No More Primtetime for TNA, 11PM on Thursday

[Epitaph]

Source: Wrestling Observer


TNA's iMPACT! move to primetime in April is no more.

Jeff Jarrett apparently told the wrestlers are a pre-show meeting today at the tapings that Spike TV executives have changed their mind and will not be putting the show in a primetime slot.

The new timeslot starting on April 13th will be Thursdays at 11 p.m. This will follow the Ken Shamrock/Tito Ortiz season opener of Ultimate Fighter.

The change was made as Spike made the decision to move the Ultimate Fighter to 10 p.m on Thursdays.

Dave Meltzer reports that on 4/13, the line-up will be CSI at 8 p.m., UFC Unleashed at 9 p.m., Ultimate Fighter at 10 p.m. and TNA Impact at 11 p.m., which is the line-up that by far makes the most sense for everyone.

[Advocate]

no suprise. They have been pulling regular .7's lately, which is only .1 or .2 better than what Velocity was doing.

[mumbles]

velocity's rating amuses me because for the most part velocity is way above smackdown in quality.

and yeah, I will still be able to watch TNA, it won't affect me negitively. Thursday at ten is still better for me to watch then sat at ten. (i'm on central time).

[D-Dogg]

Here's an update on this:

Credit to TNAWrestlingNews.com


As reported yesterday, SpikeTV has decided to move TNA Impact to Thursdays at 11PM ET, not 9PM ET, starting 4/13. TNA initially reacted to the news negatively since they had their hearts set on a "prime time" slot. However, those in the know at TNA and SpikeTV feel that the show has a better chance of success in the short term and long term with the 11PM ET timeslot.

Spike made the decision largely because "CSI," set to be Impact's lead in initially, does not have a similar demographic as Impact and would thus force Impact to draw in its entire audience without any sort of lead in. UFC's demographic is almost identical to TNA's demographic and will provide Impact with a strong lead in in addition to the audience TNA brings in. Spike views TNA as a young show which does not have a defined audience and thus feels more comfortable giving the show a good lead in. Spike's new show, "Pros vs. Joes," drew a 1.3 rating (higher than any episode of Impact) for its debut episode largely due to the lead in it got from a UFC show. "The Ultimate Fighter" will air before Impact at 10PM ET and is expected to draw a rating between 1.5 and 2.0.

The other silver lining for TNA is that "The Ultimate Fighter" is a reality show that will air for 12 weeks. If Impact performs well at 11PM ET, Spike could move the show up to 10PM ET once "The Ultimate Fighter" ends and even give TNA the second hour they need and have the show run from 10PM ET to midnightET.

Yeah iMPACT! has been drawing not it's best rating's as of late, i believe Spike jumped on the Primetime move straight after the 1.1 rating but since then TNA have only had their average rating of .8 or lower infact i believe two weeks ago iMPACT! drew it's lowest combined rating ever when iMPACT! on saturday drew .7 and then iMPACT! on Monday drew .4 so yeah it doesn'r surprise me that Spike have pulled away from the Primetime slot.

I'm hoping it won't affect TNA too much, either way their getting a better slot and also the talks of a second hour is encouraging. I think a TNA will eventually recieve a Primetime slot most likely once Sting returns full and now that they can advertise Steiner as well it is more then likely that TNA will find some of those old WCW fans who never made the jump to WWE.

Even though the Primetime slot would of been good for TNA had they failed they could of been sent back to Saturday and they have more chance failing at 9pm then they do at 11pm so still hopes are high for TNA.