Could the NWA ever be a major fed again?

[Sephiroth]

Hey, nothing's impossible. In all honesty, however, I would have to say the NWA model actually prevents the NWA from being a big name in wrestling again. I could actually envision another major fed rising under the NWA mantle, much like ECW and TNA did, but I can't see any major fed being willing to share their talent and money with the Indy Feds that form up the NWA nationwide. Pretty much the NWA would have to solidify into one fed and sever all ties to most of its small affiliates.

[Djm Doesn't Find You Funny]

No.

[Johnny B. Decent]

Nope.

[Deleted]

They had there shot with NWA Hollywood. But after all the recent stuff no, they sadly don't have much of a chance at all

[Wolf Hawkfield no1 NZ poster]

Long answer no!

[________ has left the building]

Aww hell naw.

[Mayonnaise]

There is no one NWA or central promotion anymore. Barring them changing their business model completely I don't see how.

[Baldobomb-22-OH-MAN!!!]

hahahaha no

[Welfare Willis]

Yes... I mean no.

[El Pollo Guerrera]

I think it's possible, but not they way the are running things now.

[Todd Pettengill]

Yeah, No.

[CATCH_US IS the Conversation]

I agree with the idea that the NWA would have to basically give up the NWA business model of being a collective of promotions in order to be revived.

I think the NWA could rise back to prestige with a bit of work and restructuring. But it needs proper backing by people who care about wrestling and don't have a big ego.

It would take a few steps though

1. Give the NWA World Heavyweight Championship to a big name indie talent or a WWE, WCW, ECW alum with decent notoriety. You could go further and have ALL of the NWA's major championships placed on "name" talent.

2. Take 25-35 of the "best and brightest" from all of the member promotions and make them into a "main roster" of sorts. Keep the better promotions around as NWA's "developmental system" while cutting the lesser ones loose.

3. Secure a TV deal on one of the many cable channels out there, OR at the very least, start a YouTube Channel with the intent of obtaining a YouTube Partnership. Ideally, try to release taped shows on a weekly or at least bi-weekly basis

4. Run shows in smaller venues, generally limiting the shows to the same towns that the member promotions operate out of until the company becomes big enough to go further.


I really would like this to be a possibility if only to help improve wrestlers' career prospects so that aspiring wrestlers can enter the business without the mentality of "WWE or Bust".

[Deleted]

yes, with an if. And no, with a but.

[kingoftheindies]

it can become less of a joke if they partner up with a major indy fed, or start booking more name talent to have the title (and then having them defend against bigger names as well). The Pearce/Cabana stuff brought some attention to the title, and it was good attention. But giving the title to the New Shiek (who sucks) and Kahagas (whose a good worker, but not known anywhere outside of Florida) are not good choices.

Honestly, if they keep the title on Conway, they need to book him against some credible opponents.

[Steveweiser]

I think it'll be a step forward if Satoshi Kojima wins the title on Sunday. Sure it'll become a New Japan midcard belt, but it'll get more attention than it's done since the belt was defended in TNA.

[Sephiroth]

The big issue for the NWA, as I see it, is that they still operate like its the territory days. Their whole system with a board of directors really doesn't work in this day and age-the reason the deals with TNA and Hollywood fell apart was because the bookers got tired of all these other guys trying to meddle in their decisions. The only way to overcome that really would be for some entrepreneur to purchase the NWA name outright and dissolve the traditional system, which is unlikely to ever happen, to say the least.

[Deleted]

If someone buys the company and turns into a DDT/HUSTLE style fed, then yes.

Any other form? No

[Reflecto]

Some of the ideas would work better with some slight changes:

1. Give the NWA World Heavyweight Championship to a big name indie talent or a WWE, WCW, ECW alum with decent notoriety. You could go further and have ALL of the NWA's major championships placed on "name" talent.

2. Take 25-35 of the "best and brightest" from all of the member promotions and make them into a "main roster" of sorts. Keep the better promotions around as NWA's "developmental system" while cutting the lesser ones loose.

I'd tie both of those together:

Cutting loose lesser NWA promotions is a bad idea- the better option is to strengthen smaller and bigger NWA promotions so that around the country/world, people can know the NWA affiliate is the gold standard indy promotion in their area. To that end, it'd work better to keep all the promotions, big and small, around, and try to strengthen them up from the ground up.

To that end, the way I'd strengthen it is to have the "NWA" name have a two-tiered attack- one the licensing method the NWA currently uses, with the second being an in-house talent booking agency for the NWA promotions.

The NWA booking agency would then book out the wrestlers who've signed onto their talent booking to each of the NWA member promotions at a discounted rate, and NWA membership would guarantee any NWA member promotion a certain number of free dates [the booking fee/transportation's paid for by the NWA itself] as part of their membership dues [say, for instance, one year's NWA membership dues guarantees you six at-cost dates for NWA talent and two lesser NWA title matches, with higher membership dues granting you more at-cost NWA talent dates or NWA World Title matches.)

Meanwhile, for the "belt mark" image the NWA champions have, this would change it- instead of the "pay 25 G's for the reign" form of the past NWA champs, it'd be changed where the deposit would be lower- but in exchange, no wrestler can be considered to hold a national-level NWA championship unless they agree to use the NWA booking agency (and anyone who works for an NWA promotion is eligible to use the NWA's booking agency.]

End result of this: You have a central NWA "main roster" of their in-house talent, who would be able to go anywhere in the NWA if they're handling the booking, allowing them to make names for themselves nationally. The titles can move around all the promotions in the NWA, as well as each promotion having a chance to have top names potentially break through on a national scale [making the promotions feel more important and stronger.] From there, the NWA can be a major force.

[Deleted]

Hell no.

[SOR]

NWA had potential to make this happen this time last year. Behind them they had Championship Wrestling From Hollywood (Which is great), NWA Anarchy (Which had Behren's booking agency), NWA Legends Fanfest (Probably the best wrestling convention) and a number of other really decent little promotions that would draw 75-100 a night but still have an entertaining show.

Bruce Tharpe takes over the promotion late last year and goes from having Colt Cabana Vs Adam Pearce around the country having kick ass matches to having Great Muta want to be Kahagas running around getting into shoot fights with guys like Bruce Santee and having draws with guys like Manny Fernandez.

A lot of their bigger promotions left and a lot of smaller ones did as well. To their credit Tharpe did get a decent promotion to join in his reign that being the NWA-SAW Promotion but other then that there has been an influx of bad promotions such as NWA-SEW (Sports Entertainment Wrestling) who uses knock off wrestlers such as "AJ Snow" and "Raven" (Not the ECW Raven) on their shows. The NWA-SEW guys don't even have gear. Another promotion joined and ran their debut show from a car park. It makes the NWA look a lot worse when things like this happen.

Giving Conway the belt and sending him off to New Japan was a good move. They have some name recognition and a bit of exposure but that will run out rather quickly. Tharpe isn't really building long term with the current upswing he has and that's hurting the NWA currently I believe.

As for whether or not it could be a major fed in it's current state I say no. Even if you joined the rosters together and took the best guy from each territory there isn't enough popular talent to make people care. The NWA's top wrestler is Damien Wayne. Does anyone really know much about this guy? After Damien Wayne it's a few WWE Development guys and Great Muta rip off Kahagas. 

They are running a super show this month which is to feature all of their champions plus a number of name talents such as Conway, Masters, Lance Hoyt and Davey Boy Smith Jr. Even with the 4 name talents and all the Champions it took them 2-3 months to sell the building out for the event (The building seats about 500-600)