Ex-WWE talent joining TNA back in the 2000s.

[agent817]

I see on social media that people are accepting as well as critical of the number of former WWE talent joining AEW. It's reached the point where more people are critical because I have counted the number of former WWE people (some including other staff like announcers and such) and it's a big number. However, I also remember when Kevin Owens re-signing with WWE, some of the reactions online were like the disappointed sigh that happens when you were excited for something so much but then when it doesn't go as well as you wanted it to, you sigh and look down.

Which brings me to my topic. I recall many people criticizing Impact as far as back as the early-2010s when an ex-WWE wrestler goes to Impact, but it also happened in the previous decade. We had many former WWE talents joining TNA, whether it was Kurt Angle, Christian, Tyson Tomko, and many others. Were people mostly critical because TNA pushed the former WWE talent over homegrown TNA talent? I mean in some areas, you see the same in AEW.

How did any former WWE talent joining TNA at that time differ from how former WWE talent join AEW? Was it how they were pushed? What are your thoughts?

[KAMALARAMBO: BOOMSHAKALAKA!!!]

I think the thing some fans are increasingly worried about is AEW following TNA’s habit of pushing ex-WWE talent at the expense of their homegrown stars.

AEW has done a MUCH better job of building up their own roster. At multiple points TNA seemed like they’d push ANY ex-WWE star over their own talent. One example that sticks out is the past his prime former Val Venis going over a white hot Christopher Daniels. But really that’s just one example I plucked from random. There’s no shortage.

[Zombie Mod is not a ghoul.]

in that era a lot of recently released wwe wrestlers went to TNA/Impact almost instantly.

which from a business point of view it made sense for tna to do, but to stick them either into the main event programme or right at the top of the company and use the "that other company up north didnt use me to my best" promo for 90% of them (it quickly became a meme) just made tna look like it was a holiday spot for ex wwe stars until they could get back into wwe's good graces or until they burned themselves out there.

tna sacrificed their home grown talent to chase the few wwe fans who briefly followed the wrestlers away from wwe and failed to capitalise on showing how they were different from wwe.

long story short pretty much anyone who left wwe was expected to go to tna with a terrible name and rarely a gimmick change.

[chrom]

It wasn't that they were signing ex-WWE talent, it was that they were being treated head and shoulders above their own homegrown talent.

The lowest guy on The WWE roster would be seen as above the highest TNA homegrown

[This Player Hating Mothman]

Sean Morley showing up, beating Daniels in his debut, and then f***ing off mere months later really says it all. The problem isn't in AEW hiring bigger names and cult workhorses out of WWE just like it wasn't a problem for TNA to bring in guys like Christian and have them be big deals. TNA was, at one period, willing to take literally anyone and push them way too hard while they put in half the work they did in WWE.

[Captain Stud Muffin (BLM)]

Aug 12, 2022 21:00:10 GMT -5 This Player Hating Mothman said:

Sean Morley showing up, beating Daniels in his debut, and then f***ing off mere months later really says it all. The problem isn't in AEW hiring bigger names and cult workhorses out of WWE just like it wasn't a problem for TNA to bring in guys like Christian and have them be big deals. TNA was, at one period, willing to take literally anyone and push them way too hard while they put in half the work they did in WWE.

The Hogan/Bischoff regime went full force with that and it sucked f***ing bad. Even signing Jeff Hardy with all his legal woes was a big red flag of you will sign anyone. Yes, he was arguable the top babyface in WWE even over Cena but he had Jail hanging over his head 

As AJ Styles said out his own mouth, Dixie was more enamored with guys she saw on TV as opposed to people she had already

[fw91]

Well my perspective is this. AEW seemed to have bloomed into existence from anti-WWE sentiment. So when they seemingly focused on pushing ex WWE talent that were stars over homegrown or "misused" talent, it seems hypocritical to the naked eye. With TNA, it was mostly older guys half-assing for easy Dixie money to take a break from the WWE grind until they got tired of it and came back to WWE.

[A Platypus Rave]

Aug 12, 2022 21:00:10 GMT -5 This Player Hating Mothman said:

Sean Morley showing up, beating Daniels in his debut, and then f***ing off mere months later really says it all. The problem isn't in AEW hiring bigger names and cult workhorses out of WWE just like it wasn't a problem for TNA to bring in guys like Christian and have them be big deals. TNA was, at one period, willing to take literally anyone and push them way too hard while they put in half the work they did in WWE.

Don't forget Booker T getting his own title made at his most not giving a shit ever.


Rikishi being brought in as a big deal... years after anyone thought of him... and him disappearing because Kishi figured he could hold them up for a better pay day...

etc. etc.


and almost all of them... regardless of where they were on the card... came in with a big "THE COMPANY UP NORTH MISUSED ME!" BOO THE BIGGEST HEEL IN OUR TERRITORY THE WWE!


So yeah for every Christian workhorse they got... they got about a dozen Washouts or people clearly there for an easy paycheck.

Nobody that has come into AEW has been treated like they were above the entire locker room just beacuase they were part of the WWE locker room.

those that were immediately at the top of the card were people like CM Punk, Jon Moxley, and Chris Jericho. People that were basically going to be there regardless.

The only one you might be able ot make the case for is when Shawn Spears showed up and was feuding with Cody... but that lasted for all of a month...

[06vwgti]

Team 3D, Christan, Angle, and I will go out and say Jacqueline too were good pick ups by TNA. But those are the ones I can remember off the top of my head that really didn't suck and added to the roster rather than detract

[Deleted]

Admittedly, I'm a biased fan, but Tony Khan gets the pick of the litter in terms of what the WWE willingly lets go of or otherwise, and then does his best to maximize their potential.

Compare Ambrose to Moxley, or burnt out Punk vs happy old man Punk.

Even when ex-WWE guys go over AEW "homegrown" talent, it's almost never a squash, and the ex-WWE guys put them over both in ring and promos. It's hard to argue that Darby didn't get one hell of a rub by getting the nod from both Mox and Punk.

[This Player Hating Mothman]

Aug 12, 2022 22:41:26 GMT -5 fw91 said:

Well my perspective is this. AEW seemed to have bloomed into existence from anti-WWE sentiment. So when they seemingly focused on pushing ex WWE talent that were stars over homegrown or "misused" talent, it seems hypocritical to the naked eye. With TNA, it was mostly older guys half-assing for easy Dixie money to take a break from the WWE grind until they got tired of it and came back to WWE.

I think there's fair room to say that it benefited from disillusionment with WWE and a desire for an alternative product, but "bloomed into existence from anti-WWE sentiment"? Nah, that's a lot too far. Tony's a life-long wrestling fan who only days ago talked up how much WWE's product is improving. The guys he built the company with were at least in early talks with WWE as an option for where to land. AEW isn't founded on some "f*** WWE" ideal, and even if there was, taking people who by and large got fired from WWE and going "I can do better with them" would be in line with that ethos. People gotta work.

[Mike Strike]

Aug 12, 2022 22:41:26 GMT -5 fw91 said:

Well my perspective is this. AEW seemed to have bloomed into existence from anti-WWE sentiment. So when they seemingly focused on pushing ex WWE talent that were stars over homegrown or "misused" talent, it seems hypocritical to the naked eye. With TNA, it was mostly older guys half-assing for easy Dixie money to take a break from the WWE grind until they got tired of it and came back to WWE.

Well most of them were guys that WWE foolishly lwt go instead of making into bigger stars themselves. The anti-WWE sentiment still fits them.

[fw91]

Aug 12, 2022 23:48:44 GMT -5 This Player Hating Mothman said:

Aug 12, 2022 22:41:26 GMT -5 fw91 said:

Well my perspective is this. AEW seemed to have bloomed into existence from anti-WWE sentiment. So when they seemingly focused on pushing ex WWE talent that were stars over homegrown or "misused" talent, it seems hypocritical to the naked eye. With TNA, it was mostly older guys half-assing for easy Dixie money to take a break from the WWE grind until they got tired of it and came back to WWE.

I think there's fair room to say that it benefited from disillusionment with WWE and a desire for an alternative product, but "bloomed into existence from anti-WWE sentiment"? Nah, that's a lot too far. Tony's a life-long wrestling fan who only days ago talked up how much WWE's product is improving. The guys he built the company with were at least in early talks with WWE as an option for where to land. AEW isn't founded on some "f*** WWE" ideal, and even if there was, taking people who by and large got fired from WWE and going "I can do better with them" would be in line with that ethos. People gotta work.

I didn't know how else to phrase it. Wasn't meant to be a jab.

[fw91]

Aug 12, 2022 23:52:35 GMT -5 Mike Strike said:

Aug 12, 2022 22:41:26 GMT -5 fw91 said:

Well my perspective is this. AEW seemed to have bloomed into existence from anti-WWE sentiment. So when they seemingly focused on pushing ex WWE talent that were stars over homegrown or "misused" talent, it seems hypocritical to the naked eye. With TNA, it was mostly older guys half-assing for easy Dixie money to take a break from the WWE grind until they got tired of it and came back to WWE.

Well most of them were guys that WWE foolishly lwt go instead of making into bigger stars themselves. The anti-WWE sentiment still fits them.

eh, I was thinking more of the Foley's, Booker T's, Jeff Hardy's and RVD's than guys like Lashley, Christian, Morgan etc.

[Cyno]

TNA getting ex WWE talent was never the problem. When you're a virtual monopoly, the implied expectation that if a wrestler is just supposed to go eventually crawl back to Vince McMahon or just stop being a wrestler is f***ing stupid.

TNA started with a good mix of indy talent as well as people from WCW that WWE wasn't really interested in. The few bigger name stars they did get from WWE they should've pushed. Especially guys like Kurt Angle, RVD, Christian, etc.

Then they got past their prime nobodies like Val Venis going over the company's homegrown stars. That's where the problem was. Nothing wrong with bringing in lower card WWE guys but don't have them hotshot their way to the main event without earning it first.

[This Player Hating Mothman]

And say what you will about AEW's hires, but their targets have been largely indie stalwarts anyway. Keith Lee, Swerve, Black, PAC, Ember Moon, Ruby Soho, even Tony Nese... And some guys, like reDragon, aren't just long-time indie staples, but dudes who ran with the people who help run the company, it's not a surprise to see them show up. Even thinking he's gotten a bit too much, Kyle O'Reilly doesn't feel like he got the push he did because Tony saw him on NXT, but because Tony was an ROH dork. Andrade is settling into a role running with Rush as Legally Distinct Los Ingobernables again. There's very few people getting pushed right now who feel like specifically "ex-WWE guys" on that front, and in the meantime, AEW hasn't so much as sniffed a good bunch of dudes WWE dropped, including multiple ex-world champions.

TNA was sticking the Nasty Boys on TV and having them win matches in 2010.

[Rave]

Ooh, it's this discussion again.

The problem wasn't that TNA hired ex-WWE talent. There's a crapload of ex-WWE talent, it's not easy to avoid hiring anyone who'd been there previously. The problem was that TNA hired every ex-WWE talent with a pulse, based solely on them being ex-WWE, then pushed them above/paid them more than the talent already there busting their asses. That resulted in a lot of people who shouldn't even have been given the time of day halfassing and padding their bank accounts, then f***ing off back to WWE at their earliest convenience.

TNA once wrecked AJ/Tanahashi, a legit dream match at the time it happened, just so they could debut f***ing SHANNON MOORE. That should tell you everything. And if that doesn't, here's the LOLTNA archive, there's many examples there. (Language warning!)

Aug 13, 2022 2:09:31 GMT -5 This Player Hating Mothman said:

TNA was sticking the Nasty Boys on TV and having them win matches in 2010.

Brian Knobbs couldn't even cut a promo in 2010 without getting winded.

[This Player Hating Mothman]

Aug 13, 2022 2:15:53 GMT -5 Rave said:

Ooh, it's this discussion again.

The problem wasn't that TNA hired ex-WWE talent. There's a crapload of ex-WWE talent, it's not easy to avoid hiring anyone who'd been there previously. The problem was that TNA hired every ex-WWE talent with a pulse, based solely on them being ex-WWE, then pushed them above/paid them more than the talent already there busting their asses. That resulted in a lot of people who shouldn't even have been given the time of day halfassing and padding their bank accounts, then f***ing off back to WWE at their earliest convenience.

TNA once wrecked AJ/Tanahashi, a legit dream match at the time it happened, just so they could debut f***ing SHANNON MOORE. That should tell you everything. And if that doesn't, here's the LOLTNA archive, there's many examples there. (Language warning!)

Aug 13, 2022 2:09:31 GMT -5 This Player Hating Mothman said:

TNA was sticking the Nasty Boys on TV and having them win matches in 2010.

Brian Knobbs couldn't even cut a promo in 2010 without getting winded.

I give the Hardy Boyz reunion in AEW a lot of grief and was giving it pre-grief before Jeff even showed up due to how obviously it was going to happen and how badly I did not want to see my old heroes broken down and dying in the ring. It proceeded to be just as bad as I dreaded and then worse. But Matt and Jeff ten years past the point they were too broken down to go anymore falling off of shit and getting concussions, while horrific and unwanted and uncomfortable to watch, is still a "better" idea from a pure business and drawing standpoint than the Nasty Boys could have been in whatever qualifies as their prime.

But also, linking a segment of them and Team 3D is a really cogent example of the big distinction: Team 3D were ex-WWE guys, ex-ECW guys, playing around with schticks that they'd done for years. But both guys put in work and felt like parts of the TNA roster instead of like ex-WWE presences in there because Dixie wanted WWE guys on her screen. An all-timer tag team that got to keep doing their tag team thing post-WWE, great example of why it's good for other promotions to thrive and for talent to be given chances. The Nasty Boys were not that, could never be that, and embodied everything opposite to that.

[evilone]

OK let's be for real here. Former midhot or superhot WWE guys like Ambrose take no crap when they negotiate a deal with anyone else other than WWE. Don't fool yourself into thinking that any mid card guy let alone main eventer will take the job to do the job just so "homegrown" talent could go over him. Ambrose wasn't put into AEW main event because he was hot off the WWE press but because he negotiated such stat in the first place. Same thing with Jericho. Same thing with Booker T in TNA. And probably the best example is Kurt Angle in TNA.

I know we all wanted to see Joe go over Angle in the feud finale but that was never feasible. If that was the case Kurt would have never signed for TNA and we would have never got Samoa Joe vs Kurt Angle. Simple as that. You can't sign WWE Christian and tell him to do the job in the feud against TNA Chris Daniels. Christian is very well aware of the fact who Chris Daniels is, they all know each other's backstage weaknesses and perks.

Same thing also goes for WWE to some degree. They have signed AJ Style and made him a main eventer right away. Did WWE do that because they are stupid to put TNA/Japan superstar over their own talent? No! WWE had to do that because AJ was the hottest independent commodity out there. Sting never signed up for Take mania match because they couldn't agree the ceiling of Sting's success in WWE. Sting probably wanted championships and PPV main event slots.

It's easy to blast 2000 TNA for putting over WWE guys over their own but they had no choice. Val Venis going over Daniels is all Hogan/Bischoff thing and I don't even count that as an example because TNA was doomed the second Hogan with creative clause walked into it. And here is another example right there: Hogan would not touch TNA had he not been given the creative authority over the whole company pretty much. And now we fantasize how Hogan should have jobbed to AJ Style or something.

[A Platypus Rave]

Aug 13, 2022 2:24:48 GMT -5 This Player Hating Mothman said:

Aug 13, 2022 2:15:53 GMT -5 Rave said:

Ooh, it's this discussion again.

The problem wasn't that TNA hired ex-WWE talent. There's a crapload of ex-WWE talent, it's not easy to avoid hiring anyone who'd been there previously. The problem was that TNA hired every ex-WWE talent with a pulse, based solely on them being ex-WWE, then pushed them above/paid them more than the talent already there busting their asses. That resulted in a lot of people who shouldn't even have been given the time of day halfassing and padding their bank accounts, then f***ing off back to WWE at their earliest convenience.

TNA once wrecked AJ/Tanahashi, a legit dream match at the time it happened, just so they could debut f***ing SHANNON MOORE. That should tell you everything. And if that doesn't, here's the LOLTNA archive, there's many examples there. (Language warning!)

Brian Knobbs couldn't even cut a promo in 2010 without getting winded.

I give the Hardy Boyz reunion in AEW a lot of grief and was giving it pre-grief before Jeff even showed up due to how obviously it was going to happen and how badly I did not want to see my old heroes broken down and dying in the ring. It proceeded to be just as bad as I dreaded and then worse. But Matt and Jeff ten years past the point they were too broken down to go anymore falling off of shit and getting concussions, while horrific and unwanted and uncomfortable to watch, is still a "better" idea from a pure business and drawing standpoint than the Nasty Boys could have been in whatever qualifies as their prime.

But also, linking a segment of them and Team 3D is a really cogent example of the big distinction: Team 3D were ex-WWE guys, ex-ECW guys, playing around with schticks that they'd done for years. But both guys put in work and felt like parts of the TNA roster instead of like ex-WWE presences in there because Dixie wanted WWE guys on her screen. An all-timer tag team that got to keep doing their tag team thing post-WWE, great example of why it's good for other promotions to thrive and for talent to be given chances. The Nasty Boys were not that, could never be that, and embodied everything opposite to that.

Not that they should have been hired but Saggs did seem to be in the best shape of his career at that point... while Knobbs... basically found all of the weight Saggs might have lost and then some...

Even then their schtick was old in the 90's let alone 2010...