BoboBrazil 0 Report post Posted October 2, 2003 (edited) EDIT: OOPS I meant the Torch. By Wade Keller and Jason Powell •The one-cent PPV is estimated within TNA to have drawn about 100,000 "buys" (if you want to classify $0.01 as a buy), which means the PPV gross revenue was about $1,000. Some cable companies never changed the pricing of the show, so there will be some $10 orders thrown in there. It's been such a short time since the PPV, though, that any estimate is at best a rough estimate from the handful of cable companies they contact themselves each week to get estimated numbers to track buyrates. They were encouraged before the one cent PPV that their in-house tracking indicating buyrates had been increasing for several weeks. There are no strong signs yet whether the last two weeks have indicated the one cent experiment paid off with another jump in buyrates. •The meeting between TNA officials and Hulk Hogan was on September 12 in Tampa, Fla. Hogan, Jimmy Hart, and Jeff and Jerry Jarrett were present. The hope is Hogan would get them a TV deal, which they still believe would be the best move for the long-term solvency of the company. Jerry Jarrett's optimism that wrestling fans and the TV industry were ready for a pay-per-view weekly series has soured, especially because the PPV distributor InDemand has been for the most part so unorganized and unsupportive despite early promises of the opposite. •The Panda Energy company really sees TNA as a long-term project worth investing in. The Panda reps who work with the Jarretts on a weekly basis have gotten really into the pro wrestling industry. They seem to enjoy learning about the industry and want to make the project work in the long-run. "They've really become big fans of wrestling," says one TNA wrestler. The signing of the core group of wrestlers to one-year guaranteed contracts further demonstrates Panda's desire to see this project through at least one more year. Most if not all the contracts have an option for a second year which allows management to either lock in anyone for another year or cut them loose without any obligation after the first year. That basically means if TNA stays in business, they can keep their top stars for two years before WWE will even have a chance at signing any of them, so no need to imagine what WWE might do with A.J. Styles, Raven, Michael Shane, Frankie Kazarian, Chris Sabin, Christopher Daniels, Simon Diamond, James Mitchell, or Chris Harris, among the other TNA regulars. Notebook: TNA remains such an attractive situation for wrestlers who signed the guaranteed deals because they still get to earn money on weekends, which are the biggest days for indy shows. Mid-week was always dead for indy shows, so those who are signed to TNA guarantees are still able to earn basically anything they would have otherwise. They are giving up WWE opportunity, but WWE could have signed any number of them in recent months if they really wanted them... Dutch Mantel was backstage at the Sept. 24 TNA PPV. He spent most of his time hanging out with Jerry and Jeff Jarrett, although he did make himself available to talk with the wrestlers... There has been some talk that one of the reasons Mantel was brought in is because Vince Russo doesn't want to sign a contract with Panda... Representatives from a trading card company were backstage taking photos of the wrestlers for a planned TNA series of cards. One of the representatives told the wrestlers the trading cards could be produced in as little as two weeks... Johnny Swinger had emergency appendectomy surgery, as TNA announcers reported during the pay-per-view. The word backstage was that the type of surgery Swinger opted for should only require a two week recovery period. However, if he has any complications and has to have another form of surgery, his recovery time could be substantial... TNA regulars Sonny Siaki & Elix Skipper teamed up against Mike Sanders & Alan Funk on Sept. 27 in Helsinki, Finland. Siaki landed on Funk's face and broke several bones including his jaw, eardrum, nose, and eye socket. He is hospitalized in Helsinki and won't be able to fly back to the U.S. for a while until his face heals. Also on the card, A.J. Styles beat Jonny Storm, Steve Corino beat Shane Douglas, and Kid Kash beat Shark Boy... Jerry Lynn hangs out with A.J. Styles backstage at TNA events... Although TNA officials haven't booked David Young in several weeks, he has been backstage almost every week in hopes of being booked. It paid off this time around, as TNA officials used him as a last minute replacement for Swinger... Sandman returns to TNA this week... Now that Raven and James Mitchell have made peace after the botched (yet visually marketable) hair shaving incident of two weeks ago, they are marketing the bloody shaving for all it's worth. On the Sept. 24 PPV, Mitchell asked Raven how it felt "to be the first man in the history of professional wrestling to be scalped on live TV"... On the Sept. 24 show, they set up the Oct. 1 show when A.J. Styles challenged Dusty Rhodes to a match for the NWA World Title. Vince Russo jumped in and told Styles that wasn't a good idea, and set up a tag match instead with Styles & Russo vs. Dusty & Jeff Jarrett... They announced on the Sept. 24 PPV that he chose Russo over Piper and banned Piper from the Asylum (Nashville Fairgrounds) for life. Earlier in the show they finally attempted to differentiate between the power Erik Watts has and the power Don Callis has. Callis said Watts is in charge of what happens in the ring and he is in charge of what happens outside the ring... 3 Live Krew opened the Sept. 24 PPV with a live performance of a rap song. Glenn Gilberti, Simon Diamond, and David Young interrupted the performance... In part one of the sitdown interview with Roddy Piper, he said TNA is a rocket ship ready to take off and his ego makes him want to be a big part of it. The segment was heavily spliced in an apparent attempt to make sense of what Piper said. He said he attended the meeting with NWA and TNA officials where the decision was made to fire him and "go with Russo"... Because Ted Hart, who was so impressive on the X Tournament PPV several weeks back, lives in Calgary, there are no definite plans to bring him back. Travel expenses are just too great for TNA's budget relative to what they think Hart would do to boost business. Management likes him and are trying to get him to fly in for three PPV shows at once, where he would stay in the Nashville area for 15 days and work some indy dates between (with the indy promoters sharing in the travel expenses). Jerry Jarrett's savvy thriftiness/efficiency with money is still present. It's not as if he treats Panda's money as "mark money" like many other promoters have done with financial backers over the years. Jerry wants this business to succeed for a number of reasons, the main one being he'd take pride in helping to set his son Jeff up as one of the major promoters in the country... Terry Funk and C.M. Punk were both considered as the mystery man who unmasked after the hair match between Raven and Shane Douglas, so Vampiro was not the long-term plan... Norman Smiley is no longer with TNA because his pay was being cut nearly in half... TNA is now offering cable companies a 30 minute pregame countdown show on Wednesday nights starting this week, although not all cable companies are carrying it at first. They are also going to be available on InDemand's high-definition PPV channel, so those with a high-def TVs can take advantage of the better picture... Comcast cable will be offering a video highlight show through its Video On-Demand channel each month in Baltimore, Md.; Richmond, Va.; Boston, Mass.; Harrisburg, Pa.; New Jersey; Philadelphia; Detroit; Indianapolis; Atlanta; Charleston, W.Va.; Huntsville, Ala.; Mobile, Ala.; and Savannah, Ga. with more markets to be added soon. It's nice for internet reading wrestling fans who know about TNA to be able to become familiar with the wrestlers before ordering, but most potential customers aren't going to just happen to flip past the show and see it nor are most people going to become aware of the show through any cross marketing during other shows unless TNA or InDemand buys the ad time... DirecTV's sports channel package will include a TNA Xplosion broadcast soon, so it will have the same type of national clearance and exposure as MLW... Rick Santel from the black shirted security team separated his shoulder during the Sept. 24 PPV match... Edited October 2, 2003 by BoboBrazil Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest nikowwf Report post Posted October 2, 2003 Hmm...the panda is the symbol of the WWF, and a company called panda is the main backer of NWA...hmm...i smell conspiracy. niko Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Guest TDinDC1112 Report post Posted October 2, 2003 Hmm...the panda is the symbol of the WWF, and a company called panda is the main backer of NWA...hmm...i smell conspiracy. niko Panda has been the Primary backer of TNA for 13 months now. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
