TNABaddboi

Can one of the mods change the title to Thread please? I was typing fast

I don't remember Tenay or West hyping it, but the commercial that ran a couple of times for the primetime special mentioned he'd be making his in-ring debut that night.

From TNAWrestling.com: Isn't the tournament supposed end on the primetime show? I thought the winner of next week's three-way was facing Abyss on the 16th.

For some reason, I really like all the tournament matches. I agree that squeezing the four matches into the show may be a bit much, but i think the tourney can produce some decent TV matches. Of course, we're gonna miss half of them to commercials, but I've grown to accept that about Impact. Mostly.

Preview: Discuss:

I agree...I think a big part of the problem is that still no one knows about them by the IWC, half of which has already sampled the product and decided they do like it (or decided they don't like it without even trying it because OMG...Jarrett and Russo suck!). I could almost understand them doing focusing on internet fans when they were on PPV only because it's hard to convince casual fans to pony up every week, so they needed the hardcore supporters. But they've been on TV now for two years and the only ratings increases have been because of timeslot improvements (they went from .15 and .20s on FSN to .8 and .9 on Spike). After awhile, they have to try to grow the audience. The touring should help with that, especially when they get off Hermie's chitlin circuit (though in fairness he's responsible for the northeast shows, so it hasn't been a terrible deal). But why aren't they pushing the hell out of the 2 hour special on the primetime debut? Kurt Angle's face should be all over TV (and Christian's too, since he's in the money match for that show).

I agree wholeheartedly with this.

On TNA's website, they've got a banner listing Kurt Angle vs Abyss for those shows. Here it is:

Being a good worker is the main we (as in the IWC) cheer a wrestler, but it's never been the main reason the audience at large cheers a wrestler. Hogan was never the best wrestler and by the time Austin got to the big time, his best days as a worker were behind him. The audience at large is cheering for the character. They can relate to this person or they think this person is funny or whatever the case may be. But the most over guys are not usually the ***** generals.

I remember reading that too, so i'm pretty sure we won't be seeing any PPVs from Richmond any time soon.

I doubt they'd run a PPV in a market they've never run before, even if the ME is Angle and Joe. They'd wanna be sure they could draw a respectable crowd without having to paper it, because of the cost involved with setting up the arena and all that. I doubt if they hadn't draw 3,700 people in Detroit in March they'd have run BFG there. The problem with this is, of course, is that the next best gate they did was Philly and they can't very well run a PPV from the ECW Arena. It'll be interesting to see what they do in Mexico in a few weeks though. i think that could be a test for a future PPV prominently featuring LAX. LockDown maybe?

I think the problem is actually that they spent too much time trying to develop heels, but give you real reason to like the big babyfaces. Ok, Sting "rid" us of Jarrett. But what has any other face done to make you like them. Even Styles and Daniels....they're over because they're good workers, not because we have a compelling reason to like them.

I get the feeling that they are setting it for Abyss and AJ to meet in the finals on the primetime debut in a showcase match. There are three matches next week and then the winners will have a three-way to see who faces Abyss on the 16th. AJ and Abyss is as good a match as TNA can put out there in front of their hypothetically bigger audience. That said, I thought this show was a mix bag. I really liked Christian's promo on Sting (he's been really good since he turned heel), though I think I would have let Sting have his celebration moment before Christian interrupted. The LAX-AMW brawl was intense, but might have been more effective if it came after a more competitive match with the Naturals. The stuff with Nash, Starr and Shelley was pretty good. I like where that storyline is going so far and I think when Shelley and Starr face each other eventually, it'll be a great match. And in the meaning, they'll have good matches as a team. Good stuff all around there. The tournament was as bad as it sounded in the spoilers execution wise, but it produced a good Abyss-Hoyt match. I actually would have liked to see those guys get five more minutes. They were building a nice little match there. The Joe-Angle pull apart wasn't as effective the third time, so they'll probably have to start doing something else with them eventually, and the Jarrett promo was a very good first step to making Jarrett a face again, which I think will work. Once upon a time, after all, Jarrett was the biggest face in the company (at the beginning of the S.E.X. angle). And it was good to see them finally promoting the house shows on TV. I don't know why they haven't been doing that already...it's another little thing that makes them seem like a big time company. I guess they were encouraged by the Detroit gate.

He was still operating within the framework of existing programs. The top five matches for the PPV were all continuations of existing feuds. I'm no Russo mark (i'm kind of ambivalent to the guy actually...i like some his stuff, i hate some of it), I'm just saying that going forward he should be held responsible for what happens moreso than he was what happened in the past few weeks.

I've seen it reported that though he came in at No Surrender, he was just tweaking the existing plans through BFG (i.e. making Angle special enforcer). If that's true, than this is the first show he's the main booker for. And either way, from the spoilers, this is the first show that his fingerprints are on.

I thought it was reported that Sting re-signed for another year. If he hasn't yet, I know it was reported that they were negiotating and it was highly likely that he'd re-sign.

I've just about finished re-watching the show (I'm up to the ME)and even the second time, I really enjoyed it. The tag match was short, but fun, the Monster's Ball wasn't as good as last year's, but better than the one at Victory Road in 2004 and last half of the show was suberb. Sabin and Senshi was a great back and forth contest and Rhino and Christian had an intense brawl that played into their existing storyline. The cage match wasn't as good as the AMW/XXX one from 2004, but it was a well-worked match. And the main event wasn't spectacular, but it felt like a big deal.

Yeah, because of the way they started building to Sting/Christian before the tournament, I'm thinking they'll headline Turning Point.

Mike Johnson says the show was a sellout. Here's what he reported:

It actually does make sense. Starr won the Nash Invitational at the PPV and Nash was falling all over him afterwards, making Shelley jealous. I'm sure they'll do the relunctant teaming thing for awhile before they feud over NASH LOVE~! But really, I expected them to team up on Impact from the minute that battle royale ended. The rest of the tapings though, I'll reserve judgement until it airs, but the spoilers don't look logical at all.

The fact that they're going to continue the Christian-Rhino feud is kind of surprising to me. I thought for sure they'd take a break and let Christian face Sting before Rhino got his revenge. I guess Abyss wins the tournament then, which wouldn't surprise me considering he's always TNA's put over the new champion guy (Raven in 05, Christian this year).

Here's a short interview with Dixie Carter from Slam Wrestling:

But thirteen years ago WCW didn't have something like the UFC on the same channel, much less as a lead-in. When someone is watching the UFC, with the production and the set-up as real as it is, and then TNA comes on with the tuxedos and facial expressions of Mike Tenay and the Don West's screaming, it just comes off as second rate and fake. THey have guys like LAX, Joe/Angle, and Senshi that can really bring you in and make you believe what they're doing but the typre of environment they're presented in takes away from that. I know that's not the only problem they have but it's something that can change perception of the company. TUF and Impact ratings is not that far apart anymore, just two weeks ago they were a .1 off. And if I'm not mistaken, they've both been doing worse lately than they were a few months ago. I don't even think TNA and UFC have as much crossover audience as people think. The way UFC is promoted as being real makes me think their fans would want nothing to do with "fake" wrestling. They may watch here and there, but I can't see them stick around long enough to become TNA fans. And vice versa. In the year TNA has followed UFC, I've never watched more than 5 minutes of that show. Because I tune to Spike to watch TNA. Because I'm a wrestling fan.

I think that's more indicative of people associating WWE with wrestling for 20 plus years. Any time somebody comes along the national scene at the stage TNA is at now (think WCW circa 1993, only without Turner's deep pockets), they're automatically compared negatively to WWE. That's just something that takes awhile to break. Look how long it took for non video game people to stop saying all games were Nintendo. I'm sure there are parents who still do it. I highly doubt the lasers are causing the low ranting. It's a lot of things (Jarrett and Sting on top aren't doing any favors for sure), but I don't buy blaming the arena. I could see if they were still doing the show from Nashville, but people watched the WCW show from Center Stage in Atlanta, which was basically the EXACT same set-up as Impact, though WCW used smoke in place of TNA's lasers.

I forgot about Abyss's theme. That's up there with my favs too. I think TNA's got some distinctive themes now for most of the top acts so that you know who's coming when the music hits, unlike when they started up. I could do without the WWE knock-offs though.