TNA’s new beginning is being scheduled for January 4, 2010. This is a Monday night, so they’d be going head to head with Monday Night Raw. The discussion within TNA is whether to tape during Raw or do a live Monday Night Special. TNA is trying to finalize deals with others, like Rob Van Dam and Ric Flair to also debut on that show. If they do choose that Monday, they might go against Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson as Guest Host. If not that Monday, the WWE will try and get The Rock for January 11, when he’d be Hosting head-to-head with a live UFC show that night.
Analysis: Several big bits come out of this. The WWE could choose to go after UFC or TNA here. If the wrestling boom showed us one thing, it’s that the casual audience will come in for this type of head-to-head interaction. Does the WWE want to give that kind of extra exposure to TNA as they debut many former WWE stars or do they think The Rock can crush TNA right out of the gate? If they do battle UFC with The Rock, we’ll find out just how much the two audiences, in fact, do crossover. If they got killed in the ratings by UFC with The Rock on, they would, however, have nothing left in reserve to boost them back up. TNA debuting Flair and RVD also hits a lot of demographics for them at once. Flair brings in the old NWA fan territory era guy, while Hogan hits the 80s boom and 90s Monday Night Wars fans. RVD has credibility with the ECW mutants as well as current day fans. If one night can make TNA a contender, then, with proper booking, this is it. Meanwhile, UFC has nothing but a chance to do great here. A live show with good talent will do better than The Ultimate Fighter episodes. That pretty much guarantees a profit. If they take a chunk of the WWE’s audience – something more likely without The Rock - that’s a cherry on top, but hardly necessary as just expanding their audience would be great and, if it doesn’t, they make enough from Pay Per View revenue to be fine. TNA must have this show go live. Without the element of surprise that a live show gives them, casual fans might not care enough to tune in over the live Raw. If they didn’t do better than usual by a good amount here, it would be a huge wasted opportunity. The question remains, is The Rock, Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, John Cena, Kurt Angle, and RVD all appearing in one wrestling night going to draw in enough casual fans to make TNA and should the WWE take that chance?
Credit: F4Wonline.com
Comments
cite your sources, no one other than you is reporting this
Sorry, I can't- they'd prefer to remain anonymous.
In other words...right out of your rectum.
Right, because not revealing a source means it's made up.
bull #hit
I just heard this from Hulk Hogan on The Ultimate Finale on Spike. This is going to be like WCW vs WWE again. But now it's WWE vs TNA.
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