wrestle in are those which will be recorded to be sold on DVDs.

i mean look at the talent pool, basically all of the washed up old guys are in wwe (where they draw because people remember them there) or gone completely by now.
also they build young guys - after all the guys that could have pushed them are gone, only sting remains, its sad to watch.

They have EC3, Bully Ray, Mr Anderson, Austin Aries, Chris Sabin, Bobby Roode, Samoa Joe, Christopher Daniels, Kazarian and James Storm. The first three are from the WWE but they made a name for themselves in the singles division in TNA, not WWE. EC3 has a match coming up with Sting and Bully and Anderson are former TNA World Champions.

 

[Limitless]

I have tried hard to watch the current product and I just can't. I stopped after Bound for Glory, and never really looked back. When I heard TNA may be up for sale, I was actually excited for the first time in a while for TNA. I just feel like all the bad things that could happen are starting to happen with TNA. Now that they can't use Universal, it makes you wonder how long they can go on the road for, without wasting money.

I am a little concerned, because deep down I want TNA to succeed so WWE will do something about there mediocre writing/booking.

 

[Stormlor]

This is hard to stomach in to be honest. I don't know if TNA can recover from this in a hurry.

While the new Impact Zone is not a huge worry because TNA can go just about anywhere and people will go see them. They can find something else in Florida, or any other state, but I highly doubt they will go west as it is more expensive to run. Seeing that BFG 2013 cost TNA close to $600,000 just to rent and run with barley any attendance.

Finding a new network is going to be the hard part. Right now they are lucky to be on Spike TV, but if Spike chooses WWE, Spike does realize that they will get double if not triple the rating from WWE over TNA. The best here is to go back to Fox Sports. FS1 and FS2 are good prime networks that need shows.

 

[Imbtr10u]

Perhaps maybe the best thing is for TNA to go out of business, there's so many problems there with management, money, location, ect. They have a bad name for themselves, it's to tainted. No wrestlers want to work there, even long time fans r starting to turn away, let alone brining in new fans. This isn't TNA hate, I'm all about competition and I'm sure in time a new company will start up that could do things differently.

 

[The 1-2-3 Killam]

From what I've heard Spike TV is really happy with Impact Wrestling and has no plans to drop them. I've also heard they are interesting in trying to get Smackdown for their Friday night block to lead into Bellator.

So the question really is, would Spike TV be willing to sacrifice TNA to pick up a WWE show? Better question...can they? I don't know when Spike's TV deal with Impact is up, but if it were soon we probably would have heard about it. So really, the ball is probably going to be in WWE's court on this one. If Spike can't get rid of TNA, WWE will have to decide if they want to run their show on the same network as the second biggest wrestling product.

And for what it's worth, some guy sent me an email "confirming" that TNA will be back in Orlando in March to tape 4-6 more weeks worth of shows. But I have no clue who he is, and unless he gives me some credentials I'm not about to go posting this as confirmed news. Take it with a brick of salt.

 

[Charismatic Enigma]

I have a hard time believing the whole Spike wants SmackDown talk. I understand WWE product has a strong name value but for the week of December 27th SmackDown did a 0.9 rating compared to TNA's 1.3, those numbers aren't that far apart, and obviously at peak periods (like the lead up to WM) WWE's numbers will go up, but the point is it's not a huge upgrade for Spike.

More importantly though, I also don't believe that TNA wouldn't have it in their contract with Spike that they can't carry another companies wrestling product at the same time, just seems like it wouldn't make good business sense on their part to not have that stipulation in place.

Anyway, as far as the Impact Zone situation goes, I'm not sure what to think. I live in FL and have attended many TNA shows at Universal over the years. It's not my favorite by any stretch but they put on a decent live show, with good in-ring talent. I feel like it may not be a good situation on such short notice, but there has got to be some kind of similar venue in the area that could house them. WCW used to film at Disney's MGM lot (now Hollywood Studios) back in the day, maybe that could be an option? If not, maybe they could rip of the NXT model and go to a school like USF that has it's own arena on campus and film there?

No matter what, with the roster cuts, public money troubles, and possibility of not having a home base or network could spell doom for TNA, so I really hope they figure out something ASAP. Because, if they go under WWE will buy their tape library but otherwise, it won't be like the invasion, you might get Angle and Hardy back, but other than that I wouldn't expect to see any of the TNA roster show up on WWE tv.

 

[Pedigree1]

This does not look good for TNA at all.. If reports are true that Spike picks up Smackdown,then that will basically spell the end of TNA on television. And again if reports are true,that they only have a few weeks left of taping that could mean the end of their product..

At this point we all better hope this AJ storyline is the biggest swerve in history.. Things will unfold if indeed it is not a swerve maybe AJ saw the writing on the wall.. As a wrestling fan,it is upsetting as competition is a great thing to any organization.. I wish TNA the best,but clearly on paper its not good

 

[I_Hate_Cena]

If it gets to a point they can't find a place of operations or a major cable network then why don't they move their operations to the UK. They claim to own that market when it comes to fanbase in that region. I know hardy won't be any part of that until he gets his legal issues settled but a least for the mean time it could be a viable option.

 

[Lowdown]

If this is really legit, TNA probably won't be able to bounce back. I find this odd considering how ROH still has their TV deal (topic for another thread I guess). Looking back on how 2013 started for TNA, things b looked to get off on the right foot. I was one of the main folks that thought it was a great idea to take Impact on the road. Now things seem to be spiraling out of control. It had been stressed plenty of times that competition is good for the wrestling biz. While TNA was never close to catching up to WWE, they were still the main competitor. The world isn't ending, but a lot of TNA fans, like myself, will always prefer some kind of alternative to WWE. I do hope Spike holds onto Impact, but some major change is on the horizon, and hopefully TNA doesn't become another casualty.

 

[ABMorales787]

I honestly don't buy it. Either one of these claims. Either TNA already has a plan for their schedule much like how they got back into Universal or the report is BS. It's not like the sound stage can't be re-arranged constantly and it's not like TNA wouldn't have anywhere to go. They aren't obligated to put Impact on large arenas.

I also don't really buy into the belief that WWE would want to put Smackdown on Spike TV. Even if Spike had the interest. Raw was there and it held them back. Personally, if Smackdown does channel hop for the thousandth time, it'll more than likely go to USA Network or an affiliate. They've given far more to the WWE than Spike ever did, not to mention on the handful of occasions Smackdown was transmitted from USA, it put it's original network and timeslot to shame rating-wise.

 

[Stormlor]

The problem with going on the road is the money it takes. Everybody wanted TNA to go on the road, I was one of those who said it was not a good a idea. Going the road is fine as long as you can make equal based upon rent of the building, and weekly salaries for your talent. The problem with TNA is that they have extra cost with SAT and Cable distributions. In general, it costs TNA about $200-300 grand to do a TV show, BFG was the highest they paid at $600k.

If this is really legit, TNA probably won't be able to bounce back. I find this odd considering how ROH still has their TV deal (topic for another thread I guess). Looking back on how 2013 started for TNA, things b looked to get off on the right foot. I was one of the main folks that thought it was a great idea to take Impact on the road. Now things seem to be spiraling out of control. It had been stressed plenty of times that competition is good for the wrestling biz. While TNA was never close to catching up to WWE, they were still the main competitor. The world isn't ending, but a lot of TNA fans, like myself, will always prefer some kind of alternative to WWE. I do hope Spike holds onto Impact, but some major change is on the horizon, and hopefully TNA doesn't become another casualty.

 

[Rayne]

Right now, TNA's television slot is the the most valuable item they have. There aren't going to be any other networks chomping at the bit for TNA programming after how the past three years have gone for them, especially considering the downturn of professional wrestling as a whole over the past ten years.

Without their television slot, thereis no TNA.

I'm not sure I buy the talk about SpikeTV, but in a world where we're talking about theoreticals, Smackdown is going to be a better tentpole program to support Bellator than TNA is. If that story is true, that's a TNA killer.

*shudder*

 

[Robert Roode Fan]

Perhaps maybe the best thing is for TNA to go out of business, there's so many problems there with management, money, location, ect. They have a bad name for themselves, it's to tainted. No wrestlers want to work there, even long time fans r starting to turn away, let alone brining in new fans. This isn't TNA hate, I'm all about competition and I'm sure in time a new company will start up that could do things differently.

This hope that anothor company starts up is just bad thinking. Tna going under is awful, like wcw, the wrestlers(tna guys, not ex wwe people) who are there get fucked over, they go on the indie scene and are branded as indy guys that are worthless, yet they do ten times the work, but pretty much are branded as worthless for doing so, the indies are not good anymore because anyone who does anything major there is branded as worthless and garbage even though they aren't, wrestling just might be dieing because wwe has brainwashed everyone into thinking anything not on tv is garbage, it is over, people like joe, aj, roode, daniels, kaz, will be branded as worthless. I feel like the fans(not the people commenting, and the way things are being done are driving away me away like a whole lot of people when wcw went under. People want to say well watch roh, new japan, but then they brand it as garbage and no matter how good they wrestle, it is nothing but garbage, and people wonder why the wrestling business is dying.

 

[Mustang Sally]

This thread will be littered with the worst kind of wrestling fans there are — the ones who want to see companies other than the ones they like go out of business, all so they can beat their e-chests over an "I told you so" they've been hanging onto for years.

Granted; that's short-sighted. There are different concepts of competition. Yes, TNA took the wrong track four years ago by wanting to be direct competition for WWE; to the point of moving their flagship TV show to the same Monday time slot. The younger company learned slowly, but eventually came to recognize they might fare better as an alternative to the larger company. This gives young talent a place to go when there's no room in WWE for them at the time they're ready to shine......and TNA has been a place veterans could go, especially if they were let go by WWE.... or weren't happy with their current WWE deals and wanted to take advantage of the star power they still possessed.

It's good for TNA to exist.....and good they have an attractive TV slot in which to do it. After growing with TNA these past few years, it seems hard to accept that Spike would want to abandon them in favor of WWE....and yet, if it's strictly a financial decision, maybe Spike knows things we don't .....particularly involving TNA's true financial situation.

Could TNA survive without a big TV contract? Hopefully, we won't have to find out.

 

[FitFinlay4Life]

http://www.24wrestling.com/new-details-on-tna-and-spike-tvs-contract/

According to this, the Spike TV deal carries on to October '14.

Should Spike also pick up SmackDown, this could be a blessing in disguise because I would think it would be to Spike's advantage to use the some of the advertising slots on both programs to promote the other. Another possibility could actually be something that has been bandied about on here for years - what if Spike would like some cross promotion work?

As for the Impact Zone news... is this really bad news? Ever since '04 when the Impact Zone began, critics have criticized it for looking and sounding lacklustre. Should Spike also get SmackDown - they'll not want their Thursday night wrestling product look amateur in comparison to their Friday night show. I'm not going to say IW will be attempting last years model again but we could see them move around a number of venues were they have reasonable draw taping several shows.

Who knows, these two stories just might be the shot in the arm TNA really needs.

 

[BaconBits]

From what I've heard Spike TV is really happy with Impact Wrestling and has no plans to drop them. I've also heard they are interesting in trying to get Smackdown for their Friday night block to lead into Bellator.

Spike currently uses TNA to promote Bellator an awful lot. Both promotions cater to a smaller, more niche audience.

I don't see the WWE willing to work with Bellator, as Vince McMahon and the UFC's Dana White have both gone on record as stating that they have a lot of respect for each other. Dana White and Bjorn Rebney of Bellator are extreme enemies.

I don't see Vince wanting/willing to work with a second rate organization in a way that risks the friendly relationship he has with a major organization.

 

[The 1-2-3 Killam]

Spike currently uses TNA to promote Bellator an awful lot. Both promotions cater to a smaller, more niche audience.

I don't see the WWE willing to work with Bellator, as Vince McMahon and the UFC's Dana White have both gone on record as stating that they have a lot of respect for each other. Dana White and Bjorn Rebney of Bellator are extreme enemies.

I don't see Vince wanting/willing to work with a second rate organization in a way that risks the friendly relationship he has with a major organization.

This is also a very good point. WWE stands to make a HUGE amount of money from their new TV deals. I'm sure networks will be clamoring to host Raw and Smackdown. Not all of them, but a lot of them. Raw will probably stay on USA. Not that other networks don't want it, but it's impossible to put a 3-hour show in all of the prime time slots on a Monday Night. Smackdown will be much easier, as nothing good is on Fridays. WWE has a good relationship with Syfy but I could see them wanting to get out of there. I don't think SPike TV is a good fit for them at this point. It might be a step up, but there's just too much in the way of "competition" on the network. WHo knows, maybe USA will try and grab them.

 

[ECPirate37]

I find it odd that so many people are full of doom and gloom for TNA, but none have facts to present. Everyone says, "If _____ is true, then…" or they assume there are money troubles, but no one has proof.

I understand this forum is a lot of the time for "what if?s" so I'm going with this: What if TNA knew when they signed with Universal, it was only going to be a short time? What if TNA is letting go of overpaid talent because they realize they can make the same ratings without them? I am a HUGE AJ Styles fan, but him not being on TNA will not stop me from watching it. EC3 has got me to buy in, and I'm excited every week to see what he does. EC3 is probably making a LOT less than Styles was. And he isn't the same caliber of wrestler, but I'm buying into his character. I HATED that Matt Morgan and Crimson left, but I really enjoy seeing Austin Aries, Bobby Roode, and James Storm.

For years I have read on here that people wanted TNA to cut their roster down because they had too many people for only 2 hours of programming. TNA makes roster cuts and now it is doom and gloom.

Will I miss AJ Styles? Yes, just like I miss Petey Williams, Sonjay Dutt, and the Young Bucks. Can TNA still put up the same ratings without them? Yes. If I admit there is a problem with TNA, it is that they haven't built a cross-over star. If I were them, I would get Austin Aries on any show/interview/new media special that will have him. He is smart, charismatic, and makes me buy in. I would try to get him on the Today Show, Fox Sports Milwaukee, Vegan Cooking shows on the Food Network; put him out there.

As far as Spike goes, according to their last round of contract negotiations, TNA should still be on there until October of this year. [Link attached] Eric Young said last year that TNA had signed a 5 year extension in an interview, but there is nothing from Spike or TNA to confirm that. I would hope he was correct, but if not, TNA and Spike are still together for 10 months. And although the haters like to dis TNA's ratings, their ratings are STILL better than a lot of prime time shows, and there will be another network that wants those ratings. They may have to cut more cost, but who knows, they may go to a slightly bigger network and be able to spend more. I'm not going to worry about their network situation until I see proof that they are gone.

My main point to all of this is, people for years have been wishing for a TNA demise, even when they veil it with "I'm not hating on TNA, but…" (then follow that with something about TNA failing and going out of business)

Here is what I think, I think TNA will continue to cut overpriced roster talents that aren't producing ratings. I LOVE Kurt Angle and Sting, but would not be sad if Kurt left. I would like Sting to become GM again, and never wrestle. However, if both of them aren't re-signed, I will continue watching TNA. Now if TNA cut the entire roster and started from scratch, then I might sing a different tune.

http://www.spike.com/press/2012/04/05/spike-tv-tna-entertainment-announce-multi-year-extension/