TNA's new Timeslot

[JimSteel]

FROM LORDS OF PAIN

Spike TV, the former home of the WWE, has sent out an official press release confirming the brand-new time slot for TNA: Impact!, which will begin airing on Thursday nights at 9 p.m. beginning on April 13th, 2006. Here is what the press release had to say:


"TNA WRESTLING MOVES TO PRIMETIME ON SPIKE TV: Moves To Thursdays at 9 PM Starting April 13"

New York, NY, February 6, 2006 – Spike TV has announced that Total Nonstop Action (TNA) Wrestling will move to a weeknight primetime slot starting this April. Premieres of TNA: iMPACT! Wrestling will move to Thursdays at 9:00 PM, ET/PT, starting April 13, and will encore in its current Saturday night timeslot.

“TNA Wrestling has been delivering strong ratings for Spike and is continually growing its audience,” says Kevin Kay, General Manager/Executive Vice-President, Spike TV. “Wrestling fans have been looking for an alternative and have found it in TNA’s brand of high-flying and action-packed entertainment.”

Since launching in October 2005, TNA: iMPACT! Saturday telecasts have averaged a .8/724,000 HH rating, with .8/397,000 in Men 18-49 and a .8/202,000 in M 18-34 with an average audience of 957,000. Compared to YAGO, TNA Wrestling is +56% in HH, +103% in M 18-49 and +72% in average audience. On Saturday, January 28 TNA scored some of its highest ratings with a 1.1/970,000 HH rating with a 1.0/518,000 in M 18-49 and 1.0/252,000 in M 18-34 and an average audience of 1.3 million viewers.

“The move to prime time on Spike is the most significant event in TNA Wrestling’s short history,” said Dixie Carter, president of TNA Wrestling. “I am very proud of our entire team and all their hard work in achieving this milestone. Spike has been a fantastic partner, and we have accomplished so much together in just four months. We look forward to continuing to work with them to grow the TNA brand during this exciting time.”

The new wrestling alternative, “TNA: iMPACT!” delivers a distinct brand of high-risk, athletic entertainment. TNA’s roster includes new, fresh talent like AJ Styles, Christopher Daniels, Samoa Joe, Monty Brown and recognizable stars such as Sting, Christian Cage, Jeff Jarrett, Team 3D, and others. TNA features the innovative six-sided ring and the high-flying “X Division,” as well as concept matches such as “Ultimate X,” “King of the Mountain,” and “Six Sides of Steel.”

TNA Entertainment, LLC is a privately held company headquartered in Nashville,TN. The names of all Total Nonstop Action Wrestling televised programming, talent names, images, likenesses, slogans and all TNA Wrestling logos and trademarks are exclusive property of TNA Entertainment, LLC. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. For more information, visit www.tnawrestling.com.

Spike TV is available in more than 89 million homes and is a division of MTV Networks. A unit of Viacom (NYSE: VIA, VIA.B), MTV Networks is one of the world’s leading creators of programming and content across all media platforms. MTV Networks, with more than 100 channels worldwide, owns and operates the following television programming services – MTV: MUSIC TELEVISION, MTV2, VH1, mtvU, NICKELODEON, NICK at NITE, COMEDY CENTRAL, TV LAND, SPIKE TV, CMT, NOGGIN, VH1 CLASSIC, LOGO, MTVN INTERNATIONAL and THE DIGITAL SUITE FROM MTV NETWORKS, a package of 13 digital services, with all of these networks trademarks of MTV Networks. MTV Networks connects with its audiences through its robust consumer products businesses and its more than 95 interactive properties worldwide, including online, broadband, wireless and interactive television services and also has licensing agreements, joint ventures, and syndication deals whereby all of its programming services can be seen worldwide.

[LWPD]

I have to admit I never thought I'd see TNA obtain a prime time cable slot...much less one that was funded by the network running it. Both Dixie Carter and Jeff Jarrett deserve major props for beating the odds up to this point. They've been able to prove their critics wrong and take this thing much further than just about anyone outside of their 'inner circle' ever expected.

Like Watching Paint Dry (a much bigger fan of The Ultimate Fighter than of TNA Impact...but I'll Tivo both on Thursday nights come this Spring)

[myview]

iMPACT Thursday's! I'm excited for this move to Primetime, 4/13 will seem a long time away... in the end TNA is heading in the right direction and the support is strong from this fan. Congrats to all at TNA!

[Big Bri]

Good for them. We'll have to sit back and see how they do. I'll be able to watch Impact regularly now, as I'm usually working or partying on Saturday nights, and then I go to bed at midnight on Mondays.

[swarm]

is it live?

[ringsyde]

NOPE! And you know what that means.

[offspring515]

Damn...I would probably have watched it live at any other time...but against My Name is Earl and the Office? I'll have to tivo.

[gatekeeper]

Man, it's gotta be live. I hate to say it, but Eric Bischoff said it right.

He said (regarding Nitro) "I knew we had to create the excitement of 'anything can happen', and you can't do that in a taped environment. I knew we had to be live."

[myview]

TNA will be LIVE down the road, you must take baby steps... RAW at one time was taped until 1997, so TNA will be heading to a Live show in the near future.

[Wad]

gatekeeper said:

Man, it's gotta be live. I hate to say it, but Eric Bischoff said it right.

He said (regarding Nitro) "I knew we had to create the excitement of 'anything can happen', and you can't do that in a taped environment. I knew we had to be live."

And look where Nitro is now.

Live taping may be beyond TNA's capabilities and resources. The audience gains were impressive enough with the taped shows on Spike. They would need to be on a more solid financial footing before they should attempt this.

That, or Viacom has to eat the costs of live tapings.

[Mike M]

cledermuller said:

gatekeeper said:

Man, it's gotta be live. I hate to say it, but Eric Bischoff said it right.

He said (regarding Nitro) "I knew we had to create the excitement of 'anything can happen', and you can't do that in a taped environment. I knew we had to be live."

And look where Nitro is now.

Only AFTER Raw went live too. Bischoff was by no means infallible, but he was right on the money here. If Vince hadn't gone live, he wouldn't be as well off as he is now.

I don't disagree that TNA needs to be able to afford to go live, but I do think that they should be live at least once a month outside of PPVs. That will generate interest, just like SNME did for WWE in the 80's and 90's.

[Wad]

mikem said:

Only AFTER Raw went live too. Bischoff was by no means infallible, but he was right on the money here. If Vince hadn't gone live, he wouldn't be as well off as he is now.

The decision to go live every week was one of desperation. Remember than when WCW was hot, WWF was reeling. He also happened to fire Bret Hart and had a Steve Austin that drew tremendous interest.

I don't disagree that TNA needs to be able to afford to go live, but I do think that they should be live at least once a month outside of PPVs. That will generate interest, just like SNME did for WWE in the 80's and 90's.

Saturday Night's Main Event was essentially a taped house show, and WWF got Superstars and/or Wrestling Challenge tapings out of the same show.

And being live is only a form of presentation, not a product in itself. The only advantage being live would have is to prevent Impact! from being scooped on the internet. TNA's fans are already smarkier than WWE's, and they'd still tune in and see the product. Otherwise, what else are you expecting from a live show? Thanks to the internet, we know about wrestlers' transactions, so we know which star will debut, so there are no "surprise" appearances.

I can see how live programs can also hurt quality. There's no way to undo blown spots or eliminate negative reactions such as loud "boring!" chants. Also, if you are hoping for shocking moments, Hootergate made networks take their 7-second delays seriously.

[gatekeeper]

cledermuller said:

mikem said:

I can see how live programs can also hurt quality. There's no way to undo blown spots or eliminate negative reactions such as loud "boring!" chants. Also, if you are hoping for shocking moments, Hootergate made networks take their 7-second delays seriously.

Well, they could just have good live events and then you wouldn't have to worry about that!

[LWPD]

Live taping may be beyond TNA's capabilities and resources. The audience gains were impressive enough with the taped shows on Spike. They would need to be on a more solid financial footing before they should attempt this.

That, or Viacom has to eat the costs of live tapings.

Correct. From a financial standpoint it was easy for Nitro to go 'live' because it was fully owned by a television network. There was no middle man to negotiate with so Bischoff got the thumbs up from Turner to add the additional production costs to all the other red ink they were wallowing in. The logic of 'real world' budgeting wasn't a factor in how WCW was structured...and in the end it did them in.

Vince went live under different circumstances. First there was an effort to deal with predatory competition. With Nitro being live they were able to do things like give away results and 'turn up the volume' on the static programming of Raw. Who could forget Rick Rude being on _BOTH_ shows (live Nitro and taped Raw) at the same exact time with the bashing of Raw that took place.

The additional costs were viewed as a necessity to keep up. As luck would have it Vince found a willing partner in USA Network..which helped cover the extra production costs to allow Raw to go live full time. The gamble paid off huge and both profited. The huge Spike television deal had the 'live' provision maintained in the contract with more than enough money in the package to make it worth WWE's while.

Looking back it's fact not fiction that at the peak of the Monday Night Wars taped Raw shows would outperform live Nitro shows, taped Raw shows alternating with live Raw shows would often do equal if not better ratings and after the 'Wars' were over 'taped' Smackdown' shows have gone through extended periods of outperforming live Raw shows. The 'live' factor just doesn't make much of a difference absent the conditions of predatory competition Vince faced back in the day. Those who 'read spoilers' and won't watch unless everything is fresh is a minute part of the audience. The larger universe of viewers tunes in to watch what they regard as entertaining content...live or taped.

TNA doesn't pay for the TV spot but they do pay for the costs of producing what goes on the television. At this point adding 'more red ink' to chase a fallacy isn't the goal. Testing the viability of having the show in the new time spot is the goal. Hopefully for the good of the industry they'll do well.

Like Watching Paint Dry (who remembers when 'taped' Smackdown shows booked by Paul Heyman routinely scored higher ratings than 'live' Raw shows booked by Steph and Gerwitz)

[Wad]

gatekeeper said:

Well, they could just have good live events and then you wouldn't have to worry about that!

They have the hot crowd and spots-a-plenty, but the X Division in particular has the risk of a lot of business-exposing moves.

[thefamoustommyz]

But nothing as "business exposing" as Tough Enough and sledgehammers to the head.

[pikemojo]

Checkmate. I like you Tommy. You call it right down the middle.