Looking at the rating for TNA Impact
Vince Russo and the rest of the TNA creative team receive a lot of criticism from wrestling aficionados (including me), but perhaps we’re not so smart after all.
Last night’s episode of TNA Impact matched its highest rating by a doing a 1.3 for the third consecutive week and was watched by a company-record 1.9 million viewers.
I think it’s pretty safe to say that the rivalry between Kurt Angle and Sting is what is spiking the ratings. Whether the company is planning well for its future by building the show around forty-somethings remains to be seen, but there is no denying that the audience has grown significantly from where it was 8 to 10 months ago. Impact did either a 1.0 or 0.9 rating for 14 straights weeks from April 10 to July 10 last year.
While TNA has every right to feel good about the rising ratings, it is important to maintain perspective. ECW, which is WWE’s “C” show, has done five 1.4 ratings this year, including the past two weeks.
More importantly, the buy rates for TNA pay-per-views are at an all-time low, according to tnawrestlingnews.com. Growing the television audience is great, but increasing the number of people willing to pay to watch the product would be even greater.
Comments
Kevin Its not going too happen but (sports Entertainment) needs more companies. The one horse show Is old now If we could have WWE,TNA,and another company that would hepl the Industry.
Posted by: Donta | March 6, 2009 10:00 PM
History repeats itself. In WCW, the ratings went up during Russo's stint, but the buy rates went down.
Posted by: Christopher | March 6, 2009 10:10 PM
Whatever the cause of TNA's "jump" in the ratings , I know that I haven't contributed to it . I'll still call myself a TNA fan as long as Scott Steiner is there , but I haven't watched a complete show for months , and some weeks skipped it all together .
Posted by: the artist formerly known as jack in hebron | March 6, 2009 10:29 PM
I would remind you that WWE's buy rates have also taken a good dive. Maybe not as much as TNA, but it still stands that right now is not a good time for PPV numbers in wrestling. I do agree, though, that building younger stars should be WAAAAY more of a priority than it currently is in TNA.
Posted by: Mr. E | March 6, 2009 11:02 PM
All i hope is that TNA continues to increase in ratings... and we can see two huge wrestling companies not just one. I am so tried .. of WWE. It has become soooo predictable, There is no more stables or tag teams. Its just tuff to watch the WWE these days. At least with TNA you realy dont know whats going to happen next, whether you like it or not. TNA has more swerves.. WWe only has a handful. .
Posted by: Al Fromm Miami | March 7, 2009 9:39 AM
The fact ECW has done a 1.4 the last two weeks doesn't mean more people watched ECW than TNA.
Ratings are percentage, and more people watch TV on Thursday night than they do on Tuesday. So a 1.2 on Thursday sometimes beats a 1.4 on Tuesday.
Example: ECW did a 1.2 few weeks back with 1.3 mil viewers; TNA has done 1.2s with 1.7 million viewers. But they did 1.3 last week with 1.7 mil. It depends how many people watch TV in general on a given night.
So the fact that ECW did a 1.35 (1.4) this week, while getting a better rating than TNAs 1.32, it was most likely viewed by less people.
They’re pretty close in terms of the number of people watching the shows, maybe TNA has a slight edge as of late.
RESPONSE FROM KE: You're right, but I think within wrestling they pay more attention to the rating than the actual number of viewers.
Posted by: Saske | March 7, 2009 7:55 PM