"We will die a slow death on the vine if we just stay
as one two-hour show in the US." Dixie Carter after deal with Destination
America was announced.
In light of recent events with TNA that statement, more than
any other made by Dixie Carter, seems more and more profound. Obviously for the
wrong reasons but the fact remains that the president of TNA did make that
statement and the reality is TNA only have a one two hour show on Destination
America.
Of course it wasn’t meant to be this way as when the deal
was announced with the smaller network one of the key components was that TNA
would have more programming. In addition to Impact Destination America was also
going to be showing TNA Greatest Matches and TNA Unlocked which was going to be
the Mike Tenay show essentially.
Within weeks of the January 7th launch Greatest
Matches was moved to an unsociable time slot and then Unlocked, a show which
had never made much sense, was moved. At this point alarm bells started to ring
for fans but TNA put on their brave face, like they had with Spike, and denied
any problems.
Then with no fanfare or announcement both shows were dropped
from the network leaving only the two Impact broadcast on a Friday night. While
this may have been big news to TNA fans the truth was that Destination America
is just like every other TV station and is a ratings driven business. If shows
don’t get the projected ratings they get cut and neither of those shows were
doing well enough for the station.
In reality Impact hadn’t done as well as Destination America
were hoping and had inconsistent ratings that hadn’t gone over February’s
numbers:
- January averaged 423,500
- February averaged 449,500
- March averaged 401,500
- April averaged 408,250
- May averaged 363,200
It’s worth remembering that some of the February shows
signalled the start of the UK tour, which took place in January, and
traditionally they are TNA’s loudest and biggest crowds. However the numbers
present a far bigger problem for TNA aside from being less than half what they
were getting on Spike. The trend of the numbers means that TNA are finding it
hard to create excuses for their paltriness.
In a recent interview James Storm spoke about fans being
able to find TNA and that was the main problem with the ratings which, while
may be true to a very small percentage, simply doesn’t hold water under closer
scrutiny. The February 6th Impact garnered 525,000 viewers, its
highest of 2015, while the May 22nd offering only received 232,000.
That is a drop of over 50% and when one considers May has the lowest ratings
average it shows that people have found TNA on Destination America and stopped
watching at some point. As the old saying goes the numbers don’t lie.
Unfortunately things haven’t improved as Destination America
then moved Impact to Wednesday nights with no real warning or regard for what
TNA wanted. It’s worth noting that TNA had already taped several Impact’s with
promos alluding to Friday nights. Then Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer
broke the story that Destination America would not be renewing Impact in the
fall when the station had a get out clause.
Now this is where things have got really silly as far as TNA
are concerned and most of it has been linked to social media. Bob Ryder was the
first to tweet on May 20th with “For almost 13 years some people
have predicted we were about to go out of business. It’s no more true today
than it was then. #StandUp”
Just to clarify that at no point did Dave Meltzer claim TNA
were going out of business or even insinuate it. He stated that if TNA did not
have a domestic TV deal then things would be extremely difficult for them which
many members of the TNA roster have admitted to. Moreover Bob Ryder didn’t even
deny what Dave Meltzer wrote but instead answered a question that no one asked.
TNA as a promotion also felt the need to respond by sending
out this email to TNA sites and various wrestling journalists:
Statement from TNA Regarding IMPACT WRESTLING
It has come to our attention that several internet news sources have falsely attributed statements to TNA, its executives and broadcasting partner. These false statements constitute defamation and if necessary we will seek all legal remedies available to us.
This just seemed like a mess and made zero to little sense when
one considers that it wasn’t several sources but only one who originally stated
it. Legally what Dave Meltzer wrote did not constitute defamation or even close
to it and as to date TNA have not started any legal proceedings. Best of all
was that they didn’t even send this to Dave Meltzer who wrote the original
piece about Destination America cancelling Impact. Something which again was
not denied in the statement as it never specified what they were talking about.
However without being specific TNA were trying to get over
the message that what had been reported was untrue until Billy Corgan of TNA
creative, surely oxymoron of the decade, tweeted “It wouldn’t be so bad if the
whole truth was being reported and the person reporting wasn’t being worked himself
in a sloppy angle.” So after TNA trying to deny it without actually denying one
of their staff then tweeted that at least some truth had been reported.
This is the kind of thing that seems to happen at TNA such
as the whole Vince Russo saga last year when TNA and Russo continued to deny
his involvement with the promotion until it all came out. Even at that point
they were trying to put a spin on it until they fell out with each other. Of
course this could all be denied if TNA had a grip on its staff using social
media or just simply told the truth.
Unfortunately that isn’t easy when the president of the
company tweets this kind of response to a fan who says he likes TNA, doesn’t
want Destination America to cut them and wants them to stay “Thxxx. Let your
friends and the network know.” Yes Dixie told a fan to let the network know
that he wants Impact to stay on Destination America. Would that be necessary if
everything was cosy between TNA and the network or do you think Vince McMahon
would tweet that to a WWE fan?
See it goes back to that original Dixie comment at the top
of the article that sometimes it’s better to say nothing and let people think
you’re stupid rather than open your mouth and remove all doubt. Everything
starts at the top and when people see Dixie tweeting stupid things or saying
stupid things those below just follow suit.
Corgan thought it would be a good idea to tweet:
For some reason Corgan thought it would be a great idea to
point out that TNA are not the number one wrestling company in the world. Why I
have no idea but I doubt HTC will announce their latest phone with the slogan
come buy the 2nd best phone in the world. All Corgan did was tell
new wrestling fans that there is a bigger better promotion to watch.
Josh Matthews recently was involved in a twitter spat for
making ridiculous comments about Samoa Joe’s NXT debut and previously called
fans the twitter police for pointing out his mistakes. An idea for Josh would
be not to make any and take the time to edit his own work or ask someone to
listen in rather than worry about the colour of his pashmina. It wasn’t the
first time Matthews had got silly online as he had to apologise for previously
tweeting stupid things to Jim Ross and yet he still didn’t learn.
Matthews is a classic example of someone just getting an
easy paycheque at TNA as he clearly puts no research into his work. Doesn’t
bother to listen to it over and do you really think he would swear at fans on
Twitter if he were still employed by WWE? Of course not but seen as TNA don’t
manage him why should he bother?
It just seems that TNA are constantly bringing negative
reactions upon themselves and when anyone points it out they are dubbed a
hater. Is it hate to point out that your commentator makes mistakes on a pre-taped
show that no one can be bothered to edit out? Is it hate to realistically look
at the ratings and state that they are not what TNA or Destination America
expected?
The downside to this is that the general response is either
being blocked on social media or being told by “fans” not to watch which people
seem to be taking up that offer more and more. TNA are only interested in
listening to fans who love the show no matter what, they are not interested in
constructive criticism and constantly make themselves look bad with ridiculous
tweets or statements.
Trending on Twitter for an hour does not make you a success
or is even a sign of how things are going. At the start of the year
#CancelWWENetwork trended and within eight weeks WWE reported their highest
ever subscription number so just because #Impact trends does not mean the show
was an all round success. The sad thing is TNA believe that it must be and
while they clearly want to engage in social media getting into petty squabbles
with fans and journalists only makes them look even more small time than they
already do.
For what it’s worth I think TNA will stay on Destination
America but for a renegotiated lesser price. The network have added Ring of
Honor to its schedule which was highly competitive with Impact in its first
week and is reportedly costing the network far less.
That is a key element to remember that to Destination
America Impact is just another show in a long line of successes and failures.
Cutting it will be no issue to them as will renegotiating the deal with TNA,
they are a business and thus will make business decisions.
What TNA need to do in the meantime is stop trying to work
their paltry audience and instead just concentrate on making Impact the best it
can be to give them some leverage come the fall. Stop trying to be smart or
clever with statements that try to sound like a denial without denying
anything. Tell staff to concentrate on their jobs rather than trying to take
shots at WWE but most of all just stop lying. Don’t let Corgan tweet saying TNA
aren’t afraid of criticism yet strop and block people when a little comes their
way, it just makes TNA look foolish.
If something is true just say nothing at all, that Dixie
claimed she couldn’t talk it over with talent but is asking fans to get in
touch with the network speaks volumes. Saying nothing may not be a positive
move but at least it won’t bring any negativity towards the promotion either.
At this stage the damage is done and nothing TNA can do will
repair their image on the hunting ground that is social media but what they can
do is just put up a brick wall. Yes it would mean telling people like Billy
Corgan to stop tweeting about TNA but that has to be better rather than letting
him point people in the direction of WWE.
People keep saying that TNA have nothing to lose which
simply is not true especially if they do get cancelled in the fall. That may be
a situation out of their control but what comes out of their Nashville
headquarters is very much TNA domain and what they could do is start acting
professional. Either stop workers talking about TNA or ask them to make it
clear their views are their own, it’s really not that hard to do.
At a time when the promotion could be facing a huge
challenge it’s getting embroiled with Jeremy Borash being insensitive towards
transgender people or Josh Matthews telling people to F off. It makes you
wonder if TNA are like a young child who enjoy the attention be it good or bad.
Unfortunately the saying all publicity is good publicity isn’t true when
dealing with TV executives so now is the time for TNA to truly become Total
Nonstop Action rather than garnering Total Negative Attention.
Mark Moore is our senior writer, check out all of his recent work at surelywrestling.co.uk and check amazon for his book 'Total Nonstop Attenuation - How TNA escaped the asylum and put the lunatics in charge'.
