AAVR Magazine

A Fight That Won’t be Settled in The Ring

Look out kids, this is going to be about Wrestling.

No, I don’t mean Olympic style — I mean the flying elbow-, chair shot-, multi million dollar- type wrestling. This Sunday will be what many consider the wrestling event of all wrestling events, WrestleMania! This year’s massive event is going to be held in the Citrus Bowl in sunny Orlando, Florida. For the first time in years, the WWE will be holding a pay-per-view event under the open sky (hope it doesn’t rain). Everything is set for this to be a great event: good location, good matches, good hype. However there is one side effect to being in Orlando that the WWE may or may of not thought about. Orlando is the home of TNA Wrestling, the barely five year old competition. Within the past two years, WWE stars such as Christian Cage, Kurt Angle, and Booker T have all defected to TNA. While they may not bring in the numbers that the WWE does, their fan base continues to grow. TNA has kept costs down by filiming in the same studio every week or two. Their wrestlers don’t burn out from being on the road almost everyday. And some would say that, unlike WWE, they actually seem to listen to what their fans want and give it to them. 

Speaking of that studio that TNA films at, that is also located in Orlando. Up until recently, TNA has filmed two weeks worth of shows on Mondays, and then aired them each Thursday. This week, however, they aired their first LIVE broadcast of their weekly iMPACT show. Now to bring Wrestlemania and the LIVE iMPACT broadcast together. Both are in Orlando, and with the Wrestlmania this Sunday, many WWE stars are already checking into their hotel — the same hotel that the TNA stars stay in. Vince McMahon, owner of the WWE, wants to keep his wrestlers away from the TNA talent, and in public would most likely deny that TNA is even a threat their company. The WWE stars feel a little different about the issue, and some of them ended up attending the LIVE iMPACT last night. In fact, WWE’s Robbie of the Highlanders tag team was pictured on the broadcast listed as his real name, Derek Graham-Couch, and that we was a WWE wrestler. Shortly after his camera apperance, he left the show, apparently because someone from WWE saw him there and called his cell phone telling him to leave. Two other WWE stars were also reported to be backstage.

This shows the cutthroat state that the business has evolved to. Before major TV deals, wrestlers were able to wrestle in different federations and do cross promotions. But not anymore. Vince has a goal of being the only federation in America and to also own all of the "little guys" to use as developmental territories.  Many fans, such as myself, watch both and would love to see a TNA wreslter face off against a WWE wrestler, but this just won’t happen. The WWE will not take the chance of having one of its stars losing to a TNA wrestler.  So it is a great irony that a sport/industry that is based on competition and conflict will actually choose to ignore the situation than to ever confront it.

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