TNA officials held a press conference this afternoon with talents to address Destination America acquiring the syndicated broadcasting rights to Ring of Honor. Starting June 3rd, ROH will air their weekly television series one hour prior to the start of Impact Wrestling every Wednesday night.
Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer is reporting that very little was gained from today’s call, as TNA officials were unable to address their current status with Destination America.
Because we’ve had so many reports and new information coming in, here’s everything we know about the situation so far:
-TNA talent was not informed of the deal between D.A. and ROH and found out like everyone else, when the news broke online.
-So far as we know, TNA officials (possibly including Dixie Carter) were not aware there was a deal happening between D.A. and ROH. The two sides coming to terms had very little, if nothing, to do with TNA and whether or not the network plans to continue running Impact Wrestling past September.
-D.A. has syndicated broadcasting rights of the already existing Ring of Honor TV series. That means it will be the same show that airs on syndication all around the country on Friday or Saturday (depending on where you live). That being said, ROH will maintain their syndicated programming through Sinclair and their affiliates, so they aren’t trading one network for another. This is a matter of getting the TV show into a few major networks they had trouble penetrating before, most notably Chicago, Philadelphia, New York and Los Angeles.
-The status of Samoa Joe is uncertain. He was scheduled to work ROH TV dates in the future, but it’s believed WWE allowed him to work anywhere as long as it was not for a rival television network. With ROH on Sinclair this wasn’t a problem, but D.A. makes them a national TV show, which could mean they have to go back to the negotiating table, or that Joe would have to make a long-term decision one way or the other.
-Wade Keller is reporting that there is potential down the line for D.A. to air first-run ROH content at some point in the future.
-With syndication and a national TV deal, plus PPV and IPPV and on-demand through their website, it’s very possible Ring of Honor will take over as the #2 promotion in the U.S. just in terms of viewership and TV ratings. Whether or not they’ll beat the two-hour Impact show remains to be seen (although it’s incredibly unlikely at the start, as TNA has a more established national presence), but it’s the combination of everything that puts them over the top.
-Destination America wants pro wrestling on their network. The entire reason there was talks about them dropping TNA – and it may very well still happen in September – is that Impact is expensive to run. Pro wrestling ad rates are through the roof, and many advertisers just don’t like wrestling, period. WWE was in a similar situation with USA Network, who is now trying to better promote them across all of NBC, basically by pushing them as celebrities and not pro wrestlers. ROH gives D.A. an incredibly inexpensive pro wrestling brand and, unlike Impact, they aren’t responsible for the vast majority of their financial backing.
-ROH may end up airing as both a lead-in and a follow-up, meaning they would replay the show directly before and after Impact every week. So basically ROH ratings would help Impact, and Impact would help ROH.
That’s just about everything we know so far. Stay tuned to Wrestlezone.com for more information as it comes in.
