Can TNA Recover from a Year of Hogan-Bischoff?

If you ask around, then you might find that the general opinion is a resounding no. This October will mark a full year since Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff took the reigns of TNA and attempted to revolutionize the wrestling business. The only problem with that is not a a lot of people bought Hogan's crap 20 years ago and they're not buying it in 2010.

TNA Wrestling, or WCW 2010 as I have jokingly called it over the last year or so, has consistently spiraled down and I think it will honestly take a great deal to recover from that trend. Let's take a look at a few things that Hogan and Bischoff have done since their arrival that has sparked the downfall of TNA.

At the Genesis pay-per-view in January, Hogan completely abolished the six-sided ring. Immediately, fans in the iMPACT! Zone in Orlando started "We Want Six Sides!" chants before Hogan had the chance to even address the crowd. They brought back the traditional four-sided ring, which many feel set them apart from other organizations in the wrestling world. Hogan said that the six-sided ring had only gotten them so far and he was going to change things up. Well we see how well THAT worked.

Next, he made the announcement that most wrestling fans knew was coming. They made the announcement that TNA would be going live on Monday nights. That's all fine and well, but there's one little problem with that. World Wrestling Entertainment also runs on Monday nights. Hogan said he wanted to take Vince McMahon's audience piece by piece. I'm sorry, but didn't they try that in WCW? What happened there? Oh yeah, Vince bought WCW. See the trend here?

I've spent the last week looking through several of the TNA DVD's that were released while they were still associated with the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA). Back then, you barely had the million dollar names on the roster, like Hogan, Nash, Sting, Angle, and the long-time main event stars we have all watched over the last decade and beyond. Back in the early days, TNA focused on the thriving X-Division, which featured guys like AJ Styles, Samoa Joe, Christopher Daniels, and so many others. They brought an exciting and fresh dimension to wrestling. Their high-impact and fast-paced matches highlighted a positive trend for TNA and is something that is sorely missed. Even their tag team division has taken a powerful hit.

In the early days of TNA, you had America's Most Wanted, The New Church, Triple X, and The Naturals all blazing the tag-team division. Now, you have barely as many recognized or established teams and a revolving door of thrown together combinations that have not produced what the aforementioned teams brought to the fans in Nashville.

It seems TNA has gone from a two hour weekly pay-per-view, where nearly every match was a highlight and great action to now, where they spend the majority of the two-hour weekly show on Spike talking about the main event or setting up the next pay-per-view. And the X-Division and tag team divisions have been greatly depreciated.

And all of this in the view that Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff can't seem to get out of the spotlight for more than 10 seconds. It would appear that Hogan's sole mission is to destroy the WWE. And that is almost verbatim from his own mouth. I think Bischoff on his own is brilliant. But there is something about putting him with Hogan that brings out the absolute worst.

The original plan was that they would each sign a one-year deal with TNA Wrestling. At the end of that one-year deal, if Hogan and more importantly TNA President Dixie Carter didn't feel like they had improved the overall state of TNA, then he and Bischoff would leave. Two questions immediately come to mind.

First, what if Hogan and Bischoff decide to stay onboard for another six months, a year, or longer? What else are they going to do that will no doubt be highly criticized by the general wrestling media and fan base? In my opinion, he has nothing else left to achieve. He has managed to take total control in every place he has been, and he has garnered a great deal of heat and bad feelings as a result.

The second question, and more importantly is what happens if Hogan and Bischoff decide to walk away from TNA? I believe their contracts are up in October of this year, and this has a lot of people wondering what will happen when their contracts come up. What will it take for TNA to return to the prominence they had three or four years ago?

For me, their biggest downfall has been the signing of so many former WWE talents. If you look on the current roster, you have a laundry list of former talents from WWE and WCW. Hogan, Bischoff, Hall, Jarrett, Raven, Mick Foley, Kurt Angle, Mr. Anderson, Matt Morgan, and several others are just a remote list of people that TNA has signed to various contracts away from WWE and elsewhere.

At this point in the game, could they rely on producing more home-grown talent and less on multi-million dollar contracts for the established stars of years past? Or is TNA just a replica of the Titanic and just waiting on its own foreseeable fate? Only time will tell and I guess we'll all just have to strap in and see what happens. It will be a very interesting end to 2010, that much I can guarantee. For now, you can find out more on TNA and their stars by checking out their official website of TNAWrestling.com.