Wow, TNA is Actually Becoming The Hogan Show!

Ever since Hulk Hogan took over as General Manager of Impact Wrestling several weeks ago, we haven't seen him as much on TV as I thought I would. However, when he is on, he does seem to dominate the show. I know that Hogan is one of the most famous wrestlers of all time; that doesn't mean I want to see him at every opportunity. Now Hogan wants to get his family in on the act as his daughter Brooke Hogan has joined the company to help develop the talent in the Knockouts Division.

My first thought was "What the Fuck?!?!" Brooke, while growing up round wrestlers, is NOT a wrestler herself. She is a singer who used to do the national anthem for the NHL team Tampa Bay Lightning and has had a reality TV show and a decent singing career since. According to TMZ, her main role will be helping the women in developing their characters and backstage promos. If she wants to help out with that, I don't really have a  problem with it. However, based on the advert that was shown on Spike TV recently, I think she might be involved in storylines as well.

I like it when you get children of wrestlers make it in professional wrestling. I also like it when they get to pay their dues on the way to the top. I don't think that memo got to Eric Bischoff and Hulk Hogan as they are using their backstage power to get their children jobs higher up than they deserve. In Bischoff's case, his son Garrett is wrestling, even though his moves are very basic, and he got a shot at the Television Championship last week.

I know I have mentioned this time and time again, but if TNA want to become a decent wrestling company, they need to rein in Hogan and Bischoff. They can't use their power to get their children important jobs in the company. I understand if they own the company, like Vince McMahon but they don't. I need to wiat and see, but I am slightly worried that this could lead to TNA being viewed as more of a joke than ever.

When did TNA Become the Hulk Hogan Show?

It's Impact Wrestling starring just Hulk Hogan

With work and Wrestlemania, I have only now managed to catch up with what’s happening with Impact since Victory Road and it seems to have all its focus on one man.

The Thursday after Victory Road, Sting decides to leave his position as General Manager and become a full time wrestler. He recommends to Dixie Carter that his replacement be Hulk Hogan. Yes, the same Hulk Hogan who had a similar position of power a couple of years ago who then went on to ally with Eric Bischoff to form Immortal. Hulk Hogan was offered the position and decided to make his decision next week. At the end of the following week’s Impact, Hogan finally accepted the position. This week, Hogan became General Manager and made a couple of matches for Lockdown, which prompted Ric Flair to think that Hogan was out of control. All throughout Impact, he is either featured on the show or mentioned six times. I mean, what the fuck?!

I understand that a change of General Manager, especially when it’s Hulk Hogan, is a big deal. It doesn’t need it to be the main story on the show. If you compare this to what is happening in the WWE, it’s not a big deal. John Laurinaitis (did you know he’s the Executive Vice President of Talent Relations and the General Manager of both RAW and Smackdown?) has just become the most powerful man in WWE after Vince McMahon. I agree that it is a big deal but is it the main focus of the show? No, it isn’t. TNA could have made this storyline go for just one episode. You could have Sting announce that he’s resigning as General Manager and he has already offered the position to a friend. Hogan comes out and convinces Dixie Carter to let him take the job. There you go, instead of spending 2 weeks about Hogan, it could be done in 5 minutes and you could spend the rest of the time on, I don’t know, developing other storylines.

TNA are going into one of their flagship PPVs this Sunday with the potential of a tremendous story going into it. James Storm is finally getting his rematch for the World Heavyweight Championship against his former Beer Money Inc partner Bobby Roode. This is a story about a person who was betrayed by his former partner not once but twice, who now has the chance to gain revenge in his home state of Tennessee. However, that’s not the main story. It’s Hulk Hogan once again feeding his ego at the expense of others. TNA has a talented group of wrestlers and it would be nice if they take a little bit of the focus that they have on Hogan and use it on their roster.

A Slap to the Face

In an earlier article, I wrote about what TNA will do with Bobby Roode after his Bound for Glory match with Kurt Angle for the TNA World Championship. If you haven’t read it (and you should because, not being biased, it’s a great article), the two options that I gave were for either Roode to continue on his quest and eventually become World Champion; or for Roode to go back to tag team wrestling with Beer Money Inc.

On the following Impact after Bound for Glory, TNA decided to go with a third option: completely fuck Bobby Roode over. I heard about this on Friday afternoon but I had to wait until Sunday to see how it went down.  With the company now back under the control of Dixie Carter, she appointed Sting to run the day to day operations of Impact. Kurt Angle came out to boast about cheating beating Roode, prompting Roode to come out. Sting made a match between Angle and Roode for later on that match. Unfortunately, that match was shot down almost instantly, as Angle pointed out that the contract for the match at Bound for Glory said that Roode could not get a rematch if he lost. James Storm came out and promptly challenged Angle instead, which Sting agreed to.

The match itself was a joke. It consisted of Angle continually beating the crap out of Storm in the corner and arguing with the referee. Angle put his arms in celebration, turns round and walks into a Last Call by Storm and he gets the pin becoming TNA Champion. It lasted less than 90 seconds. Understandably, the match couldn’t last long due to Angle’s injury, but I hate matches in which one man would be completely dominant and then have his opponent do just one move to win the match.

This makes no sense to me and I feel really sorry for Bobby Roode. The Bound for Glory Series took place over 3 months and when Roode won that, TNA had videos of him speaking about his family, his background and the match with Angle. I thought it would be crazy for TNA to do all that and then let Roode lose. Apparently, it was all set for Roode to become the TNA World Champion, but Hulk Hogan thought otherwise and it was changed at the last minute.

If I was Bobby Roode, who has been with the company for years, I would feel that it was a slap to the face. TNA had plenty of time to decide who was going to win the Bound for Glory Series and to see if that person would win the TNA World Championship. More importantly, Hulk Hogan had plenty of time to decide if Roode was ready or not. If Hogan thought Roode wasn’t ready, he should have told TNA a long time ago, and that way they could have arranged for someone else to win the Series. For that to happen to Roode, and then have his partner win the title a couple of days later, must be heartbreaking.

There’s no doubt that this will result in a feud between Roode and Storm. This could go one of two ways with one of them turning heel. You could have Roode slowly turning heel as he gets jealous over Storm being the champion; or you could have Storm turning heel by him becoming arrogant and saying that he doesn’t need Roode or his Fortune teammates any longer, perhaps developing his character away from the cowboy persona.

It might seem as if I’m shitting all over James Storm and I’m not. I’m interested to see how he will do as champion. However, the fact remains that Roode has been completely screwed over by one man. I don’t even get why Hogan did it as he didn’t do it in order to benefit him. Hogan, due to his success, has a massively overinflated ego, which has been damaging to other people (WCW being a prime example). If TNA want to become anywhere near as successful as WWE, they need to start building new stars and take risks. Hogan needs to realise that, otherwise TNA could end up like WCW.