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Old 07-30-2014, 02:51 AM   #7771
Tom Guycott
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Noid View Post
Great read. TNA has managed to garner hot-spots of interest over the years, but they have managed to piss them away. Kurt Angle unfortunately walked into the company around the same time as Vince Russo, and focus changed from it being a professional wrestling alternative to a sports entertainment rival.
I think the bigger problem was the idea that they would be able to compete with WWE in an unrealistically short period of time by going all in on short term strategies that somehow would be an "instant" game changer. Hell, WWE didn't have the same success as WWE overnight. If you look at the period of time TNA has been a thing, and align that from when Vince (Jr.) enacted his plans, you would just now be coming to where the real money began to come in. TNA always seemed to want to jump straight to the success of the Attitude Era without infrastructure.

As much as the writer downplayed ECW as "not being real competition", it was actually more successful *because* it wasn't. While WWE and WCW were playing tug of war over more or less the same audience, ECW was over on the swingset with its own fans who may or may not have also been fans of the other two.

Anytime TNA had something that started to work... when the X Div was on fire, when the Knockouts reigned supreme, when the Tag Team scene was hotter than shit WWE was doing at the time, as Noid said, they'd "piss it away" in favor of some nonsensical jackassery designed to chase Vince instead of walk their own road- bringing WWE guys and hotshotting them to the top of the card, the publicity stunt that was Hogan, reforming the nWo without being able to call them the nWo, flip flopping faces and heels when they start getting over one way or the other, moving to Monday, etc.

So while I think that trying to be WCW 2: the sequel was a detriment for the reasons given, the lack of title lineage wasn't as heavy a weight as it is made out to be here. Hell, look at WWE's Hardcore Title. It was a joke from a throwaway backstage segment, and evolved into an actual defendable and legit championship for awhile (until they went a bit overboard with 24/7 rule). TNA constantly shot themselves in the foot using WWE as the measuring stick and trying to fill WCW's shoes.

It is sad now that they seem as poised as they ever were to establish their own identity, but only after they fucked around and wasted so much time and money trying to be everything they're not instead of embracing what they currently have. Just have to wait and see if it isn't too little, too late.
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