INSIDER ARTICLE, PT.2: THe TNA/SpikeTV Blueprint For The Future

Here is part two of the two-part article posted this weekend on PWInsider.Com. This is the more controversal of the two, as you will see...

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SLAMJAMZ CENTRAL: THE TNA/SPIKE-TV "BLUEPRINT FOR THE FUTURE"
Part 2 of 2

By TC Kirkham

(DISCLAIMER: The following is an op-ed piece by TC Kirkham, and does NOT necessarily represent the point of view of PWInsider. Com. TC Kirkham assumes FULL responsibility for the content of this article.)

As Bette Davis once said, "Buckle your seat belts. It's going to be a BUMPY night"...

It's been nearly ten years (February 1996, to be exact) since I caused some REAL trouble in the wrestling world. And the time has come for me to stir up the pot again...and in a BIG way, too.

Yesterday, in part one of this article, I looked at the WWE;s Massacre of talent and what 10 of those superstars might be doing in the not too distant future.

Today, I'd like to address this part of the article to everyone who is interested in the continued operation and wellbeing of Total Nonstop Action Wrestling, also known as TNA. I'd like to address six people/entities in TNA in particular, and to one of their hopefully-corporate partners.

Call this the "TNA/Spike TV Blueprint For The Future".

So listen up, I'm about to tell you a story that's painful to hear. And I'm also about to tell you how to STOP the pain. Stopping the pain involves some pretty intense stuff, and in order for it to work, one huge corporation has to have the BALLS to help make it work. So let me address them first.

::Ahem::

To the programming department at Spike TV
RE: WWE and Total Nonstop Action

For the last five years, Spike has been home to World Wrestling Entertainment. You've had to put up with ratings far less than Vince McMahon said he would deliver to your network. Yes, one of the causes of that has been that there has been no direct competition since March of 2001, when Vince bought WCW and shut it down. But the other reason is one that isn't Spike's fault directly either - horrible writing, bad relationship with the wrestling fans, and a severe case of nepotism.

You saw the light earlier this year - you dropped out of negotiations with WWE months before their contract was due. And you let Vince make a deal to return WWE Programming to the USA Network. Looking back over the last several months, that was probably an extremely smart move.

Now you're negotiating with Total Nonstop Action Wrestling for a timeslot on your network. TNA has made it clear that they need a weekly TV deal, and that Spike TV is their choice of venue. But Spike is being a baby about doing what they need to do. Offering TNA one measly hour on weekend late nights is NOT ENOUGH. If it's all we can get, it's a START. But Spike TV - AND TNA - need to be willing to do MORE.

You say that you're not sure wrestling is where you want to be at when it comes to original programming. It's said that UFC officials who now have a deal with Spike don't want to be associated with wrestling either.

TIME TO WAKE UP, Spike TV. Without wrestling, you would still be a pissant in the industry, a network that was 9th in the ratings overall, and even CSI repeats, one of your lifeblood providers, would not have raised your network status that much. It was WWE that brought you to where you stand now. It was WWE that helped make several of your franchise shows, including "The Ultimate Fighter" and "The Joe Schmo Show" a success. Without the WWE around, those shows would have BOMBED. Badly. You yourselves proved that fact, by airing the first season finale of "The Ultimate Fighter" on a Saturday evening. As loathe as UFC will be to admit it, they know deep inside that it was the fact that without the lead-in from the WWE, "The Ultimate Fighter" couldn't cut the mustard. They were predicting an 8.0 for that Saturday night finale...and only delivered something like a 1.8 in the ratings. That, Spike TV, was a COLOSSAL DISASTER. Had you aired the finale after RAW, would it have made any difference? Probably. But we'll never know now, will we?

My point is this: TNA needs a new home. Spike TV NEEDS the loyal wrestling crowd to help it survive. ONLY if Spike is willing to go the distance and take some necessary risks, will this truly be a fruitful venture. But be willing to risk a few legal entanglements, embrace TNA completely and FULLY, and I can almost guarantee you that Spike TV's post-McMahon ratings will grow the same level they've been at during that era...and probably even climb higher. Oh, sure, they'll slip at the beginning, but not as much as you might think, because the publicity factor will be in full play.. Not all of it will be positive publicity, but it WILL draw new viewers to your network. The bottom line: YOU DO NOT OWE VINCE MCMAHON ANYTHING. He BURNED you in the end. Lower ratings than expected, and storylines that made Spike TV embarrassed to be associated with wrestling. If you, and your parent Borg conglomerate, Viacom, have the BALLS to really COMMIT to what I'm going to propose to TNA, you have the potential of locking down Monday Nights WITHOUT WWE programming and sticking it to USA Network where it hurts the most - in the weekly Nielsen ratings.

From this point on, I will continue to address Spike TV within the context of addressing TNA. So please continue to pay attention. Several points within the TNA letter will be addressed directly to you.

So without further ado, let me move the playing field away from Titan Towers, and back to solid ground, away from the isolation of WWE and back to the real world.

::AHEM::

To Total Nonstop Action Wrestling
RE: The future survival of your company
CC: Dixie Carter, Bob Carter, Jerry Jarrett, Jeff Jarrett, Bob Ryder, and the TNA Booking Committee (Scott D'Amore, Jeremy Borash, Mike Tenay, et al)
BCC: Spike TV Executive Suite

It is time to face some cold, hard facts. TNA has been around for three years now. And what do you have to show for it? Not much...

You have exclusive contracts with two of the hottest young wrestlers on the scene today. You have a loyal following, smaller than you'd like, but it's there.

And that's about it.

Let me put this out in the open for you to take a long hard look at, and to let it sink in. A lot of internet pundits, including editors and columnists at all the major sites and sheets (i.e. PWInsider, PWTorch, 1Wrestling.Com, Wrestling Observer, and Figure Four Weekly) have danced around what I'm about to say without really saying it for a long while now, but it's time it was actually said, in words that are too blunt and succinct to misunderstand. So I'm going to finally say what all of the columnists, news journalists, and even fans have been too coy to say. Because it has to be said.

TNA is a FAILURE.

And not just a FAILURE, but a COLOSSAL FAILURE at that.

EVERY opportunity TNA has had land in their lap, you have BLOWN. Usually so spectacularly and succinctly that the pundits (including yours truly from time to time) were immediately predicting your demise within weeks.

Yes, you've proved them wrong. You're STILL here three years later. But you have almost NOTHING to show for it. In his first three years of running WCW, Eric Bischoff took a flagging company that was going nowhere fast, turned it around, and was well on the road to making it a number one ratings grabber. TNA isn't even out of the gate, and for that, every last one of you - Owners/Financiers Dixie and Bob Carter, co-owners Jerry and Jeff Jarrett, Talent Relations head Bob Ryder, and the various heads of TNA's booking - should ALL be ashamed. You have SQUANDERED opportunity after opportunity in favor of assuaging the bruised egos, when your entire company - executives and performers alike - should be working for the good of THE COMPANY, not the good of THE ONE.

Another golden opportunity has now dropped in your lap - the WWE Talent Massacre of July 5 & 6, 2005, a two-day period that will resonate in the minds of wrestling fans forever as a point to which they can say that WWE blew it big time, and possibly dealt themselves a potentially FATAL blow.

It is now the responsibility of TNA - and Spike TV - to pick up the ball and RUN WITH IT. Are you going to seize the opportunity, assume the responsibility, and make it happen? Or are you going to drop the ball again, as you have done so many times in the past three years?

To make this golden opportunity work, you have to have the courage, determination, and --with all due respect to Ms. Carter - testicular fortitude to MAKE it work. It's time to take aim at the jugular vein of WWE and SHOOT. It's time to start playing WWE's game with WWE's Rules.

Take no prisoners. Spend whatever it takes, even above and beyond what the bean counters might consider reasonable. Risk the lawsuits. Take courageous steps to beat Vincent Kennedy McMahon at his own game. With determination of the parts of both TNA and Spike TV , you don't have to wait to make this happen. You can make it happen NOW, virtually overnight. And if you do, the aggressive behavior you use and the publicity it will generate will equal RATINGS far higher than TNA has seen thus far. Maybe NOT WWE level ratings right away, but there's a ton of potential for that to happen. It will be expensive on the part of both TNA and Viacom, but in the long run , it will mean far more profits for both companies. Profits that will outweigh the risks.

Here is what you have to do. Step by Step. Follow this plan, and TNA can be a slow but steady ratings-growth WINNER. You can single handedly usher back in the days of the late 90s,when WWE and WCW combined to pull in a tenth of the television viewing audience every Monday night. What I have to suggest is going to be controversial, and even unethical in several places - not my usual stance. But 90% of my favorite performers are in TNA already and several others recently became massacre victims. I want to see TNA survive. And as I've said, if you're out to beat the WWE, you've got to beat them at their own game. In wrestling terms, it's Ric Flair's, "To Be The Man, you've got to BEAT the man" line on a business scale. If you continue down the path you're on right now, you're leading to total collapse. Sooner rather than later.

The first move belongs to both TNA and Spike TV. You need to sit down and finalize a deal. A LONG TERM deal. A FIVE YEAR deal. Not some namby-pamby one year "TNA Buys time" deal. This needs to be one that the entertainment industry will sit up and take notice at. A Deal that out -McMahon's McMahon. This needs to be done NOW. BEFORE the next TNA PPV hits the airwaves next Sunday. And it needs to be announced BEFORE the PPV as well. That means you have, at most, FIVE DAYS to make this deal happen.

Then, the ball is in Spike TV's court. And it's time for the next step.

Spike TV needs to BREACH THE EXCLUSIVITY AGREEMENT.

McMahon is gone, Spike. Let him move on. Risk the money it's going to take to give TNA a real shot at making it, and giving yourself a ratings benefit at the same time. McMahon will be on your network for just 10 more weeks. He screwed you. He left for USA Network. You don't owe the WWE ANYTHING. And I don't believe there is a judge worth his salt in this country that would dare give McMahon an injunction against you for doing so. He's leaving, he knows it, you know it. And so would the judge.

It is time for the screw-ee to become the screw-er.

By the first week in August, Spike TV needs to premiere TNA on MONDAY NIGHTS. That's right. BEFORE RAW leaves. Drive McMahon crazy. TNA Needs to put together a LIVE show for Monday nights. And Spike needs to air it RIGHT BEFORE "WWE RAW". Run the show from 8 to 9 PM on Mondays through the end of September. And then expand the show from 8-10 PM, so that the VERY FIRST WEEK that Raw is back on USA, it's first hour is going head-to-head with TNA.

Then, that same week in August, TNA Impact needs to make it's move back off the internet and back onto weekly television, with all new matches, Saturday nights at 10 PM, right before WWE Velocity.

And TNA should also premiere some kind of hybrid show, with both new matches and magazine style features, on Sundays at 6, right before WWE Sunday Night Heat.

In short, you need to make the last two and a half months of WWE's tenure on Spike TV miserable. Make Vince want to regret ever leaving Spike TV. And at the sme time, make him GLAD he's going back to USA Network.

Next, the ball is in TNA's court. Once the deal is done, TNA needs to set several actions of it's own in motion.

The first motion is to DOUBLE THE ROSTER. You heard me. What I have outlined is going to TRIPLE TNA's airtime, and you need more performers to do the job. You don't want your big stars to burn out. As the first move in doubling the roster, you need to maximize the publicity factor and hire as many of WWE's massacred stars as you can that will add to your ranks, and add salt into the new wounds in WWE that they themselves would be responsible for opening when they let them go. You need to give yourselves the ability to thumb your nose at McMahon.

BREACH THE 90-DAY NO COMPETE CLAUSES. Panda Energy has the necessary income. So don't claim that it can't be done. It most certainly can. Guarantee the performers whatever salary they would have drawn from WWE during those 90 days, and make sure they get the money pronto - no more Kid Kash-like ranting on the net about unpaid salaries and such. That kind of stuff has to end. Pay them whatever they ask for, but set a ceiling on the salary offers early, so that you don't get taken unfair advantage of. Then, make lots of noise about hiring the fired WWE employees and how TNA wants to see them back on TV sooner rather than later. Although I don't expect TNA to hire everyone, it is absolutely ESSENTIAL that TNA sign these people and have them ready to go IMMEDIATELY, for reasons I will go into shortly:

The Dudley Boyz (no 90 day clause to worry about here)
Billy Kidman
Maven
Shannon Moore
Akio
Spike Dudley
Jackie Gayda
Matt Morgan

TNA could benefit as well from hiring Charlie Haas and Mark Jindrak as well, but they don't play a major part in my future suggestions as the others above do.

Let everyone know that ALL of the former WWE employees will appear during TNA's first two weeks of shows on Spike TV, and really pump the publicity machine for all it's worth. There's more to this in a few minutes, and will involve some other hirings that we'll go into as we go through the expanding gimmicks list shortly.

And above all, as the ENTIRE wrestling world knows, don't blow the opportunity - BEFORE the PPV next Sunday - probably sometime on Friday, his "freeday" --maximize the publicity and make the announcement that TNA has indeed landed the services of "The Angelic Diablo" Matt Hardy. DO NOT BLOW THIS. Matt is a very important element in your success, and I think all parties involved - TNA, Spike TV, and Hardy - know this.

The next step is to hold a press conference - maybe the same one where the two above events are being announced. And in said conference, TNA needs to announce the following points:

1) That TNA is committed to making wrestling respectable again, and will use so-called "Crash TV" elements sparingly if at all. That TNA is going to try to blend the right elements - action, suspense, a bit of "Crash TV', a little "Extreme" and a little blood here in there - to make wrestling something that the whole FAMILY can watch TOGETHER. TNA Wrestling fans - and parents - who tune in want to see actual Wrestling and less "sports entertainment" elements - than WWE offers. A little bit goes a long way, as the old adage says. No Terrorism, no necrophilia, nothing like that. Blood is a natural part of wrestling, and a little won't offend the parents of younger fans, and you need both parents and kids as well as your current fan base to survive. Make it clear that you KNOW THIS.

2) That TNA has committed itself to a long-term deal with Universal Studios, and the "Impact Zone" as it's called. Give TNA a home that they can be proud of, like the old "ECW Arena". A Single place that can be TNA's alone. Forget house shows for now, and stay focused on one arena. Make the "Impact Zone" a place that wrestling fans long to travel to, like ECW Arena was the mecca of extreme fans.

3) That TNA is committed to it's FIVE Belts. That's right, I said FIVE. TNA needs to announce it's commitments to the World Heavyweight Title belt, the X Division belt, and the Tag Team division belt, as well as two brand-new elements in the TNA Mix - the TransContinental Belt and the WOMENS' division belt.

OK, now that the technicals are out of the way, and Viacom and the Carters have played their hands, and are risking the financial end of things, it's time for Scott D'Amore and his team to step up to the plate. Booking is going to be a big element in the "NEW TNA", and it will fall to you to put together a lot of stuff in a very short time.

The LAST thing I (or ANY fan for that matter) want to see is an "NWO" style storyline. It simply will no longer fly in this day and age. You most certainly should take advantage to point out who's coming over from WWE, and why, but aside from the obvious selling of that point, leave it at that. Stress how glad most of the people are to be a part of TNA now that they've had the opportunity.

Classic wrestling has always survived on 'factions' of wrestlers. In recent years, factions have fallen by the wayside. In fact, in the last two or three years, only two factions have been alive in wrestling. WWE had "Evolution" with Triple H, Batista, Randy Orton, and Ric Flair, while in TNA, Team Canada, led by manager Scott D'Amore, has thrived and make superstars out of Petey Williams, Bobby Roode, Eric Young, Johnny Devine, and A1. The time has come to put together a few ready-made factions to start working the TNA angles around. I can offer up four new factions for you, but ultimately the decision will be up to you, as would whether they would be considered face or heel factions. But to start off, here's what I would suggest.

Faction #1 - The Omega Factor - Matt Hardy, Jeff Hardy, and Shannon Moore - these three guys have been working it together for years, and all of them started off in Omega. Make it work for you. You've got one guy for each of the three singles belts. Put Matt in the Heavyweight game, Jeff in the TransContinental game, and Shannon in the X Division. And all three of them have laundry with WWE to air, I'm sure....and if at some point in the future Shane Helms becomes available, so much the better...Make "The Omega Factor" your lead faction for leading the fight against Vince.

Faction #2 - TTFN(Y) - full name Too Tough For New York - Vince has NEVER truly taken advantage of what they started with "Tough Enough" so perhaps it's time for TNA to step up and show them how it's done. TTFN(Y) consists of recent Massacre victim Maven, as the leader, with fellow Massacre victims Jackie Gayda and Matt Morgan, and two other performers that will be new additions to the TNA ranks - Nidia Guerin and Mike Mizanin. "The Miz" alone brings huge publicity with him from his MTV "Real World" connections, which can also be exploited to the fullest. You may also want to consider other "Tough Enough" candidates that didn't make it all the way as well, such as Daniel Rodimer or Hawk Youkins..but I'd do that carefully and slowly, not with the five who make up the beginning ranks.

Faction #3 - Extreme Incorporated - it could also be "The Extreme Coalition" or whatever you want to do with it. WWE is once again blowing the perfect angle. So if WWE can't - or more likely refuses to - sustain ECW Fans, let TNA take the lead. Led by Bubba Ray and D-Von Dudley, this faction would also include Spike Dudley, new TNA signee Rhino, and one or two of TNA's own...Jerry Lynn, Shane Douglas, or both (perhaps with Douglas acting in the Ric Flair Evolution role). But whatever you do, Extreme must be spelled out. Why? See Number Four.

Faction #4 - X-citement - or any other name utilizing the "X" to mean "X Division" rather than "Extreme". Put together a group of TNA newcomers to light a fire under a reorganized and repurposed X Division. I'd suggest launching this group a little later, using an experienced face "X Division" performer - Chris Sabin or Amazing Red or Shark Boy - as a leader who recruits a group of hot new young performers to help him wrest the X title out of heel hands (Michael Shane?). Sort of like WCW"s old "Jung Dragons" but as a face group. The other performers would all be new to TNA, and all but one getting their first major national exposure. My choices for the others would be WWE Massacre victim Aiko, along with three dynamic up and coming UPW Performers, Li'l Nate, Billy Kim, and Shawn Riddick, as well as a funny, talented, and charasmatic heel performer who goes under various names but is best known as either "Alpha Male" Justin Powers or "Alpha Male" Justin Shaype, depending on which indie he's working for on the New England indie circuit.. Of course, the "Alpha Male" part would have to go, because Monty "No Talent Whatsoever" Brown uses it in TNA, but that's fine. Adding Zack Gowen to this team might also prove to be useful.

Anyway, you get the idea. Factions can and should be an important part of TNA's future.

Now, let's move on to those new divisions I mentioned earlier.

The TransContinental Division would be the first new belt to be introduced on TNA, and it should have a HUGE fanfare. This belt is designed to be TNA's equivelant of what WWE's InterContinential belt USED to be - a hugely important belt for those who don't quite make it to heavyweight status.

Let's face facts, boys and girls. AJ Styles, phenomenal performer that he is, is NOT really Heavyweight material. But put him back in the X Division, where he likes to be, and he absolutely obliterates the rest of the contenders. The X Division nearly collapsed earlier this year when AJ returned to it and decimated the rest of the performers therein - Chris Sabin, Michael Shane, Frankie Kazarian (at the time) and others. He would have also obliterated Amazing Red, had he been around, but this happened during the time when Dusty Rhodes unceremoniously had dumped him.

The TransContinental Belt changes all that. It becomes a bridge between the two current division. It puts people who really have no business being in the X Division anymore but who either aren't the right size or aren't yet ready to move on to the HeavyWeight division in their own class with their own belt to feud over, instead of mucking up the newer, smaller X division guys, or worse yet, just feuding to feud with nothing at stake, one thing I've always loatned about pro wrestling.

Launch the TransContinental Belt with an 8 man tournament on the Spike TV Debut of TNA. It can take several weeks to get to the crowning moment and the very first winner of the belt, and you can build up the tension between the 8 competitors. I suggest that to begin the division, the 8 people to start with should be AJ Styles, Christopher Daniels, Jeff Hardy, Shocker (also not X Division material), Samoa Joe (ditto), Sean Waltman, and two of the incoming WWE Stars, best choices probably to be Maven and Billy Kidman. Other possible choices for this belt include Sonny Siaki, David Young, Charlie Haas, Mike Mizanin, and Cassidy Riley among others.

The point is to give this size and weight class a belt all their own. And If you put some prestige behind it, TNA's TransContinental Tourney could be a HUGE ratings getter. And it gets the larger guys who shouldn't be in the X Division out of it.

Second, the TNA Women's Division. Now, I know TNA has always shied away from Women's wrestling, but one of those Golden Opportunity moments has arrived. TNA has a chance to do something neither WWE nor WCW has really seriously tried - make a SERIOUS attempt at making Women's wrestling as big as it is in Japan.

There are so many talented women performers out there, that as TNA goes through it's first few months of it's Spike TV run, you can be lining up competitiors who want to prove to the United States that Women's Wrestling is NOT all Bra and Panties matches. That you don't have to be a DIVA to be a women's performer. That wrestling to some women is as important as it is to men. To start, I'd have another 8-person tourney. And it would mean acquiring additional talent. But it would be worth it. Think of the prestige of giving the women a 30-minute final match just under the main event (or even as the main event - it HAS to be better than the Trish/Lita match WWE main-evented earlier this year) where WRESTLING , not T and A, is the important element. To kick things off, I would choose 8 performers who can hold their own in the ring. To my mind that would mean TNA's own Traci Brooks, established performers like Miss Jacqueline, Molly Holly, Nidia Guerin, and Jackie Gayda (with some more training) and outside elements to introduce to a national audience for the first time, such as NECW's Mercedes Martinez and Violet Flame, Japan's Sumie Sakai, and UPW's Jenny "Looney" Lane, among others.

TNA has an opportunity to launch a revolution in Women's wrestling. Seize the opportunity and the fans will follow. Of that I am sure. More importantly, it would make everyone see just how poorly WWE really does treat their female performers.

OK, I've outlined some of the stuff that needs to be done. The rest I'm leaving (warily) in the hands of the booking committee. I'm just a fan, and we all know it. But I'm a knowledgeable fan, and many people know that I have an ability to read trends in this business, and make accurate predictions on how things may go involving various angles and wrestling performers. I'm usually right in those predictions. Ask around, you're bound to find someone who can tell you. Some of them are in your own backyard.

Overall, the point of this article is to point out some major mistakes TNA has made and ways to correct them that will give them an advantage, and also to point out that wrestling NEEDS competition in order to fuel true creativity. TNA has shown some creativity over the past three years, but not enough to beat WWE at their game, even though they're way more creative than WWE has been. I want to see TNA survive. And it takes more than Panda Energy's money to make that happen. It takes creativity. It takes drive. It takes fandom understanding. It takes decent execution.

I have been dreaming of the day when TNA shows it has what it takes to survive. So far, it hasn't done anything to show me it can. In fact, 90 percent of the time it has pulled bonehead moves that has left me - and many of my fellow wrestling fans - wondering if TNA really DOES want to be a success (no, I HAVEN'T forgotten the Bait and Switch PPV last year...and NEITHER has anyone else...).

What I've done is provided an outline, a blueprint, for some extreme actions that need to be taken to ensure TNA's future. And I hope that TNA and Spike TV will listen to them. Dangerous, and sometimes unethical, as they are, they WILL work.

Now I am turning to the FANS who are reading this.

The fans are an important element in TNA's success as well. And for all our bellyaching, it's time we showed Spike TV that TNA is worth taking risks on, and that we show TNA that we will be there to support them.

To that end, I'm asking wrestling fans worldwide to sign on to my proposed "TNA/Spike TV Blueprint For The Future" by adding their name to a list of fans supporting the above initiative or individual elements of it on PetitionOnline.Com.

The petition says the following:

We, The Undersigned, declare our support for the "TNA/Spike TV Blueprint For The Future" as outlined by journalist and wrestling fan TC Kirkham in his SlamJamz Central column and blog entry of July 10/11, 2005. We believe that the extreme actions such as those outlined by Kirkham in his article would help to ensure TNA's survive into the future, and that his suggestions, while risky to both TNA and Spike TV, would be worth the maximum exposure and publicity they would generate. I am a fan of TNA and it's family of performers, and hereby pledge to do my part by watching TNA programming whenever and wherever on Spike TV it would eventually land (if a US resident) and to help by passing along the address of this petition to others who might be interested in signing it and by encouraging them to sign and show their support for TNA - Total Nonstop Action Wrestling and Spike TV's airing of their programming.

All you have to do is sign your name, your e-mail (which can remain private to PetitionOnline only or to myself only, and does NOT have to be made public) and your city, state, and country. I've also left optional spaces to list your favorite TNA performers, Favorite WWE Massacre Victim, and general comments about the situation.

My goal for this petition, available at http://www.petitiononline.com/jamz01/petition.html is 10,000 signatures by this Friday, July 15, at 5 PM EDT. Now, we may not make that many, or we may get more, either way, but you don't have to stop signing the petition at that time. Keep signing and keep supporting TNA .

Please remember that signing this petition does NOT commit you to anything more than general support for the ideas listed above, and a general pledge to watch TNA programming and help it succeed once Spike TV picks it up. But passing the word along to your friends, your chat friends, and any wrestling fans you know, will help generate more signatures. And the more signatures we can raise, the more support we show for TNA and the louder Spike TV will hear our pleas. So paste the petition address in your e-mail, publicize it on your website or in your blog, and help us meet this goal.


OK, TNA and Spike TV - I've laid things out on the line for you. I've told you what you need to do, or at least START to do, to give TNA its first REAL shot at success.

Now the BIG question is:

Will you take the risks, take the initiative and RUN WITH THE BALL? Or will you BLOW IT, yet again, and allow the world to watch you slowly collapse around yourself and die?

Only YOU are the destiny of your future. But remember...the futures of dozens of professional wrestlers depend on your actions over the next 7 to 14 days. If you don't make the right moves, you could be responsible for the demise of any chance for real competition for WWE to emerge...EVER....

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Until Next Time....REPRISE THE THEME SONG AND ROLL THE CREDITS!