wrestling / Columns
The 8-Ball: Top 8 Reasons TNA Should Be Terrified by the ROH/DA Deal
You have to imagine Dixie Carter blew through a box of Poise pads on Wednesday when the news broke that Ring of Honor would be airing on Destination America immediately before TNA Impact on Wednesday nights. Coupled with the now confirmed rumor that Impact will get the ax at the end of September, this is not an encouraging turn of events for TNA. We’ll get into the reasons why momentarily. First, though, allow me to mention a potential silver lining.
Perhaps DA executives have hatched a brilliant plan to air a Wednesday Night War confined to their channel. ROH and TNA slugging it out to see which one truly is America’s #2 wrestling promotion. That could be fun. However, it does not sound like that’s in the works. TNA got blindsided by the announcement and reportedly refused to confirm Impact’s future on DA during a conference call. Yet maybe the network executives find themselves with strong ratings on Wednesday nights and stick with the wrestling rivalry angle. It would be kind of fun if they started signing each other’s talents and cutting promos on one another.
However, if that doesn’t happen, then TNA finds itself in treacherous waters. There’s a lot of reasons to think this will not end well for TNA. Here’s the top eight.
When Destination America signed on the dotted line for TNA it was getting a program that had a history of drawing more than a million viewers. Now it doesn’t attract half of that. DA surely wanted something closer to the Impact Spike numbers. Impact was supposed to be the network’s signature show, the one that drew in new viewers for other shows on the network. That hasn’t materialized. My take is the fault is shared. DA doesn’t have a large footprint and its core programming seems to be redneck TV. A lot of people who get the channel likely don’t know it. Far more won’t bother to watch it. If the notion was that TNA was the rightful heir to the rasslin’ crown, that was a mistake. TNA caught on thanks to its all-action X Division and six-sided ring. A decade ago, TNA was kind of innovative. Yet TNA hasn’t exactly dared much since it debuted on DA. What have they done that was must-see? Maybe EC3 vs. Spud, but Impact has been more proficient than excellent. It needed to be excellent.
One of the big disconnects for ROH is most of the northeast U.S.A. does not have a Sinclair Broadcasting affiliate. Boston, New York, Philadelphia – all huge wrestling towns and the geographic region that initially launched ROH, but you can’t watch ROH in those markets. DA provides a partial fix for that problem, plus Chicago, plus Los Angeles. DA has a paltry reach when you’re coming over from the Spike Network, but it’s a healthy upgrade to the spotty footprint of Sinclair. TNA has held the title of the nation’s #2 wrestling promotion largely by default. ROH now will be catching enough eyeballs to bring that designation into question (more than TNA in the U.S.). The playing field just got tilted and TNA scarcely can afford a change in perception that other promotions are moving past it in terms of prominence.
Too bad for ROH this deal starts after its big crossover week with New Japan. Getting to see Hiroshi Tanahashi, Kazuchika Okada and Shinsuke Nakamura against some top American wrestlers surely would have goosed the ratings. Don’t rule out the possibility that they might be back later this year now that ROH put itself on more television screens. Yet ROH has access to more than just Japanese stars. Quick, name the most famous currently unaffiliated pro wrestler on planet earth under the age of 40. That’s right, CM Punk. Unfortunately the particulars of Samoa Joe’s contract with NXT may make it impossible for ROH to stage the match that could lure Punk back to the ring (though there seems to be some conflicting reporting on that point). Yet Punk has friends in ROH and it’s not unthinkable that he could appear on the company’s programming in a non-wrestling capacity. Punk even near a wrestling ring could be worth a million viewers.
Rumor has it DA insisted TNA make Kurt Angle its champion … because America. Terrible decision. Angle’s done fine work in 2015. He’s a pro’s pro in the ring. Yet he’s an old story. Meanwhile Ethan Carter III, the heir apparent to the TNA title remains on a bafflingly slow burn. EC3 was/is the guy who could make TNA more relevant, the unbeatable one percenter who always gets what he wants. He’s got prodigious on-the-mic talent and the smarmiest look in the business, soli in the ring too. Great character, great story to tell, perfect guy to push the envelope. When someone finally beats him it could be epic. Yet all indications are that DA has pushed for a more middle-of-the-road program. Due to the nature of TNA’s deal with DA, it has to listen when network buffoons try to exert creative control. Since ROH is on a syndication deal, DA is removed from the creative process, though Sinclair is there to fuck that pooch. To give Sinclair some credit, it seems to have figured out it doesn’t know squat about running a wrestling company, giving ROH more leeway in the past couple of years.
AJ Styles, Jay Lethal, Christopher Daniels, Frankie Kazarian, Chris Sabin and Matt and Nick Jackson (possibly even Samoa Joe). Those names ought to sound familiar to TNA. They’re some of the most talented wrestlers to work for the promotion and now they’re all plying their trade for ROH. AJ is the big one. He’s getting poster play with this announcement, though his main gig still is New Japan. He was Mr. TNA, the signature talent in that promotion. TNA fans wore themselves out arguing Styles’ ring superiority to John Cena back when TNA was aiming to challenge the WWE (and they were right). Now AJ’s working for a direct enemy and his New Japan success has made him an even bigger deal. If you’re a longtime TNA fan, you might feel more kinship with the ROH roster. Does it matter if TNA is still around if you still get to see your favorite TNA wrestlers working for someone else every week? Might not.
Side-by-side comparisons of ROH and TNA will be inevitable if they air back-to-back. Every Wednesday night will be a televised battle to see which one is better. ROH has the advantage of knowing this was coming. It has no one to blame but itself if it doesn’t attempt to blow our minds on June 3rd and then every week after that. It knew it was about to get itself in a fight. TNA got caught completely unaware. It’s already got a month’s worth of shows in the can. While I’m sure those shows will be fine, they surely weren’t put together with the thought that they need to blow away anything ROH might air. Supposedly this arrangement will last at least four months. ROH can come out slugging before TNA ever figures out a plan of attack for a fight it cannot afford to lose. TNA needs to trounce ROH in the ratings and win in terms of critical acclaim. Then maybe DA will change its mind or some other network will see an opportunity. If the ratings go the other way and the buzz becomes that ROH is the better show, that could be fatal to TNA.
As mentioned above, ROH has a syndication deal with DA. It already pays its production costs and for the talent on its roster. This is extra money for the promotion. With TNA, the DA deal is what keeps the lights on. TNA does not a thriving live event business beyond its television tapings. For all intents and purposes, its business is the Impact television show. DA is the primary revenue stream. That’s a hefty commitment. The leaked DA memo about cancelling Impact emphasizes that point, stating the show has done fine, but that its performance doesn’t justify the expenditure. Perhaps if DA were committed to the wrestling game and TNA was its only option, it could rationalize the cost. However, ROH just undersold TNA. DA gets to have weekly wrestling programming for pennies on the dollar. The price point for what TNA does has dropped. It now needs to figure out how to offer its programming at a cost more in line with what ROH costs DA. I don’t know that it can.
Here’s a list of ROH wrestlers under the age of 30: Adam Cole, ACH, Adam Page, Cedric Alexander, Kyle O’Reilly, Michael Elgin and Nick Jackson. Here’s the TNA list: Bram, Magnus, Chris Melendez, DJ Z, Jessie Godderz, Khoya and Mandrews. One of those lists has a lot more promise than the other, though I suppose a person could differ if you’re a huge Magnus mark. Technically Drew Galloway doesn’t turn 30 for another week, but if I start counting guys age 30 or 31 it turns into a bigger landslide for ROH. Simply put, ROH has a younger roster with some bona fide indie stars. Adam Cole alone would tip the scales. He’s on the CM Punk/Daniel Bryan/AJ Styles path to superstardom. A big reason to watch a secondary wrestling promotion is to see who’s coming next. Lucha Underground features Prince Puma, Fenix, Pentagon Jr. and Angelico. Even the WWE has Seth Rollins, Dean Ambrose, Roman Reigns (just turned 30), Bray Wyatt and Neville. TNA has a more established roster. It’s not really pumping out the new blood on which the business runs. That alone is going to give ROH a younger, hungrier, more vital vibe. Lucha Underground and NXT also air on Wednesdays. TNA stands to be the old man of that group. You can’t fight the future and fans legitimately may come to question how much of the future TNA is offering these days.
I take requests.. The purpose of this column is to look forward. What could be? What should be? What is and what should never be? What would make more sense? 411 has plenty of columns that count down and rank things that happened in the past. This is not one of those columns. The Magic 8-Ball is here to gaze into the future. If there’s someone or something you think should be given the 8-Ball treatment, mention it in the comments section. I might pick it up for future weeks.
