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2 hour special same old ending

FormulaFirebird91Posted on 11/04/05 at 09:26:24

Why... WHY?! I mean seriously.  How many times can we see the same thing happen. Just because it's in a new Forum (This one being a 2 hour thursday edition) does that mean they have to rehash the Jeff gets the title under handedly yet again. What is he trying to do break Flairs record for world title reigns in a matter of months or something? I mean maybe I should have seen it coming but... come on. Rhino JUST freaking won the belt last week. What was the point of even letting him win it at all.

It's sad I loved Jarrett as a mid carder when he was teaming with Owen... I loved his don't piss me off gimmick... but he's just not the guy to... as Warrior says so sweetly... put the asses in the seats.

Aside from that I enjoyed the 2 hour show. Thought the six man tag was the best match by far. Then again I'm biased when it comes to Daniels and Styles anyway. I think Samoa Joe is really doing a great job. I heard everyone hyping him up from ROH (seeings I've never got to watch ROH I wasn't sure what to think) and I also really dig Alex Shelley. I wish Dutt would stop doing the sprinkler thing though. lol

What did every one else think of the show though?
rey619Posted on 11/04/05 at 10:04:05

I do agree with Anubis that Rhino should've been kept out of the title picture in the first place, and that Jarrett should have retained at BFG. If they felt the need to take it off Jarrett because of Nash's problems, why put it back on him? The fans would have bought the fact that Jarrettt retained over Rhino (who after all had been in a gauntlet and a monster's ball) way more than having him lose it just as easily..

I'm looking forward to watching the prime time special, as I'm still gunning for TNA to succeed, even though they have a big problem finding a suitable Heavyweight Champ..
PulsarPosted on 11/04/05 at 15:20:55

Overall I thought it was a good show. And if you take away the END of the match, Jarrett and Rhino did a really good job. I'm still a little on the fence with TNA so far. They're putting on some good matches, but haven't completely blown me away yet. I just thought it was weird having a huge show like that and half their bigger star either don't wrestle, or wrestle crap matches. (See: Jeff Hardy, Sabu, Abyss, Raven, Monty Brown etc.)

BTW, I didn't get to watch much RoH anyway, but I am so an Austin Aires fan right now.
pszPosted on 11/04/05 at 16:20:15

It was OK. Daniels and Styles, as usual, went all out with everything. The Spot Match (Hardy, Sabu, etc) SHOULD have been good, but A: Felt WAY too rushed, B: had guys who have had more bumps in the last month than most guys have in a year, and C: Had too many people (Tag match would have been fine. 6-man was, IMO, too much)

The CROWD, though, just didn't... Seem into it the whole time. There were segments were it was like the old ECW arena in terms of pop/noise/chants/etc, but other times, Tenay was screaming about how into it the crowd was, but the camera showed people kinda... Bored looking. THAT hurt.

Jarret v Rhino? Eh, they BLEW that ending when during the show they played a commercial for the next PPV where they flat out said "NWA Champion, Jeff Jerret" :-P
AnubisPosted on 11/05/05 at 06:33:24

Yeah, I saw that as well.  I was like, DOH!  I was also like "WOW THANKFULLY!"

I think once Samoa Joe gets built up enough, they should give him the title and let him have a Goldberg-style run.  I daresay Samoa Joe is even cooler than Goldberg!  (I know everyone would agree, but those who know me know how big a Goldberg fan I am, so that should shock some people.)
Snabbit888Posted on 11/05/05 at 08:57:16

The TNA primetime special got a 0.9 rating, about the same as the Saturday night slot is getting.  From a numbers standpoint, doesn't seem to be the big payoff they hoped for.
FormulaFirebird91Posted on 11/05/05 at 11:03:40

Yeah Snabbit I think they wanted a little higher than that and really overall it was a solid show. Not mind blowing really but solid anyway. I guess their weren't enough of us who listened to Mike Tenay and called our friends to watch. I knew I should have done that. :)

Anubis I do like Samoa Joe quite a lot. I was never a Goldberg fan but I know from many of your posts that you are so I do see the shock value in what you said about Samoa Joe. I won't rip on Goldberg though cuz I hate when people rip on the wrestlers I love. lol He just wasn't my cup of tea I guess.  I do think given time you may be right about Joe though. He just seems to have that something. Some kind of presence or something. Hopefully in time he'll get built up pretty good. I love watching him in the ring and look forward to seeing more of him.
AnubisPosted on 11/06/05 at 12:17:02

On 11/05/05 at 08:57:16, Snabbit888 wrote:The TNA primetime special got a 0.9 rating, about the same as the Saturday night slot is getting. From a numbers standpoint, doesn't seem to be the big payoff they hoped for.
One thing I could never understand is why companies thing a specific show's rating is an indicator of how good that particular show is.  After all, you gotta see it to know if it's good.  I tend to look at ratings as an indication of the quality of the previous show.

That said, 0.9 is actually 12.5% higher than their top Saturday night rating (0.8), so given how short a time they've been on the air (one month) coupled with the fact that this was during primetime on Thursday night (the second most heated and competitive night of the weak, just behind Monday night), that rating is damn impressive.  Remember, the ratings are relative to the competition; 0.1 would be instant cancellation during primetime on a mainstream network, but syndicated shows are lucky to get that high a rating in the middle of the night.  Competing with shows that routinely get 10.0 and up, getting 0.9 on a national cable network with only one month of previous exposure and decent advertising is a good start. Realistically, we knew they weren't gonna be getting 3.0 out of the gate (although I did hope).

Of course, if ratings are the same a year from now, that would be a bad sign.  I would say,generally speaking, an increase of 5-10% per month is reasonable for the first year.  If they're doing a good job, they should be close to the 2.0 mark by the time of their one-year anniversary.
Snabbit888Posted on 11/06/05 at 22:31:31

For me though, the rating wasn't great, and nothing of the show was so amazing that it's going to draw any casual fans to the show. For as great as we think people like Styles, Samoa Joe, etc. are, at this point, casual wrestling fans aren't going to give a shit what Styles and Samoa Joe did on a primetime special. I think TNA has the potential to do good on Spike; I just don't think this show is really going to do a whole lot for them.

Oh, and the October 25th late night slot got a 0.9, as did the primetime special.  So no increase there.  But I do see your point.
AnubisPosted on 11/07/05 at 06:09:32

It did?  Hmmm, I could have sworn they've done a 0.7 and the rest 0.8 . . . Ah well, no matter.  A 0.9 on Thursday primetime is still a helluva lot more meaningful than a 0.9 on Saturday night to be sure.

I was impressed by the primetime special.  I honestly do think that it will eventually catch on so long as TNA doesn't attempt to compete directly with WWE until they have a firm hold, that way fans can watch both products.  Once they get a firm base of fans, then they can compete head-to-head and hopefully crush the competition so long as they don't jump the shark like WCW did.  I still have nightmares about the New Blood.
Rick GarrardPosted on 11/07/05 at 06:49:52

sadly enough, QVC consistently pulls in a higher rating than a 1.0.  And even Billy Mays and his OxyClean informercials are beating TNA in their weekly Saturday night ratings.  
AnubisPosted on 11/07/05 at 21:49:55

Yeah, but QVC has been around for like two decades, and has the entire soccer mom population watching it.  As for OxyClean, well, even I have to admit that product is damn impressive, but I think you might be exaggerating about the ratings of his infomercials (especially since you only need to see it once because it's just a commercial, so they aren't prone to return viewership).

Remember, TNA has been on for one month.  FOX was always retarded in that they would judge a show's success based on its first month of ratings, but the historically best shows (the best example I can think of is M*A*S*H*) all started out a tad slowly.  I know there is a better example, but I can't remember it at the moment.

Well, the point is, intelligent executives give a show at least six months to produce some kind of result, and it only has to beat whatever else they might put in the time slot.

So I'm not worried right now.  They're just getting started.  It takes time to build up an audience when you're the new guy in town.
Snabbit888Posted on 11/09/05 at 23:25:25

In what makes matters worse with regards to the TNA Primetime Special's disappointing rating, PWTorch.com reports that the Jarrett vs. Rhino match actually drew a smaller audience than the first quarter hour. Since growth from start to finish is typically viewed as affirmation that fans are enjoying the program and anticipating the conclusion, the figures reflect a medicore endorsement of the main-event (and the show as a whole).

Although Spike TV (and TNA) was hoping for a number in the 1.5 ballpark, it still intends to give TNA more primetime specials. The 0.9 rating was a 23% spike from what the network had been previously doing in that timeslot, indicating that there is some benefit to these events. What Spike will not do at this time, however, is grant TNA a permanent primetime slot. Considering the stigma attached to professional wrestling, Spike TV would need to see much stronger ratings to shape one of its nights around TNA.
AnubisPosted on 11/12/05 at 23:04:32

They expected a 1.5? Good grief, I was hopefuly, but I wasn't counting my chickens before they were hatched.

I look more at that 23% spike from the previous ratings in the time slot. That's what's important.

As for Jarrett and Rhino, well, Jarrett and Rhino both suck and they advertised that match all night, and they put two great matches on immediately prior to it, so that match was a heat killer. I knew that. It's why I'd like the belt on someone talented like A.J. or Joe or Raven.
Snabbit888Posted on 11/12/05 at 23:37:45

That is one of those double-edged sword things.  Yes, we love to see matches like the six-man on the Primetime special or Ultimate X, but the problem with having a lot of workers like that is if they put on these great, fast-paced high spot crowd pleasers, it all but kills the main event.  So to a certain extent, I agree with WWE's policy of "toning down" certain wrestlers.  Now I think they tone them down too much, but the primetime special is a good example of when you let highly talented wrestlers go all out, sure, you get a great match, but it totally cheapens your main event.

TNA needs to either a) tone down the style of the X-division JUST a little bit, b) put those guys in the main event (this is likely not to happen), or c) figure out a better way to space out the matches so as to not completely kill the main event's heat potential.
Rick GarrardPosted on 11/13/05 at 03:35:49

They could always do like WWE used to do and still does to some extent, which is put the match on first that is expected to be the "show stealer", that way it's out of the way and long forgotten by the time the main event occurs.

WWE was noted on it's Superstars and Challenge "squash match" shows for putting The Rockers, The Bushwackers and Hacksaw Duggan on there first mainly just because of the crowd pop alone.  And more recently with RAW they usually have had guys like the Dudley Boys, The Rock, Steve Austin and RVD be the ones that open RAW, whenever RAW isn't started with a 15 minute self-promotional in ring speech.  This is also a good way to judge what type of crowd you will have for the event, whether they will be hot or if they will be sitting on their hands and have little to no reaction.

Wrestling has been in the past a very formulaic program.  And the more complex writers try to make it, the worse off is apparently becomes, so keeping it simple is almost always the best.
rey619Posted on 11/13/05 at 10:05:56

Remember that the X-Division has main evented pay-per-views before (Joe vs Daniels vs Styles.. Iron Man 1 as well?). Even the tag-division has main evented (AMW vs Triple X). If the heavyweight division can't capture the interest of the crowd or tv audience, put someone who can in the main event.
Rick GarrardPosted on 11/13/05 at 17:10:28

The only reason they even have the NWA World Title at this point is so that Jarrett has a reason to be on TV every week.  Otherwise, the X-Division is the thing carrying the TNA product, as it has since their inception on weekly PPV when they were in Nashville.
AnubisPosted on 11/13/05 at 20:55:26

On 11/12/05 at 23:37:45, Snabbit888 wrote:So to a certain extent, I agree with WWE's policy of "toning down" certain wrestlers. Now I think they tone them down too much, but the primetime special is a good example of when you let highly talented wrestlers go all out, sure, you get a great match, but it totally cheapens your main event.
Um, no.  I disagree completely.

I say, always make your most talented crowd-pleasers your main event.  That way, not only are your biggest talents the ones with the biggest pushes, but then your fans always go away pretty happy.
91Posted on 11/13/05 at 21:00:26

The main eventers should be the ones who are going to draw the most, in terms of buyrates, TV ratings and attendances. End of.
rey619Posted on 11/13/05 at 21:50:09

On 11/13/05 at 20:55:26, Anubis wrote:
That way, not only are your biggest talents the ones with the biggest pushes, but then your fans always go away pretty happy.
Depends on the crowd. Whoever main events in RoH/TNA couldn't main event for WWE's fans, and vice versa.

The main eventers should be the ones who are going to draw the most, in terms of buyrates, TV ratings and attendances. End of.
Yes, but that does not specify WHO gets to main event, and is in turn also depending on the crowd. What sucks (in my opinion, and possibly Anubis' as well), is that TNA's going to steal as many casual fans as possible away from WWE, and we all know that casual fans are more into SE than high-flying. So unless TNA manages the impossible (turn the casual fans into another style of wrestling), TNA will be forced to have heavyweights in the main event, bring in charismatic mic-skilled talent from WWE and generally try to please the causal fans.

The minority of the American people enjoy pure, traditional, high-flying, work-rate based wrestling. If it were the opposite, RoH would probably be the biggest company in the world right now  :(

AnubisPosted on 11/14/05 at 06:25:56

I dunno about that.  I actually think the action-style of booking just doesn't get enough exposure with the properly talented people.  It will likely take a top-notch wrestler to break the standard, but I think it is easy to see that TNA has all the talent needed to do that.

A.J. Styles
Petey Williams
Samoa Joe

Those three are three of the best wrestlers in North America, and I think they are fully capable of diverting the casual interests away from big guys and to action-packed wrestling.  It's already happening with WWE's ratings faltering since the end of ECW and WCW; people are sick of big guys.

Good mic skills will ALWAYS be a plus, the key is to get wrestlers who can put on great matches AND have mic skills.  I think this is where the X-Division does the best; by main eventing the X-Division AND the Heavyweight Division, they can pander to both crowds simultaneously without pissing off either.  (WWE pisses off action-based wrestling fans by pissing all over their best workers, and TNA could use this because they've shown the ability to be able to book both action-wrestlers and heavyweights very well.)

On that note, I must say I've gotta give Jeff Jarrett credit where it's due.  Seeing his most recent matches, I see that he still loves the business.  Unlike guys like JBL or Triple H or Undertaker, who LOOK like they're "working a day job" in the ring and don't put passion into it anymore, Jeff Jarrett at least looks like he enjoys what he does, like Ric Flair still does.  He may not be the best, but at least he's a stable champion who may not elevate the belt but neither does he degrade it.  Rhino winning the belt and losing it in a week was the worst booking they've done so far; they shouldn't have taken it off Jeff until they were ready for the next long-time champion.  I still don't like him, and he has an ego, but at least he still puts effort into his work.
91Posted on 11/14/05 at 18:56:33

Triple H? I don't particularly care for him, but let's not exaggerate here.

And good mic skills aren't just a plus, they're almost always a necessity, and it's bizarre that anyone could play that down so much. If in doubt, go find a very good piece that Raven once wrote on the matter.
AnubisPosted on 11/15/05 at 05:53:13

I got two words for you.

Chris Benoit.

Proof that a wrestler can be over big with zero mic skills.

Wait, I got another.

Goldberg.

Like him or not, he was over HUGE.
Snabbit888Posted on 11/15/05 at 06:54:12

Not saying it's impossible.  Just mic skills are a HUGE plus.  It's the same thing as saying, "Yeah, to make it as a wrestler, you need to have a cut muscular look and look to be in great shape."  There are obviously exceptions to that rule (Rikishi, Mick Foley, Samoa Joe) but in this day and age, it's pretty standard.
pszPosted on 11/15/05 at 14:14:16

To be over anymore (at least short term) you need to be one (JUST ONE) of the following:

A) Ripped/Built/Athletic as all hell (Even if you have the technical or highflying prowess of an armadillo... I'm thinking Goldberg here)

B) Great on the mic (Not thinking Goldberg here)

C) Super-Ridiculous-High-Risk-Insane (Jeff Hardy anyone? Sabu?)

D) Anyone VinnyMac/Jeff Jarrett/<promoter of choice> WANTS to be (Including, unfortunately, themselves and family :-P)

If you can acheive any ONE of those, you can probably be over for at LEAST a short while... Hit more than one, and you're a shoe-in.

Problem is, it seems like there are less and less A+B's out there :-< (I like C, but don't consider it a requirement ;-> I actually prefer Techinicians, but they tend to get "Boring" chants unless they're in Philly or Canada :-P)
rey619Posted on 11/15/05 at 15:48:56

Why is it that WWE has all the great mic talents, why RoH and TNA are left with Raven, Jarrett, and to an extent, Daniels? Is it because WWE finds all the good talkers and hires them? Because they have a lot of mic training in OVW? Or because the indy feds don't focus a lot on promos and segments?

Almost everyone straight from OVW is a decent talker, while indy talent that has been around for a while, such as Sabin, Styles and Joe are generally below average. What can be done to improve mic value on the indies, or is it at all desireable?

RoH (and to an extent TNA) doesn't need a lot of soap opera segments, but it would benefit them greatly if they had someone who could cut promos. I think the American Dragon shows potential, but watching Austin Aries cut promos while he was the champ was almost painful.. Looking at Gibson and Spanky (both with WWE experience), their promo skills were clearly above the others. Should TNA and RoH bring in someone to improve mic skills? Jim Cornette and Heenan perhaps?
91Posted on 11/15/05 at 20:39:49

On 11/15/05 at 05:53:13, Anubis wrote:I got two words for you.

Chris Benoit.

Proof that a wrestler can be over big with zero mic skills.

Wait, I got another.

Goldberg.

Like him or not, he was over HUGE.
And if you'd bothered to read Ravens column, you'd see those are two of the three exceptions he threw up (the other being Crow Sting). Instead you chose to take what I said literally, skirting round my use of the word 'almost'.

Sure there are exceptions to almost any rule, but not many, and you certainly couldn't build an entire company round a load of them. They're few and far between, Goldberg was clearly hand picked in advance to be turned into a star and it took Benoit years before anyone relented and gave him a world title.

Besides, Benoit doesn't have "zero mic skills" - granted they're not as good as the other main eventers and he gets by purely on his god given talents but he's not even as close to as bad as people sometimes make him out to be.
Snabbit888Posted on 11/15/05 at 20:47:20

Yes.  Benoit is solid if not unimpressive.  He's never going to blow you away with a fantastic promo, but I can't think of a moment when I've ever cringed at one of his interviews.
AnubisPosted on 11/16/05 at 06:10:12

On 11/15/05 at 20:39:49, 91 wrote:
And if you'd bothered to read Ravens column,
As if I know where to find it. Huh?

Oh, and I'd like to add the only good mic work I've heard from Benoit was during his Four Horsemen days when he had the backup of Ric Flair and Arn Anderson.
Tom_ImpPosted on 11/16/05 at 07:37:29

They should just start calling Jarrett "HH".

He's only 2/3 as good as Triple H, yet he's like him in the regard that he thinks the whole show is about him, revolves around his "greatness" and basically should focus all it's attention on him.
rey619Posted on 11/16/05 at 10:42:06

Tom Imp: I think you hit the nail on the head there ;D
Still, I think Jarrett is a little more important to TNA right now than Triple H is to WWE. TNA really needs to build up a couple of stars that can lead the company, and I think they are doing just that with Monty Brown, Samoa Joe and to a degree AJ Styles.

Anybody knows where we can find the Raven piece?
91Posted on 11/16/05 at 20:18:01

On 11/16/05 at 06:10:12, Anubis wrote:

As if I know where to find it. Huh?
Oooh, I forgot you have no access to a search engine that'll allow you to type in 'Raven' and find his website. You'd need an IQ of about a million to pull that off.

And I reitterate - Benoit's promos are neither show stopping, nor remotely as bad as you or anyone else makes them out to be, they're OK, passable.
FormulaFirebird91Posted on 11/17/05 at 00:39:27

In regards to Benoit's promo's... they've improved about a million times over what they were. As a huge Benoit fan I will gladly tell you he is not the best on the mic... but from what he used to be... MUCH MUCH better.  I think Rey that people tend to label a guy a way and stick with it even when he improves. Cuz your right... he is no where near as bad as people make him out to be.

pszPosted on 11/17/05 at 16:31:37

Benoit is average AT BEST (Not average as in "Equal To The Majority Of Wrestlers" as most of them suck lately, but Average as in "Nothing spectacular, nothing to make you wretch. Somewhere in the middle")

He has improved. I do think, however, his best promos were the Him/Sullivan/Woman ones, but he had help. On his own, he's gotten MUCH better in the last... 2 years or so, but he's no Rock or Austin or Jericho. Hell, I'd rank him somewhere around Owen Hart or OldSchool Jeff Jarret (Can't comment on Jarret lately as he's too busy winning his title back to talk)
AnubisPosted on 11/19/05 at 04:52:21

On 11/16/05 at 20:18:01, 91 wrote:

Oooh, I forgot you have no access to a search engine that'll allow you to type in 'Raven' and find his website. You'd need an IQ of about a million to pull that off.
How about you kiss my ass you stupid pompous arrogant motherfucking son-of-a-bitch. I'm done taking abuse from shitstains like you who think you're so great. I've never even heard of this fucking article you spoke of, so even if I found his web site, I wouldn't even know what I'm looking for.

So how about you get off your fucking high horse you piece of shit? You see, in case you can't tell from my tone, I'm not in the mood to put up with shit from anyone, so if you keep it up, you'll just have a flame war on your hands. If you wanna stop that from happening, the only way to do so it for you to shut the fuck up, asshole.
91Posted on 11/19/05 at 14:23:28

Yes Anubis, threaten to start a flame war, you ever wonder why nobody takes you seriously? Why don't you leave the nice adults to have a conversation in peace?
AnubisPosted on 11/20/05 at 05:19:10

Hey, way I see it, intelligent people take me seriously, and those who don't are in your group: dumb as a doorknob.
Captain TagonPosted on 11/23/05 at 01:01:47

On 11/20/05 at 05:19:10, Anubis wrote:Hey, way I see it, intelligent people take me seriously, and those who don't are in your group: dumb as a doorknob.
I think that quote right there proves why any intelligent person wouldn't take you seriously.
Rick GarrardPosted on 11/23/05 at 01:46:29

Doorknobs have more fun because they don't care who gives them a turn.
ZedjaPosted on 11/23/05 at 21:11:28

Threathening with a flamewar is just childish in my opinion.