|
Post by HMARK Center on Sept 28, 2013 19:55:05 GMT -5
Ok, some time last year I decided I would get back into watching Impact regularly after a good year and a half keeping tabs on it pretty casually.
For awhile, I felt like my decision was justified: the new Russo-less booking team reinvigorated Samoa Joe, my favorite wrestler; they put together a solid storyline pushing a red-hot Bully Ray to the World Title; Austin Aries shot up the card in no time; guys like Bobby Roode and Chris Daniels were amazing heels that didn't get "cool heel" cheers, just pure heat; even a stupid storyline like Claire Lynch led to character development for AJ Styles and the solidifying of Bad Influence/EGO, so it felt worth it.
That stuff, along with a solid BFG series and all-around logical (if not necessarily perfect) booking made keeping up with it feel worthwhile.
However, I think most of us can see what's happening lately. TNA is clearly in a weird transition period, with the roster seemingly receiving an enormous overhaul, and I don't think they're handling it well at all.
It's not that the matches are all bad, or that the storylines all suck; no, there's a few matchups going on lately that are perfectly cromulent in my book.
However, the production and presentation feels scatter-shot; the eye for details that gave us things like Bully's six month plan to win the World Title just aren't there; guys who are great at what they do are being shoehorned into roles that don't suit them (e.g. AJ doing worked shoots or whatever).
So, let's sum it up: what would you do to get TNA refocused as a product?
Work off an assumption that guys like Hulk Hogan aren't around, that the roster has been as severely trimmed as it seems, and that there's clearly a transition happening that continues to evolve every day. How would you try to fix that?
This isn't necessarily a "how to fix the company" thread, it's more about how to get the show feeling like it has more cohesion and logic again.
|
|
Sephiroth
Wade Wilson
Surviving
Posts: 28,955
|
Post by Sephiroth on Sept 28, 2013 20:11:32 GMT -5
GET-rid of Hogan.
|
|
kidglov3s
Bill S. Preston, Esq.
Wants her Shot
Who is Tiger Maskooo?
Posts: 15,870
|
Post by kidglov3s on Sept 28, 2013 20:35:58 GMT -5
I would start building clearly defined feuds. I would completely dissolve Aces and 8s and drop heel Dixie. I would have EGO be a very loose association, where the guys each have their own primary feuds.
|
|
|
Post by The Spelunker! on Sept 28, 2013 20:36:44 GMT -5
Person who did not read OP detected.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Sept 28, 2013 20:39:01 GMT -5
OK then
With what's left, Aces and Eights isn't practical, neither is the Main event Mafia. So wrap up that storyline with a big win to TNA. No more factions. TNA has done them to death. Seriously sack the next guy who even suggests a faction. He is dead weight.
I like Bully as champ, but there needs to be some babyface building, that isn't happening. Seems everyone is turning heel. With a heel champion that makes no sense, unless AJ Styles is getting the belt. Which he probably is.
With Hogan gone, they might be able to bring in a few X-division guys to help fill the cards. I wouldn't bother with the Knockout's, because the division needs a large amount of time and investment to get back on track. The X-division will get better results with less effort and investment.
|
|
Brood Lone Wolf Funker
Ozymandius
Got fined anyway. Possibly a Moose
James Franco is the white Donald Glover
Posts: 62,102
|
Post by Brood Lone Wolf Funker on Sept 28, 2013 20:50:26 GMT -5
Give Bully a clearly defined feud where the contender actually looks like a threat and can get in some offense Bring some more attention to the X Division its the one thing that makes them stand out from WWE Since the Knockouts are getting thrown to the wayside try and find a way to make them interesting again Keep certain wrestlers away from the main event scene that don't need to or deserve to be there Have a decent passable mid-card with some upper card guys that can be in the main event (Styles, Bully, Magnus, Joe come to mind) Keep MMA fighters far away from TNA Let Knux go solo get rid of Garrett still too green right now Bring back the TV title this way the mid-card has something to go for Make some new tag teams right now there are about five I can count off the top of my head Have commentary actually be interested in whats going on in the ring Drop Heel dixie Drop factions
|
|
|
Post by Michael Coello on Sept 28, 2013 21:22:45 GMT -5
Honestly, I'd like to see a more opened contendership area for the belts. All the belts, even the World title. My idea is to have the small core of wrestlers (the signed talent you will use to market stuff like merch and put on the roster) and there will be a much langer pool of "red shirt superstars", to use a weird phrase, to kind of fill out the talent. You have short runs of these people in all the divisions, treating it as an open challenge to not only to the talent in the company, but also to "the world". Think of an X-Cup theme but as the entire foundation of a title subdivision.
Imagine a scenerio where you have the tag belts being defended by Chavo & Hern versus a hot indy team from Canada, the woman's title getting pursued by some mysterious fighter from Japan, the X-title being brawled over by 4 people from 4 completely different nations, and even the World title seeing a challenge from, say, a champion from a different regional or state fed. You can probably work in former guys in WWE or Legends, trying to get back into a return, with wolves from nearly every nation and style around them. Kind of like a territory system, but if the entire world was like several territories. I know TNA does business with a lot of indies and international places, and it could bring an interesting twist to TV.
It adds the sense of "anything can happen" to the show, as well as varies up the matches, and from there you can play them as complete trials by fire to talent you might want to sign long term and maybe see win the belt and make TNA stars of. It should also not be as costly as signing someone big like Sting or Hogan, as 1)if done with touring, you can get the local talent to some in, saving travel costs for them and 2) Even with the variable of rates, having someone for 1-2 months at a time would be cheaper than contracts for 1-2 years.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Sept 28, 2013 21:24:53 GMT -5
The roster needs to be stabilized first and foremost, anyone that is on the chopping block should be removed from the planning and then using the people that are definitely going to be there build feuds using the KISS method. That alone would be a great start.
|
|
AdamAFL was sooooo wrong
Hank Scorpio
note to all: he's a pants-less heathen
I Survived The Impact Spoilers 7/22/15-7/30/15
Posts: 7,097
|
Post by AdamAFL was sooooo wrong on Sept 28, 2013 21:59:37 GMT -5
Honestly apart from booking the show a little bit better I don't know that there's a lot they can do. The faction stuff has got out of control. They need to stay away from faction's controlling the show for quite a while yet. EGO doesn't necessarily need to disband because they can just be a loose alliance whilst all three or Roode and Bad Influence do their own thing. But MEM and A&8's have to be done after Bound For Glory.
It's not like the show's terrible right now though. It's nowhere near as good as it was for almost the entirety of 2012 but it's far better than things were in 2011 (although you wouldn't know that if you read the Impact thread every week, I've seen less depressing suicide notes). But they screwed up this year's BFG Series and focused far too much on all the faction warfare drama which has just taken away from the show all summer.
With the budget cuts going on it's not like they can bring in a load of new talent and I don't think going back to the roots of TNA is particularly something they need to do. They need to look forward not back and try to get things back on track booking wise. Bound For Glory should be the turning point. AJ wins the belt and the company goes in a bit of a different direction. I'd be interested in seeing how people on here would book Impact from Bound For Glory onward because it is a bit like pressing the reset button and that means anything could happen.
|
|
pacino
Don Corleone
Posts: 1,504
|
Post by pacino on Sept 28, 2013 22:00:52 GMT -5
take Dixie off TV
|
|
tenshi
Patti Mayonnaise
Probably more memorable than a Charlotte title reign
Posts: 34,036
|
Post by tenshi on Sept 28, 2013 22:22:07 GMT -5
Watch WWE and do exactly the opposite of what they're doing. The big problem with TNA isn't that they don't have star power, it's that they don't know how to use the talent they have and this might fix some problems the company is dealing with even for a short period of time.
1. Revamp the X division and the Knockouts division: With a handful of talents in both divisions, a smart thing to do is calling talents from OVW and fill voids left by people who moved up the card or left the company. That won't instantly make these divisions better but at least there would be a bigger talent pool to work with, having the opportunity to rotate champions and challengers as well as making feuds outside the title picture, which takes me to another point.
2. The midcard titles must matter: Rob Van Dam was X division champion not long ago. Samoa Joe won the X division title after he was world champion and so did Austin Aries months ago. How come that doesn't happen anymore? How come the top guys don't go over titles that aren't the world title? Having more talent available on the roster can bring variety into the mix and, like any good competitor that respects itself, the "top guys" would want to test their skill against the young guns. Manik defending the X division title against, for example, AJ Styles would be a big deal for the X division because a top talent is going for its title and that alone makes the title mean more than just keeping it to a certain group of guys.
3. Use veterans to your advantage: Sting isn't going anywhere anytime soon and Kurt Angle would want to compete in a high level but you can't allow that to happen as a booker because that has been happening for a while. If you want to keep these guys as well as creating new top players, use their knowledge and skill to the benefit of someone else. You can have an up-and-coming face like, for example, Magnus be Sting's tag team partner and they can go for the tag titles together or you can have someone like Christopher Daniels, Chris Sabin or Kazarian feud with Kurt Angle and win in order to establish them as permanent upper midcarders and/or main eventers. TNA has tried some of this before and it worked to an extent so I don't see why they wouldn't try to do that again.
4. Keep things basic: AJ Styles vs Bully Ray is set to headline Bound For Glory this year but we haven't seen much of a build-up for this match. What we have instead is Ray dealing with his own group dissolving and rebelling against him while his challenger is bickering with the owner of the company because things aren't how they used to be. You can have a bunch of stuff put into one title feud but the core must be the same: one guy has a belt, the challenger wants it and the champion wants to keep it. It's simple and easy to follow and that's what matters the most while all the tweaks that can be used to hook people into watching the match are used for the purpose of reinforcing this formula instead of messing with it.
|
|
|
Post by Magic knows Black Lives Matter on Sept 29, 2013 0:04:08 GMT -5
Get back to rap, you T-Paining too much.
...Wait.
|
|
|
Post by jimmyjames on Sept 29, 2013 1:03:34 GMT -5
Refocus and reload the Knockouts and Tag TEam Division. That's one of the things that separated TNA from WWE. NOe, they've reloaded and/or focused on those, while TNA has deemphasized them.
Focus on the X-Division and it's title. The X-Division championship shouldn't be used aa golden ticket to ash it in and advance to a match for the TNA championship.
Stop with the faction obsession. 1 or 2 groups is alright (especially if it's EGO), but you don't have to have 4 all fighting each other.
Speed up storylines. The who's in Aces & 8s storyline should have been wrapped up in 3 months, not 8 months. TNA is notorious for dragging out storylines for so long, one loses interest in the whole thing.
Focus on what you have. Kenny King, Austin Aries, CD and Francois, all should be the main focus of divisions or the company.
Drop Hogan. The time has come to cut bait. Drop Chavo, Hernandez, and Gunner. Ease Sting and if he comes back, Kurt Angle. They can still have roles in the company, just reduced, greatly in some cases, and they do not need to be in the main event.
Try to add another show. Have a 1 hr show on Saturday night on Spike. There has to be more coverage than Thursday night Impact and the Sunday night Spanish rerun on MTV Tres.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Sept 29, 2013 1:19:24 GMT -5
1. Establish a strong secondary singles title. It's a MUST, they have zero midcard right now because there's nothing to fight for, and if the belt is strong enough and we see that holding that title is a springboard to the world title, guys that aren't in the world title picture at the moment will have better direction.
2. Add more Knockouts and more X-Division/cruiserweight wrestlers. TNA needs to emphasize the "3 ring circus" theory of wrestling, a lot of different styles and something for everyone, instead of one big glut of guys and a couple of women and a couple of cruisers.
3. No more "control of the company" angles for like 10 years. By proxy that means no more weekly on-screen authority figures, becuase they always feud with talent and it always turns into a power struggle.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Sept 29, 2013 5:34:16 GMT -5
Continue to be on the same path and eventually it will become "Impact is so bad, it's actually entertaining" and people will tune in to see the clusterf***.
|
|
|
Post by ________ has left the building on Sept 29, 2013 5:57:36 GMT -5
Figure out who will be very important for the promotion for the next 2 years. Lock them up into long term contracts. Find talent who are ready to go to fill the voids left the budget bloodletting. Go back to the basics with the booking. No more faction warfare, on screen management battles, non-wrestlers being the main focus of storylines, and constant character alignment shifts. Renew the focus on the X and Knockouts division only after the ranks been refilled. Bring back the TV title and put the veterans and rookies who aren't involved in the main event scene there. Make the main event scene young and athletic. Sell themselves as a wrestling promotion instead Diet WWE.
That's how they can get there focus back.
|
|
|
Post by Hit Girl on Sept 29, 2013 8:20:22 GMT -5
1- Decide on a name. Is it TNA or Impact Wrestling? Even the title of this forum doesn't know. My advice would be to say "TNA" is the name of the company and "Impact" is their main show. Keep it simple.
2- Have clearly defined divisions: World, X-Division, Knockouts and Tag Teams. All should be treated with respect and booked strongly with very little crossover between them.
3- Have a relatively small roster. Ideally about 8 performers per division. This will allow each of them to be well defined and get enough screentime. Hire a supply of part-time jobbers to get them over.
4- Cut all backstage segments. That "hidden camera" thing looks ridiculous. Even worse than the "invisible camera" in WWE. All interviews and promos should be conducted in the ring.
5- Get Dixie Carter off screen. She's a dumb hick who projects no authority. Her segment with AJ Styles sounded like a teenaged boy arguing with his mom after she found granny porn under his bed.
6- Get rid of Taz. He's a useless incoherent idiot. One of the worst commentators of all time. Tenay is dead inside, but he's still the best they've got. Just let him call the shows alone.
7- Stop hiring ex WWE/WCW cast-offs, especially older ones. It gives the company an image of being a pale imitator of WWE (which they are). They need their own identity, and that will only come from developing home-grown stars. They should be actively using their resources to sign promising indie talents. As special attractions they should also showcase occasional Japanese and Mexican wrestling stars wrestling their own performers just to offer something different.
8- Form ties with the rest of the wrestling world other than WWE. Make arrangements with indie feds and international companies for talent exchanges and the like. This keeps things fresh and builds goodwill among the non-WWE companies.
9- Keep things clear and concise. TNA often overbook things. They are too chaotic for a viewer to keep track of. Simplicity is best
10- NO MORE AUTHORITY FIGURES. The concept is DEAD, DEAD, DEAD. Yes, it's been done in WWE, but really it should be the final example of it. In any case, HHH and Stephanie can project authority. No one in TNA can.
11- Go back to the six-sided ring. It gave TNA a distinction, at least visually, from WWE.
That's all for now.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Sept 29, 2013 10:43:43 GMT -5
- Determine who the core set of guys are and rotate them in feuds accordingly. The biggest problem with TNA, aside from budget cuts, is their lack of feuds unrelated to the world title. Let Samoa Joe feud with Bobby Roode for 5 months. Seriously. There are barely any PPV's, so stretch a feud out so that two of your top guys who are not currently involved in the world title picture have something meaningful to do. It just seems like guys are twiddling their thumbs if they are not in the world title scene, or they are thrust into a make-shift tag team to kill time. There is no reason for AJ Styles, Bully Ray, Jeff Hardy, Austin Aries, Samoa Joe, Bobby Roode, Bad Influence, James Storm, and Magnus not being in feuds at any given time.
- I realize the "budget cutter" makes this next thing hard to accomplish, but book long-term. It's October, but TNA should already know what the Lockdown and Slammiversary main events and top undercard matches will be next year. Again, that's hard to do with the budget situation, and the budget problems have already sliced up BFG, but that leads back to my first point of having a core group of guys who you know will be around for a while. The rest can be interchangeable.
- Show indy stars that being in TNA is beneficial. Let's be honest, the top indy stars will go to the WWE 99% of the time. That 1% of the time when they don't is if WWE is not interested for whatever reason (see Desmond Wolfe). So the best thing TNA can do is go after the lesser known talent that WWE may have missed on, or the talent that WWE does not want. There is talent to be found. Maybe they won't sign the next Daniel Bryan or CM Punk, but go after the lesser guys and see what type of mileage you can get out of them.
- As others have said, see what the WWE is doing, and do the opposite. The WWE gets 4 million viewers a week. TNA gets 1.1-1.5 million. Chances are, the 1.5 million that watches TNA already watches the WWE, so it's pointless to try to emulate them. Go a different direction. That's why I loved the BFG Series in 2012. It was different. It was unique. It made wins and losses matter. That's what the WWE lacks. The WWE has the production value and decades of experience to do all the "entertainment" stuff. TNA should focus more on the old school wrestling aspect of things.
- This one is never going to happen, but strike a partnership with ROH. When AJ Styles wins the TNA championship and "leaves", TNA has a chance to copy CM Punk's 2011 storyline but take it places WWE never could. Have AJ show up at an ROH show (or hell, any indy show) with the TNA title and do some sort of talent sharing. TNA is lacking talent due to the budget cuts, and ROH could probably benefit from the Spike TV exposure. It can be mutually beneficially, but again, unlikely.
|
|
|
Post by HMARK Center on Sept 29, 2013 14:59:35 GMT -5
- Determine who the core set of guys are and rotate them in feuds accordingly. The biggest problem with TNA, aside from budget cuts, is their lack of feuds unrelated to the world title. Let Samoa Joe feud with Bobby Roode for 5 months. Seriously. There are barely any PPV's, so stretch a feud out so that two of your top guys who are not currently involved in the world title picture have something meaningful to do. It just seems like guys are twiddling their thumbs if they are not in the world title scene, or they are thrust into a make-shift tag team to kill time. There is no reason for AJ Styles, Bully Ray, Jeff Hardy, Austin Aries, Samoa Joe, Bobby Roode, Bad Influence, James Storm, and Magnus not being in feuds at any given time. I fully agree on this point - even with all the cuts, there's still more than enough talent on the roster today for TNA to be putting on some very good feuds. Just looking at Austin Aries, he looked like he would be fighting EGO going into BFG, then next thing you know he's doing a promo with Kenny King, now it appears they may not even be facing each other by BFG...c'mon, pick something for the guy. One point other people have been making that I DON'T agree with is adding more midcard belts. Especially given their big roster cuts, there simply aren't enough bodies around to warrant it. I honestly think one smart aspect of the Hogan era was to say "put most of the focus on the World Title", given how much smaller the roster wound up getting. That said, if they went with the approach mentioned earlier, that of bringing in a lot of outside talent in a "modern global territory" style, then it COULD work to have 4 different belts, because there'd be a constant stream of challengers for each one.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Sept 29, 2013 16:49:53 GMT -5
It's really not that hard. Get rid of the overpriced guys (Which they seem to be doing).
Hire indy guys to short term deals, if they catch on sign them long term.
Keep costs low, hopefully someone breaks out as the John Cena of the company and they start making a big profit.
|
|