Please continue any discussion on wrestling here.

13 hours ago, bigg jay said:

You've seen it before because that style has been around for a long time.  That must mean Rey is a rip-off of Jushin Liger or Ultimo Dragon then because those guys (amongst many others) were doing that well before Rey was.

Liger wasn't a Luchidor but a Japanese wrestler. Rey came into WCW right around that time Eric Bischoff took over. Certainly the AWA back in the 60's, 70's & 80's didn't have a lot of Luchidors working for them either so I don't consider Rey a ripoff of anyone but I do think the WWE is trying to make Kalisto into another Rey.

Edited May 18, 20169 yr by iso_55

I don't recall Flair ever working Liger.  Liger came to WCW in late 1991 and worked a program with Pillman.  The Great Muta is the only Japanese wrestler I can recall from the late 80's that Flair really feuded with.

Stampede was one of the few companies (at least that I had access to seeing) that I remember bringing those types of guys in in the early 80's.  ECW did a good job with them in the early 90's and that really helped them get a regular spot in the US.

Some talk that tna impact has been canceled by destination America 

Yeah, that was the feud I remembered with Flair. The Great Muta with the crap he'd blow into opponent's eyes.

Edited May 18, 20169 yr by iso_55

11 hours ago, Goalie said:

Some talk that tna impact has been canceled by destination America 

It was cancelled by Destination America a year ago.  ;-)

You mean POP TV.  Its really inevitable.  TNA is in an ad-share arrangement with POP, meaning they get paid nothing for their programming and split the ad revenue.  But wrestling generates lower ad rates per rating then other programming (this is true even for WWE).  I dont recall the details but I saw the ad revenue estimates and they were very low.

When TNA signed the deal with POP, the CEO of POP was incredibly positive saying they expected TNA to eventually build up to their SPIKE TV numbers (1 million viewers).  They've been in the 200,000-300,000 range.  POP stopped doing social media promotion for them a few weeks ago around the time of the up fronts where TNA wasnt mentioned at all.

The TNA replay was moved to Saturday a few weeks ago and now cancelled outright which is the same thing that happened on DA before it was cancelled for good.

TNA has continued to be late paying people including talent but mostly production people.  They have borrowed money from their production company (run by the Harris Twins) just to be able to afford their TV tapings.  The Harris' were rumored to be working on a deal to buy TNA...the same Harris who are Neo Nazi's.  Once that came out, their Nazi ink and shirts photos were tweeted en mass to POP's CEO,

The one thing TNA has, the international TV, is anchored by a big deal they have with India which supposedly pays tens of millions of dollars but required TNA to do a yearly tour which they have cancelled at least once supposedly due to terrorism concerns but more likely because they simply couldnt afford it.

It was May last year when word came out that Destination America was not going to renew TNA.  So its probably a similar timeline this year if the contracts are similar.  Remember, two things that sunk TNA on DA were bad ratings and Dixie sent an email bad mouthing DA's President and accidentally CC'ed him on it.

14 hours ago, iso_55 said:

Liger wasn't a Luchidor but a Japanese wrestler. Rey came into WCW right around that time Eric Bischoff took over. Certainly the AWA back in the 60's, 70's & 80's didn't have a lot of Luchidors working for them either so I don't consider Rey a ripoff of anyone but I do think the WWE is trying to make Kalisto into another Rey.

Eric ran WCW for about three years before Rey came in but Rey was a huge free agent that everyone wanted.  He actually worked for ECW first and gained American acclaim there.  Same goes for Eddie, Malenko, Benoit, Tajiri and many Mexican workers too.  Heyman saw the business changing.

Rey might have been the biggest masked high flyer in America but he was just another guy (albeit talented) in Mexico ofcourse, where there was a long history of masked high flyers.  So Rey was definitely not the first.  Just the biggest in America during a time wrestling exploded.

Del Rio was a masked Mexican wrestler too and didnt want to lose his mask in WWE...

Ultimo Dragon is a unique case as he was Japanese but went to Mexico in search of his first break and thats where he made it big.  Dragon entered WCW around the same time as Rey if I recall and was probably better than Rey for awhile.  I had the pleasure of working with Ultimo a few years ago when he came to down to wrestle Mentallo and Kenny Omega.  Very nice guy.

WWE has been looking for a Lucha star whether its in the vein of Rey or Eddie for ages.  But remember, they had Rey put the mask back on after he had worked WCW for years without it because they saw the marketing appeal in the mask. Which is the same with the Luchadores.  So in that respect, they want Kalisto to be the next Rey but they also know he will never be the next Rey.  Kalisto will never be World Champion.

Just checked, TNA makes just over $18,000 in ad revenue per two hour episode.  Its former lead-in, Days of Our Lives reruns made $44,000 and DOOL was cancelled by POP and replaced by That 70's Show reruns.

If the ad split is 50-50 that means TNA generates around $480,000 per year which is very low for US TV rights fees.  Considering the Hardy's are probably paid upwards of $300,000 each (Im speculating but I believe James Storm got a $250,000 deal from TNA so the Hardy's would be significantly more), TNA is losing money based on their TV deal.  They dont run house shows and their TV tapings are done at Universal Studios in front of a non-paying audience. 

 

Edited May 18, 20169 yr by The Unknown Poster

TNA sounds doomed. If you can't take your wrestlers to their fans with live house shows I'd say they're finished. The WWE will benefit with more talent coming in but no real competition.

Random thing I heard the other day..... TNA has now officially lasted longer then WCW did....  crazy fact! 

WCW was a cluster****.

TNA has lasted longer as a money losing venture that no one cares about.  WCW was the most profitable promotion of all time up to that point (WWE later surpassed it).  And due to the AOL Time Warner merger, too many people cared about it (and didnt care about wrestling) at the worst time possible.

Ted Turner had previously had execs suggest dumping WCW when it was a money loser but Turner warned them never to bring that up again.  He loved wrestling and credited it with making TBS a success.  So as long as Turner was in control, WCW was safe. 

Eric Bischoff had a deal to buy WCW in 2001 and save it and had ideas to revamp it.  But with Turner out of power in his own media empire an exec named Jamie Kellner who hated wrestling decided to cancel all wrestling from the Turner stations and that killed Bischoff's deal.  He had previously negotiated a long term deal to air Nitro on Turner so pulling the deal changed everything.  Bischoff still frantically tried to find a new Television home but just ran out of time.  Shame really.  There has been suggestions that Kellner cancelled WCW as a favour to WWE who had kicked tires on buying it (they earned right of first refusal due to their infringement lawsuit against WCW) but wouldnt spend that much money on it... Kellner cancelled the TV and killed the value of the company and WWE swooped in and bought it for next to nothing...with AOL/Time Warner agreeing to keep the big contracts WWE didnt want to take.

TNA is like a kid's lemonade stand.  At the end of the day it might have cost you more money to open the stand but at least it made your kid happy for a few hours.  Im not sure who TNA makes happy.  But it basically has no business being in business other than there is no one left to care about it so Dixie keeps blissfully chugging along losing money every day.

I'm sure it isn't Dixie's money (or her parents) she's losing or she'd have acted already to shut TNA down.

Edited May 19, 20169 yr by iso_55

It is her parents money she is losing. It's her Dads money more specifically. 

33 minutes ago, iso_55 said:

I'm sure it isn't Dixie's money (or her parents) she's losing or she'd have acted already to shut TNA down.

Well her parents spent over $30 million and that was the number I heard a few years ago.  Dixie is surely drawing a large salary.  Her parents cut her off last year and thats why the stories of misses pay and late pay and lowered production values etc have sprung up.

Her dad had a great legitimate offer to sell TNA to a group headed by Jeff Jarrett and Toby Keith.  They had everything agreed upon including sale price.  But Bob Carter held out wanting Dixie to be guaranteed a role and it killed the deal.  Just foolishness.  

Jarrett & Keith have no idea how lucky they were.

21 minutes ago, iso_55 said:

Jarrett & Keith have no idea how lucky they were.

Jeff doesn't since he just tried to form his own version of TNA.  But Toby wouldn't invest unless Jeff got a TV deal, which he has been unable to do.

When does the deal for RAW to be on USA run out. It seems like that ESPN has been very chummy with WWE now for a while might the be making a switch.

17 minutes ago, Jpan85 said:

When does the deal for RAW to be on USA run out. It seems like that ESPN has been very chummy with WWE now for a while might the be making a switch.

I believe it was a five year deal signed in 2014 for around $200 million per year average (starts lower and has escalators built in).  Thats why WWE isnt overly concerned about ratings now but as the expiry nears, they will be.

WWE is just becoming as profitable as they were before they changed their business from a PPV business to Over The Top.  So they've done a good job of changing how they generate revenue for the future.  Assuming the Network grows, even slowly, WWE should be profitable for a long long time.  Comparatively, they generate more revenue than UFC, though UFC generates more profit.  WWE is a larger and wider brand than UFC also and does better TV ratings.  UFC obviously does better PPV buys.  But its interesting that UFC is supposedly looking for a valuation upwards of $4b and Vince just sold shares in WWE that valued it at around $1.3 B.

WWE would be a good brand for a company like Disney that could diversify the brand even more.  Though I dont expect the McMahon family to ever sell control.  Although ESPN is owned by Disney, coincidentally.

The way I understand the ESPN deal is that they were reluctant to cover wrestling for a long time for obvious reasons but are inundated with viewers wanting information, especially during high points like WrestleMania...so ESPN made the decision that it was ok to cover wrestling as Sports is Entertainment.  Plus having Coach involved, they have someone that "gets" wrestling.

If Disney got involved we'd have storylines with Hornswoggle to get the kiddies to watch. No thanks. I'm on edge now as a fan with my emotional involvement with WWE. Something like that would be a deal breaker for me.

Well how would that be different from all the storylines we already got with hornswoggle?

2 hours ago, The Unknown Poster said:

Well how would that be different from all the storylines we already got with hornswoggle?

He isn't in any storylines, thank gawd... I'm saying he would be cuz he's so cute. Da widdle kiddies wud wuv him.

He was in many storylines including being a leprechaun, Finlay's son, Vince's son, anonymous GM. Pretty high profile stuff 

He hasn't been used in a long time though. One thing about Disney is they seem pretty savvy about buying valuable properties and using them correctly.  I hope WWE remains in McMahon hands forever though. 

Cody Rhodes has asked for his release

35 minutes ago, Jpan85 said:

Cody Rhodes has asked for his release

Potential angle alert. But can't blame him. He's still young and studied to be an actor. They dropped the ball with him. Not saying he's the next ric flair or anything but the stardust angle is atrocious and only works if there was a payoff which their wasn't. 

When dusty died he should have been pushed as Cody going on an inspirational run in his fathers memory. Still crowds chant Cody Cody at him and WWE just goes on blissfully unaware. 

16 hours ago, The Unknown Poster said:

He was in many storylines including being a leprechaun, Finlay's son, Vince's son, anonymous GM. Pretty high profile stuff 

He hasn't been used in a long time though. One thing about Disney is they seem pretty savvy about buying valuable properties and using them correctly.  I hope WWE remains in McMahon hands forever though. 

I wouldn't call it high profile. More like low brow.