You may have heard of this company. If not, you might know them by another logo:
TNA was founded in May 2002 by Jeff Jarrett and his people. I started watching it around 2004 when it was FSN. It later switched to Spike TV around 2006. I even remember watching their debut show on Spike because they had AJ Styles as the first person they wanted people to see. He came out first and his match was first.
TNA was so innovative. They had a six-sided ring, that had so many different match types like the King of the Mountain match, which is a reverse Ladder match where the winner hangs the belt on the hook. They have the Ultimate X match which looks something like this:
TNA just had so many amazing matches over the course of their 11 years in existence. They're allowed to do so much more and the matches are so much more crisper and the moves just flow. There's no lull in the action, and barely even sloppiness.
The only thing WWE has over TNA is the money. WWE's been around a lot longer and they've got a lot more money to work with leading to better production values and bigger venues for their events.
I stopped watching wrestling altogether around 2009. In fact, right after the CM Punk/Jeff Hardy feud in the Summer of 2009. I would always tune in for WrestleMania season though. I got back into WWE after CM Punk's pipe bomb promo. I got back into TNA after Lockdown in 2011 when Bully Ray turned heel and joined the Aces and 8's.
Here are some things TNA gets right to me:
6) Better Storylines.
- TNA's storylines aren't ridiculous and out of nowhere. The wrestlers can go out and there and sell their match on the mic and get the people invested into it. They do a good job of building up a match week by week, keeping the fan interested no matter how minor the progression is. And when a title is involved, it's about THE TITLE. The Champion and his title aren't an afterthought. The storylines make sense, they get you invested with the promos and you can't wait to see the culmination of it in the endgame match.
5) Better Matches.
- TNA puts on better matches than WWE. WWE's wrestling today doesn't compare to the great wrestling matches they had in the Ruthless Aggression Era and Attitude Era. WWE's wrestling is slow, sloppy, and boring. You have great workers like Bryan, The Shield, Bray Wyatt, Punk, Cody Rhodes, Sandow, Ziggler, etc. and you'll occasionally get some great matches.
- But with TNA, the pace their matches have is so good. It's quick, crisp moves, great wrestling and it's not sloppy. It may be slow at some spots, but the matches still keep a consistent pace. Not everyone in TNA are great wrestlers, but they have some great workers. Guys like Austin Aries, AJ Styles, Bobby Roode, Kurt Angle (yes, he's there), Jeff Hardy (yes, he's there too), Magnus and Samoa Joe. Just more exciting wrestlers.
Here are a list of some of my favorite TNA matches during the time I've watched and even some that I currently went back and rewatched. If you can find them, make sure you check them out.
TNA Unbreakable 2005: AJ Styles vs Samoa Joe vs Christopher Daniels
TNA No Surrender 2006: AJ Styles & Christopher Daniels vs LAX
TNA Bound For Glory 2011: James Storm vs Bobby Roode
TNA Destination X 2012: Austin Aries vs Bobby Roode
TNA Genesis 2006: Kurt Angle vs Samoa Joe
TNA Victory Road 2010: Beer Money vs Motor City Machine Guns
Do some Homework and check out some of the great matches TNA has to offer. This is just my list and there's plenty more where this came from.
4) The Women wrestle too.
- Gone are the days where women had interesting storylines on television and the endgame would be a great match. Gone are the days where we had good female wrestlers like Trish, Lita, Molly, Victoria, Jazz, Ivory, Chyna, etc. Also, gone are the days where the women got TIME TO WRESTLE. WWE Divas get, what, 30 seconds to 1 minute on RAW? The Divas Division are full of models and somewhere in there, you have a couple of good, not great, wrestlers.
- TNA has a great pool of female wrestlers: Gail Kim, Taryn Terrell, Mickie James, ODB, Brooke Tessmacher, and Velvet Sky. Mickie James left TNA, but you see my point. The women get 5-10 minutes to wrestle a match and when they do, 9 times out of 10, they put on a good match. And they turn it up a few notches at the pay-per-views.
- The females in the WWE are treated like crap and are just there to look good, come out with corny pop entrance themes, and are more theatrical in the ring. TNA women wrestlers look sexy, have entrance themes that actually suit them, and put on great matches. I'll give you an example. This is probably the best Divas match I've seen in YEARS.
I dare you to point out a better divas match that WWE has put out recently. Don't go back to 2006-2007. I mean, recently. Don't worry, I'll wait.
3) The faces aren't cheesy, and the heels are badasses.
- Notice how in WWE, almost ALL the faces act exactly the same. They pander to the crowd, they're cheesy and corny, don't have a cool factor, or tough side. The only exception to that is CM Punk. Everybody else is too....nice and generic. Like Stone Cold, The Rock, and Undertaker were good guys, but they were "bad boys" for lack of a better term. The fans loved them because they were so cool. The way they carried themselves and how they talked on the mic was what made them loved. You can't say the same about today's current good guys. CM Punk is slowly leaning towards that category as well. I would hate to see him go out like that. He's clearly not the same Punk like in 2011.
- The heels are such an important part of wrestling because you need that obstacle for your good guy to overcome. In WWE, the heels don't do anything. There is no dominant heel that the people love to hate, or is dangerous, calculating, vicious, or just a plain monster. WWE doesn't have that. They had it in Mark Henry, but look where he is now. WWE has too many faces and not enough heels. TNA clearly has their dominant heel in Bully Ray, or some may know him as Bubba Ray Dudley. He's badass, he's got a cool look, absolute dynamite on the mic, can get himself over and does heelish things. The most important thing about a heel is for them to do things where they put other wrestlers on notice to not mess with them. Bully Ray does it, and does it well.
I guess my problem, in short, is the faces are so made out to be so dominant that it's impossible for a heel to emerge as dominant. The power should be balanced through faces and heels. There shouldn't be a single dominant face in the company. Hogan had Andre, Bret had HBK, Austin had McMahon, Rock had HHH, Undertaker had Kane, Angle had Lesnar, etc.
2) TNA is not marketed towards kids.
- People don't understand that you can market a product towards kids without having to insult the intelligence of older wrestling fans. The Attitude Era had LOADS of kids that were into. They didn't have to change the way they were doing things. They kept the violence, blood, half naked women, and cuss words. You could even see kids in the crowd during a lot of Attitude Era shows.
- Nowadays, everything WWE does is towards little kids. The characters, the promos, the music they use, all generated towards this generation of kids. I guess it could be a cause of this generation being so soft. The least bit of violence will have parents rioting and marching to the doors of WWE HQ. I understand the company has to evolve. I understand there's no way the Attitude Era can be recreated. I'm not asking for that. All I want is an entertaining product that I can enjoy. TNA is a more mature product that doesn't insult the viewer's intelligence, but at the same time is good for all age groups. WWE can still market towards kids and put on a good product that everybody can love and enjoy, but I guess that's not the way they wanna do things.
1) TNA isn't centered around ONE person. WWE is.
- No matter what happens in WWE, it all comes back to John Cena. WWE poorly builds up their mid card, and doesn't give anybody else the chance to rise to the top. CM Punk was the WWE Champion for 1 year and wasn't given that main event push. He wasn't given the chance. When Cena is around, nobody else is given the chance to thrive. WWE just pushes him and him alone.
- TNA does a masterful of job of building the entire roster so that anybody, when their time has arrived, can run with the top spot. When it was Bobby Roode's time, he became the Champion. When his time was up, it was Austin Aries. When his time was up, it was Jeff Hardy, and when his time was up it was Bully Ray's. The TNA World Title picture stays fresh with new faces, new feuds, and new matches. There is not ONE guy in EVERY main event feud in EVERY main event of the ppv. When it's somebody's time, they get a chance to run with the belt. If they succeed, it stays on them, if people don't like them, the belt comes off. The important thing is that they were given the chance and it either worked out, or didn't work out.
- TNA trusts their roster more because they are built up properly and relevant enough to carry the company's top championship, or carry 2 hours of a broadcast. Of course they won't hit a home run every time, but when they do something, it usually works out. All superstars get an equal share of the spotlight. WWE, it's one guy. It's been that way for the past 8 years.
In short, WWE, as a product, is stale. It's almost as if they're scared to move in a different direction. They have the roster and the pieces to be SO much better than they are now, but they don't want to pull that trigger. Especially when they keep clinging to John Cena.
TNA is not perfect by any means. They do some stupid things too. But they have better feuds, better wrestling, and a better overall product. They effectively use 2 hours and make it mean something. WWE is better at marketing and better production values.
I'll tell you this, TNA Bound For Glory is next Sunday and the card looks extremely stacked and looks like a must order. And unlike WWE, the outcome of some matches are unpredictable.
If you're looking for a change from the norm, turn to Spike TV, Thursdays at 9.
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By: Gerald "Showstopper" Prophete
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