Impact Wrestling: The AXS Era

Mitsunari · April 29, 2020

<div style="text-align:center;"><a href="<a href="https://letstalkcountrymusic.files.wordpress.com/2020/05/impact-x-division.jpg?w=200" rel="external nofollow">https://letstalkcountrymusic.files.wordpress.com/2020/05/impact-x-division.jpg?w=200"</a> target="_blank"><img src="<a href="https://letstalkcountrymusic.files.wordpress.com/2020/05/banner.jpg?w=1024" rel="external nofollow">https://letstalkcountrymusic.files.wordpress.com/2020/05/banner.jpg?w=1024"</a> border="0" alt=" photo Impact X-Division_zpsvgr65lcy.jpg"/></a>

Stars</div>

<div style="text-align:center;">Knockouts</div>

---------

<div style="text-align:center;">Impact Wrestling on AXS TV Trailer released

--------

Mitsunari · April 29, 2020

<blockquote class="imgur-embed-pub" lang="en" data-id="a/VPe6pBO"><a href="//imgur.com/a/VPe6pBO">Impact Plus 2</a></blockquote><script async src="//s.imgur.com/min/embed.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

IMPACT Plus is the ultimate IMPACT Wrestling experience! Find all the latest episodes of Impact Wrestling along with historic events all stored in one place. Subscribe today to get 30 days free trial of the service. Impact Plus is the only wrestling streaming service you need.

October 2019 Week 1: Impact Wrestling "Dissension Versus Everything"

October 2019 Week 2: Impact Wrestling "The X-Division Ace"

October 2019 Week 3: Impact Wrestling "The Go Home Showdown"

Mitsunari · April 29, 2020

Champions

<a href="

https://letstalkcountrymusic.files.wordpress.com/2020/05/impact-world.jpg?w=200" target="_blank"><img src="https://letstalkcountrymusic.files.wordpress.com/2020/05/impact-world.jpg?w=200" border="0" alt=" photo Impact World_zpsnhvhko9m.jpg"/></a>

Impact World Champion

Brian Cage

Impact World Tag Team Champion

The North

Ethan Page & Josh Alexander

Impact X-Division Champion

Jake Crist

Impact Knockouts Champion

Taya Valkyrie

Anyone know of any other decent photo hosting websites. Photobucket seems to watermark the images and don't really want to pay for hosting? Might need to make a new graphic or some up with another solution for this down the road.

Mitsunari · April 29, 2020

Diary Entries

Prologue

Diary Entry 1: Saturday 21st September… A brief History Lessons.

Diary Entry 2: Monday, 23rd September... Context is for Kings

Diary Entry 3: Tuesday, 24th September, The Bound for Glory Conundrum

Diary Entry 4:Thursday, 26th September, The Ultimate Opportunist

Diary Entry 5: Saturday, 28th September, Rumblings From the East

Chapter 1: The Great Wrestling Arms Race...

Diary Entry 6: Thursday, 4th October, Sucess and Failings

Diary Entry 7: Friday, 11th October, The Major League Coup.

Mitsunari · May 1, 2020

Prologue Part 1

Diary Entry 1: Saturday 21st September… A brief history lessons.

18 years ago, the Monday Night Wars ended. For years, the two biggest wrestling promotions on the planet battled it our for-TV ratings. Only one would survive this battle to the death. Now the war lives fondly in memories of the last great wrestling boom.

From the ashes of the war, new promotions rose. Hoping to challenge World Wrestling Entertainment and their dominance on the industry and they failed. Vince McMahons Empire was left unchallenged for most of the last two decades. During this period ratings dropped, and the wrestling industry fell into decline. This is until a new threat appeared from the far east.

New Japan Pro Wrestling became the hotbed for the pure wrestling fan. While WWE product was based around entertainment New Japan delivered a product based around hard-hitting combat and quality in-ring product. The promotion experienced unprecedented growth outside of Japan, creating new stars and establishing itself as the number two promotion. It is new stars that would become household names to wrestling fans and It here our story starts.

The Elite backed by billionaire Shahid Khan owner of Fulham FC and the Jacksonville Jaguars in January announced the formation of All Elite Wrestling and soon after secured a TV Deal, with TNT announcing their intention to go live every Wednesday Night.

AEW were not the only company make deals however, WWE announced plans for its Smackdown show to find a new home on Fox TV. While in a move to counter AEW, moved its NXT Brand to Wednesday nights. With shots fired from both companies, the new Wrestling War is set to being.

But what of TNA Wrestling? The promotion that once tried to go head to head with WWE itself. What was once classed as the number two wrestling company in the world, has slowly declined. Years of mismanagement has put the company in a financial mess. In an attempt to save themselves they took outside investment from Smashing Pumpkins star and wrestling fan Billy Corgan. He loaned the company money and was named president of Impact Ventures. All was fine until, Impact chairman Dixie Carter betrayed him, doing a deal with Anthem Sports & Entertainment Corp. Anthem would soon take full control of the company. Dixie Carter resigned as chairwoman after 14 years running to promotion.

Things did not go as planned for the new owners. They brought back the founder Jeff Jarrett who now owned the promotion Global Force Wrestling. 2017 saw an attempt to rebrand the promotion under the Global Force Wrestling banner. A merger that would fail and see the agreement terminated by October of the same year.

With its reputation destroyed and brand in tatters, the promotion dropped the TNA name. Now going under the name of Impact Wrestling. Anthem bought in Don Callis and Scott D’Amore to run the company, the rebuild begun and has been steady with Impact Wrestling having a good platform for its weekly TV show on Twitch and re-entering the agreement with Ohio Valley Wrestling as a development territory for the promotion.

In the Wrestling business, however, storm clouds are never far away from the horizon. This is where my role in the story begins. Just as Dixie pushed Corgan out from the company. Anthem quickly threw Don Callis and Scott D’Amore to the side. Why? Because it’s not only AEW and WWE who are making names on the national stage. On the 9th of September Anthem completed the purchase of AXS’s TV. A deal that would put Impact Wrestling into potentially 50 million homes.

With a new opportunity comes the possibility of new enemies. New Japan Pro-Wrestling home on American TV was on AXS. Anthem hoped to enter a working agreement between NJPW and Impact Wrestling in exchange for keeping the TV deal in place.

New Japan has never forgiven Impact management for how it used talent such as Okada while on loan to the company. The current IWGP champion was used as enhancement talent. Tetsuya Naito was treated much the same way. Some of the biggest stars in wrestling were mishandled by the promotion.

New Japan does not forgive or forget. The ownership might be different by New Japan refused the deal. Not wanting to work with Impact Wrestling and in response, Anthem terminated its TV contact. The number two wrestling promotion in the world suddenly founds itself without a TV deal in America. A blow in New Japans attempts to corner the American Market.

There is however another enemy much closers to home. For while Impact was busy rebuilding itself. TNA Wrestling former president Billy Corgan has been busy buying the National Wrestling Alliance brand. Now set to launch its weekly YouTube Show NWA: Power. Billy Corgan has stated he would new business with any promotion. He is happy for his talent to work anywhere the only prohibition is Impact Wrestling.

While not officially at war with either promotion. The hostilities between them are building and it could only be a matter of time before open warfare is declared. Meanwhile, other promotions such as Ring of Honor sit quietly it the background, waiting for take the brass ring of wrestling glory and other challenges lurk in the water as a recession is predicted for early 2020.

My job is to lead Impact Wrestling threw these turbulent times. The great wrestling arms race has ended. The next great wrestling war is set to being. I fear however this conflict will run much deeper and have many more casualties than the previous. October is the month wrestling will change forever.

Prologue Part 2

Diary Entry 2: Monday, 23rd September: Context is for Kings

So why the history lesson? Well, that just leads us to the next question. Why me? Putting the wrestling world into context goes a long way to answering that question. Unfortunately, I was too stupid to work it that answer out for myself.

I was a storyteller. Originally from England, I moved to Canada in my teens chasing a degree in media. I graduated and after releasing a few small projects, landed a job with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. The last 10 years were spent time writing on producing small TV and web-based programming.

While making a name for myself in the Ottawa area. I had always been a wrestling fan and outside of my work with CBC I helped with production on events for both Capital City Wrestling and Smash Wrestling. It is here I was introduced to Ed Nordholm and that led to me being hired to run creative.

Don Callis and Scott D’Amore they were both wrestling guys. They came with years of experience producing shows and didn’t like being told what to do. While the product was good and consistent. Behind the scenes, it wasn’t so rosy. Ed had his ideas and Callis and Scott had theirs. The problem was they did not always see eye to eye, and this led to friction backstage.

Ed Nordholm wanted someone who had a creative background in television. Someone that could trust to manage the show on screen. He wanted someone he could easily imprint his version for the product on. That where I came in. A relatively young man, with a well-received background in media that is not likely to question any orders from the top. Someone they could also easily remove if things did not work out as planned. He didn’t want a general leading the line. He wanted a cooperate yes man, too afraid to speak his own mind. The truth is, I didn’t have the experience or the respect to lead a locker room.

It didn’t take a genius to know I was out my depth. During the first few days, Ed set up conference calling between myself Callis and D’Amore. This was part of my climatization to the role. They were a lot of names I wasn’t familiar with. People like Jake Crist, who was he? And why did he hold one of our Championships? Questions like this sprung to mind. Callis and D’Amore seemed content in doing the minimum they could. The current product was built by them only to see Ed Nordholm push them out the door. As they wrapped up the last few weeks of television, I was sure they were content with watching me sink.

The reality had not dawned on me yet. I was on my own here. If Impact failed! if we lost in this upcoming war. Then my head would be on the chopping board. If It is a success, then Ed Nordholm would pat himself on the back and take the credit for my hiring. Like it or not it was a lose-lose situation I found myself in and sooner rather than later I would find this out the hard way.

landxx · May 1, 2020

Champions

<a href="
https://s1201.photobucket.com/user/Takehikomits/media/TEW2020/Impact%20World_zpsnhvhko9m.jpg.html" target="_blank"><img src="https://i1201.photobucket.com/albums/bb347/Takehikomits/TEW2020/Impact%20World_zpsnhvhko9m.jpg" border="0" alt=" photo Impact World_zpsnhvhko9m.jpg"/></a>

Impact World Champion

Brian Cage

<a href="https://s1201.photobucket.com/user/Takehikomits/media/TEW2020/Impact%20World%20Tag%20Team_zpsctzj2nwd.jpg.html" target="_blank"><img src="https://i1201.photobucket.com/albums/bb347/Takehikomits/TEW2020/Impact%20World%20Tag%20Team_zpsctzj2nwd.jpg" border="0" alt=" photo Impact World Tag Team_zpsctzj2nwd.jpg"/></a>

Impact World Tag Team Champion

The North
Ethan Page & Josh Alexander

<a href="https://s1201.photobucket.com/user/Takehikomits/media/TEW2020/Impact%20X-Division_zpsvgr65lcy.jpg.html" target="_blank"><img src="https://i1201.photobucket.com/albums/bb347/Takehikomits/TEW2020/Impact%20X-Division_zpsvgr65lcy.jpg" border="0" alt=" photo Impact X-Division_zpsvgr65lcy.jpg"/></a>

Impact X-Division Champion

Jake Crist

<a href="https://s1201.photobucket.com/user/Takehikomits/media/TEW2020/Impact%20Knockouts_zpseextvlzs.jpg.html" target="_blank"><img src="https://i1201.photobucket.com/albums/bb347/Takehikomits/TEW2020/Impact%20Knockouts_zpseextvlzs.jpg" border="0" alt=" photo Impact Knockouts_zpseextvlzs.jpg"/></a>

Impact Knockouts Champion

Taya Valkyrie

Anyone know of any other decent photo hosting websites. Photobucket seems to watermark the images and don't really want to pay for hosting? Might need to make a new graphic or some up with another solution for this down the road.

use Imgur.com for photos.

Nobby_McDonald · May 2, 2020

Very interesting back story Mitsunari. I'll be following this when it starts.

I used to use Photo bucket myself but immediately stopped when they made you pay and deleted all your uploads if you didn't. I use imgur.com now. I've never had an issue with them and prefer them to old photo bucket.

Mitsunari · May 2, 2020

Very interesting back story Mitsunari. I'll be following this when it starts.

I used to use Photo bucket myself but immediately stopped when they made you pay and deleted all your uploads if you didn't. I use imgur.com now. I've never had an issue with them and prefer them to old photo bucket.

Thanks, they are 5 parts of the back story to be released slowly over the next couple of weeks while we wait for the release. Including what the card for the first episode of Impact will be. Been testing the mod for a while and ran the show in the beta, after updating the month, last night as a test on the save so even now I'm pretty committed on that card for the first episode of impact. Be fun to hear peoples predictions when that's ready to be released sometime next week.

I have solved the image problem. Don't know why I didn't think of it sooner. I had a short term music blog, Letstalkcountrymusicuk.com. Not really posted in there in a while and its become abandoned but I'm still paying for the hosting so uploaded the images to there instead.

Mitsunari · May 4, 2020

<div style="text-align:center;">Prologue Part 3</div>

Diary Entry 3: Tuesday, 24th September, The Bound for Glory Conundrum

In the ideal circumstance, the first couple of shows on AXS TV would be run by Don Callis and Scott D’Amore. These were not, however, ideal circumstances, and this led to a problem. Bound for Glory was the biggest show of the year. Everything Callis and D’Amore had done over the past 12 months was building to this show. Only to have it taken away weeks before it was due to air on PPV.

I Tried calling them for advice. Hoping to get some insight on what they had planned for the PPV. Calls that fell on deaf ears. Looking back on it now could I blame them. This company was and this PPV #was their child. Given away to an outsider. Impact wrestling over the years had rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. These were just two more names to be added to that list.

Still it did leave us with an unfortunate problem. It wasn’t possible to continue with the original plans for Bound for Glory. I didn’t know what they were and Callis and D’Amore weren’t willing to share. The alternative was making massive last-minute alterations to the card, I had three weeks to basically rebuild the PPV from scratch. How would they feel about a relative unknown coming in and changing long term plans? The first show wasn’t far away. Our market department had already made up the poster for out first event. I would like to say I booked this show. The reality was Ed had put the card together without much input from myself. The matches for our AXS TV debut were locked in.

It had been less than a week since the announcement of my appointment. Only a few days away before the start of the month when I was too due to take control of creative. The guys back then were loyal, fiercely loyal to them. One high profile wrestler on the roster called Ed Nordholm the company CEO and the man that appointed me and threatened to walk out if he did not reconsider.

I barely knew Ed Nordholm at the time, but I did know he could be stubborn and did not like things not going his way. Was the decision to remove them the correct one? Maybe. Could it have been handled better? Certainly. In the ideal circumstances, I would have taken over the show after Bound for Glory. This, however, was less than ideal circumstances.

<div style="text-align:center;"><a href="<a href="https://letstalkcountrymusic.files.wordpress.com/2020/05/impact-wre.png?w=724" rel="external nofollow">https://letstalkcountrymusic.files.wordpress.com/2020/05/impact-wre.png?w=724"</a> target="_blank"><img src="<a href="https://letstalkcountrymusic.files.wordpress.com/2020/05/impact-wre.png?w=724" rel="external nofollow">https://letstalkcountrymusic.files.wordpress.com/2020/05/impact-wre.png?w=724"</a> border="0" alt=" photo Impact X-Division_zpsvgr65lcy.jpg"/></a></div>

((It will be a little while, but if anyone wants to have a go at predicting the results for the card feel free? Impact will be out pretty much as soon as the came hits in hopefully 10 days times.))

Nobby_McDonald · May 4, 2020

Callihan

OVE

Blanchard

Swann

Elgin

Interesting that your World champion is now Brain Cage.

Texasrangers13 · May 4, 2020

Very cool, been tinkering with a very similar concept and have always been a TNA/Impact fan.

Callihan

OVE

Blanchard

Austin

Edwards

Mitsunari · May 4, 2020

Interesting that your World champion is now Brain Cage.

Lol, someone in marketing must have misprinted the posters... XD Ed won't be happy with them when he finds outs.

Very cool, been tinkering with a very similar concept and have always been a TNA/Impact fan.

Thanks, October 2019 until now has been a very interesting time to be a wrestling fan. Well, pretty much the whole of 2019 really going back to the announcement of AEW. To quote Brian Zane from, Wrestling with Regret. An arms race between promotions heading into the end of September and then October. With AEW and NXT both starting to air on primetime TV. But then the Impact moves to AXS, the NWA announcing power.

New Japan Pro Wrestling making moves firstly buying Stardom and then announced the formation of a new American subsidiary of the company, named New Japan Pro-Wrestling of America. In reality, this happened at the end of the month but for fitting in with the world I've added them in to start as I didn't want to have to add them while in-game. But its was certainly a busy month in the wrestling industry with lots going on and lots of competition to sign talent and tie them down to written deals which has been going on all year.

tryker2710 · May 4, 2020

Van Dam

The Deaners

Blanchard

Swann

Elgin

In future would it be possible to get the match card in a text form to copy/paste? It saves having to scroll up and down to remember all the matches. Otherwise this is shaping up to be very interesting

Mitsunari · May 8, 2020

Prologue Part 4

Diary Entry 4:Thursday, 26th September, The Ultimate Opportunist

It could not have been more than a couple of days before I was due to take over from Don Callis and Scott D’Amore. Ed Nordholm and I were having our daily meeting over breakfast. My role was still unofficial at that point. Still, we would meet every morning and discuss the business. This was Ed’s way of making sure I was familiar with talent before taking over at the next show.

It’s here that the news broke in the wrestling media. “NWA appoint Scott D’Amore and Don Callis” I still remember the headline like it was clear as day and Ed’s reaction from hearing the news. It’s no secret that there was bad blood between Ed Nordholm and Billy Corgan. The news story read as followed.

‘The National Wrestling Alliance is due to enter a new era. Today we announce that NWA wrestling will be returning to your television screen. Our new weekly show NWA Power will be shown on demand on the NWA official Wrestling YouTube channel.

NWA Power is bringing back studio-style wrestling. As part of this new era, we are pleased to welcome Scott D’Amore and Don Callis to the creative team. These men are both vastly experienced in the wrestling industry. We look forward to having a long and successful partnership together’

We were both stunned. Was this planned? It was clear from the few meetings they did not like me. After the betrayal from Ed they liked him even less. Now it made sense the reason my calls fell on deaf ears. Billy Corgan had gotten the better off us.

---

((So it looks like the full release of the game will land next Thursday, so episode 1 should finally be out this time next week. In the meantime, we have one last little bit of prologue, adding the final touches on the world-building to come early next week. Then the diary starts properly from then.))

Mitsunari · May 14, 2020

Prologue Part 5

Diary Entry 5: Saturday 28th September... Rumblings from the east

For all his faults, and Ed had many of them, his major flaw was how he could rub people the wrong way. You don’t rise to top of an organisation like Anthem without being both ruthless and cunning. Ed had both characteristics, but he was also intelligent. For the most part anyway.

New Japan Pro Wrestling, they had established themselves as the undisputed number two promotion in the world. The fans were disenfranchised with the product us and WWE had been putting out. They went looking for an alternative and New Japan delivered. They experienced massive growth in an era the wrestling industry was on the decline. In the weeks leading up to me taking over Impact. I spent many nights locked in my hotel room. Watching how they presented and booked its stars. Hoping to learn from the blueprint they had laid down.

Ed saw the importance of allying ourselves with New Japan. If we could get the likes of Hiroshi Tanahashi, Kazuchika Okada and Tetsuya Naito on our programming. We could become the most talked-about show in wrestling. Despite All Elite Wrestling and NXT battling it out every Wednesday night. Ed well he was an ambitious guy. It’s a shame he rubbed people the wrong way.

While I was sat in my hotel room. Ed was meeting with representatives from Bushiroad, New Japans parent company. AXS TV was New Japans home in America. Ed offered a deal if you could call it that. We enter a working agreement or AXS TV drop New Japan programming. The Japanese are a proud people and they don’t take kindly to blackmail. I didn’t know this at the time but the rumour around the locker room was the representative from Bushiroad had Ed escorted from the building and put on the first flight back to Toronto.

See Ed wasn’t the only person with ambitions. New Japan had been making moves both on home soil and abroad. World of Stardom, yeah, I hadn’t heard of it either. They were a Joshi promotion based out of Tokyo. Still, the company was valuable enough for Bushiroad to buy it out. They wanted to dominate both the men’s and women’s scene on home soil.

Their ambitions didn’t end there. We both knew they wanted a piece of the action in North America and back home in England. They had mainly allied themselves with promotions like Ring of Honor and Rev-Pro Wrestling. That was going to last forever. They had dipped their toes in the water and then decided to jump straight in.

They didn’t just throw Ed back on that plane they followed him. He was still somewhere over the ocean when the news broke. New Japan announced the establishment of a US-based subsidiary, New Japan Pro-Wrestling of America to be based in California.

The Kings of Japan had a new goal in mind to become the number one company in America. Ed poked the bear and then lead it straight to me.

The End

And so the stage is set. New Japan of America looking to take over. An impending war between Impact and the NWA while WWE/NXT and AEW engage in an arms race while battling on Wednesday Night TV. Looking forward to getting some episodes done with this save Impact should be out by the weekend.

Mitsunari · May 16, 2020

https://www.youtube.com/embed/6oKuOSgaA-Y" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Super excited to finally get an episode of Impact Wrestling. Thank you for everyone that made predictions for the results. Hoping you all stick around for this wild and crazy ride.

Mitsunari · May 17, 2020

<div style="text-align:center;">Chapter 1</div>

October 3rd 2019: Success and Failings

I still remember the nerves before that first edition of Impact Wrestling. Ed had me flown down from Toronto on Monday and put up inside a hotel. The anxiety made it hard to sleep. Worries about what would happen tomorrow when I arrived for the creative meeting and put the show together. They were some decisions I had already made. The wrestler and the fans would just need to accept them.

The bound for Glory main event needed to change. Rob Dan Dam was the most popular person in the company. It made sense to hotshot him into the feud between Sami Callahan and Brian Cage. Brian and Sami were not keen on the idea at first but as it played out on TV they eventually started to warm.

Another problem we had was the Tag Team Division. The Division was very Heel heavy with only the Deaners and the Rascalz, neither which you could build a division around. We needed to bring in more talent. Make them the cornerstones of the division for the other to challenge.

In terms of the show, it seemed to go well. The feedback show drew a 0.46 TV rating with a total of 376,442 views. I am not really sure I could have called the show a success, but it was a start. With impact booked we could turn out attention to other matters. Improving the quality of the roster was paramount but who?

New Japan Pro Wrestling was on the move. Over the course of the first week, they had offered numerous contracts for exclusive written deals. The biggest signing being Alberto Del Patron, but their once allies Ring of Honor were also targeted. I’m not sure you would have called it a War, but it didn’t take long for hostility between ROH and NJPW to start as they raided the promotion for talent.

We were lucky as our roster was protected by exclusive written deals for the most part. However major talent such as Killer Kross and Brian Cage both had contracts expiring and it was critical we kept hold of our biggest talents. The first episode was done but there was a lot of work to do before our next episode…

Now if memory severs these were the matches we had booked for the next show.

---

Brian Cage VS Eddie Edwards

Taya Valkyrie VS Madison Rayne

Rhino VS Michael Elgin

The North VS The Rascalz

Ace Austin VS Rich Swann

Texasrangers13 · May 17, 2020

Nice first show, enjoyed your take on things and the presentation. I've really come around on Youtube diaries when they are done well and this one hits the mark. Nice to see. Looking forward to BFG.

Mitsunari · May 17, 2020

Nice first show, enjoyed your take on things and the presentation. I've really come around on Youtube diaries when they are done well and this one hits the mark. Nice to see. Looking forward to BFG.

Thanks, my idea for the Diary was Impact would be done in Video format. Then in the background, you would have the written entries that are kind of written from a perspective in the future, reflecting and shooting on the event that are happening in the game. Stuff such as hiring, booking decisions the behind the camera stuff.

You don't need to read the diary entries to enjoy it but they are there to add perspective to the stuff you do see on TV. Kind of like a companion piece.

Mitsunari · May 18, 2020

https://www.youtube.com/embed/3Y-p0deYsbg" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Episode 2 of the new era of Impact Wrestling has been released. The commentary could have been better as I get lost a few times. Still new to this video making stuff. Hope you all enjoy it, lots going on behind the camera as well so will have another written journal update coming soon.

Mitsunari · May 19, 2020

Chapter 1

Friday 11th October, The Major League Coup.

So how does one redefine themselves? People say to redefine yourself you must understand who currently are. Well, what was Impact Wrestling? That was something I was still learning. The roster was hungry for success, talented workers but lacked the star power the other major promotions had. To move the promotion forwards this was something I needed to change.

Matt Sydal, they were certainly some eyebrows raised when I suggested making that signing. Still, he ticked the boxes we were looking for. An older wrestler who has the experience and most of all some name power. Once we had him signed him putting him into the X-Division title picture was an east decision.

The next problem was the tag team division. Like with most of the roster we had talent but lacked a solid face team we could build the division around. They were a few names that came to mind. Ed and I went and talked it over for a few days. He was keen on bring in Enzo and Cass. I was not sold on the idea. While they added name value the flipside was the reputation, they had for trouble backstage. No the team I wanted to bring in was the Von Erich’s.

They were the type of team we could build a division around. They had wrestled for Impact Wrestling before of course. In was Slammiversary 2014. The show was in Texas and the Von Erich’s happened to be a household name. Ross and Marshall were brought in to wrestle due to this fact. Still, that was a long time ago and the Von Erich’s had gone on to make a name for themselves in Major League Wrestling. I told Ed that they were the future of our tag team division.

It didn’t take long for Ed to come around to the idea. He made a few calls to the Von Erich’s and sent over the contracts the same day. I told you Ed was ruthless. In a matter of hours, he had the Von Erich’s signed on the dotted line and just like that the owner of MLW was on the phone to me. You see Major League Wrestling had an agreement with us. This was carried over from when I took charge. By snipping the Von Erich’s that agreement was shattered. Still, I wasn’t hired to make friends. I was hired to run creative and ensure the product aligned to Ed and Anthem vision.

There was a cold war happening in the wrestling industry. While everyone was looking at AEW who had just won for the second straight week against NXT. Everyone else was making moves and if we were not aggressive, we would be left behind. Even if that meant on stepping on some toes along the way. The promotion wars would not stay cold for long.

Mitsunari · May 20, 2020

https://www.youtube.com/embed/Np7uN7F9kys" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Sign In

Impact Wrestling: The AXS Era

Recommended Posts

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Link to comment

Share on other sites

Join the conversation