CALDWELL'S TAKE CORNER CUBE WEDNESDAY 2/13: TNA's Toy Story rains on WWE's parade Feb 13, 2008 - 3:38:32 PM

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Updated throughout the day from the corner cubicle, Torch columnist James Caldwell's weekday blog focuses on hot topic current events and other items of interest from around wrestling.

Updated Wednesday, February 13

TNA quickly turned smiles upside down in WWE's offices this morning. WWE had a great Wednesday morning lined up, as they sent out a press release that Mattel - the number one toy company in the U.S. - had signed on as the company's official toy manufacturer starting in 2010.

It was expected to be a fitting transition for WWE's highly-successful licensing division after working under a strained relationship with Jakks that includes close to five years of legal fees, court procedures, and no end in sight for a lawsuit.

There have been plenty of issues between WWE and Jakks the past five years stemming from the various legal procedures. Jakks scored a victory in Federal court a few months ago, but WWE still has an outstanding lawsuit in Connecticut state court, which CEO Linda McMahon quickly pointed out in yesterday's conference call with investors.

Enter TNA. On the same Wednesday morning WWE was ecstatic to announce the Mattel partnership, TNA turned around and announced their new deal with none other than Jakks, starting in 2010.

It read like something straight out of the high school dating playbook. WWE dumped Jakks after a rocky relationship, and signed up with the prettiest trophy girl in school. But Jakks turned right around and announced a new dating relationship with WWE's most hated rival. You can almost picture Jakks fawning all over its new partner right in front of all the popular kids, trying to make WWE jealous.

This isn't the first shot from TNA directed at Titan Towers. Last week, Kurt Angle was running his mouth in the U.K. talking about their upcoming video game blowing anything WWE has done lately out of the water. There isn't an official date for the video game release just yet, but there will be plenty more to this story coming soon, I've been told.

But, mark down this date as the first time TNA got legit equal billing with WWE in stories from Reuters, Business Journal, and other mainstream media sources covering the two announcements. TNA is far, far, far away from equal billing with WWE in every category across the board - ratings, PPV, revenue, brand awareness, quality of TV show, marketing deals, etc. - but TNA got major points today in terms of perception in the marketplace.

For the last year, Kurt Angle has been talking about TNA eventually surpassing WWE as the number one pro wrestling company in the U.S. market. Angle has the credibility of Roger Clemens when it comes to half of what he says, but TNA is slowly picking up some steam in terms of public perception.

They're still a distant number two, but TNA's Toy Story on this day was taking another step in terms of growth and public awareness for their brand of pro wrestling, while stealing WWE's former significant other. Not bad for a Wednesday morning.

Updated Tuesday, February 12

5:00 p.m. I haven't had a chance to break down the WWE financial report today, but we'll have full analysis in the next Torch Newsletter. As for now, just scanning WWE's press release and .pdf presentation, one thing that jumps right off the page is the 49 percent increase in licensing revenue and 43 percent increase in profit for sales of toys and assorted merchandise apparel.

It's financial confirmation I of the anecdotal evidence I saw last week at the TV tapings that WWE's target demo is making a huge shift to kids. (Of course, adults buy action figures and t-shirts, but for the sake of argument, I'll assume these are kids dragging their parents to Toys-R-Us and K-B Toys, or parents buying toys, apparel, and action figures for their kids for Christmas.)

From WWE's presentation: "Domestic sales of toy and apparel, primarily action figures and t-shirts, were the primary drivers of the growth in licensing revenue." There's also the international market - WWE's next frontier - where toy and apparel sales were also strong. From the presentation: "International revenue increased more than 60 percent and accounted for $1.3 million of the year-over-year growth." With the entire Licensing division increasing $3.1 million over the 2006 fourth quarter, international sales made up 42 percent of that increase.

Kids everywhere are snapping up WWE's product right now. I'd say it's one of the top stories going forward this year, especially looking at how the age of the average TV viewer continues to get younger. Speaking of TV, last week, I wrote about WWE needing to find a way to partner with Disney in light of this kids movement. Even if it's not the broadcast home for Smackdown, there is a marketing relationship that could be cultivated to strengthen WWE's business going forward.

Torch reader A.A. Norman brought up a great point in an email today about The Rock fitting into the picture with the huge theatrical success ($106 million in ticket sales) of his "Game Plan" movie that was produced by Disney. Rock has been a crossover celebrity star for years, but his name is still associated with WWE. There's a partnership between WWE and Disney featuring The Rock just waiting to happen.

I'm also reminded of something Ted DiBiase mentioned on the "Cruise for a Cause" last June where Lex Luger, Nikita Koloff, and DiBiase were guest speakers. DiBiase talked about the real money-making movies these days being movies aimed at families, as those parents have disposable income to spend on their kids. (This was months before Rock's movie even came out.)

WWE has the stars and ownership of the pro wrestling market to generate ticket sales at theaters. The problem is their first three movies produced by WWE Films have been a horror flick and two action movies that missed the target demo. Last year, Vince McMahon even acknowledged the R-Rating for Steve Austin's movie was an error in judgment, as the kids couldn't even attend the movie. Yet, Cena's second movie, "12 Rounds" reads like another blow-'em-up action movie.

The demo is kids. The Rock drew big numbers at the box office doing a basic family movie with Disney's promotional machine in full force. WWE has the likes of Rey Mysterio and Hornswoggle (yes, even Hornswoggle) to draw numbers at the box office with good promotion aimed at the target kids demo. The financial report today shows where the money is coming from these days.

***

2:00 p.m. So, there's a Steve Austin DVD that came out today. Well, on my lunch break from the Cube, I ventured out to the hippest place in Houston, the Galleria Mall, to validate this. Apparently, retailers didn't get the memo (or the shipments).

First stop was FYE. Ya know, the retailer doing the boutique partnership with WWE to feature mini-shops for WWE products. Well, the mini-shop is still there against the back wall from the when I checked it out month ago. Only, it looks like no one had placed a finger on anything in the section for a month, as they're still featuring the Rey Mysterio DVD exactly like a month ago.

There were no Steve Austin DVDs. No posters. No signs. No ads. No banners. Wouldn't even know that WWE has a new DVD coming out today. So, I went to the register where the clerks said the DVD wasn't shipped to the store yet. They recommended going to Borders.

So, off to Borders. Nothing on the front display. Nothing on the shelves under "sports". I pulled up the DVD in the Borders in-store computer to reveal that the DVD "should be in store". Yes, should be in store. Only problem is they have exactly one DVD shown in the store, and this one DVD was received on Friday, Feb. 8. This led to a manhunt by two clerks to find this one DVD. It wasn't found, so it was either bought earlier or shelved in the wrong category.

I've seen reports of Wal-Mart having the DVD this past weekend, a few days ahead of the scheduled release date. So, let's get some feedback from you. Have you tried looking for the Austin DVD, and have you had any measure of success? Drop me a line.

***

11:40 a.m. Last night's Raw had the feel of the Raw before Backlash in April last year. The final sales pitch for both was a lengthy TV match featuring Shawn Michaels in a four-star-plus battle. Insert Jeff Hardy for John Cena this time around. The pattern held as far as timing goes. WWE had three weeks to sell Backlash following a major WrestleMania PPV. WWE had three weeks to sell No Way Out following a major Royal Rumble PPV.

So, instead of trying to hammer viewers over the head with storyline points from very basic three-week programs leading to No Way Out, WWE simply closed their books, put their pencils down, and let viewers enjoy a great wrestling match as a teaser for No Way Out.

Certainly, the logistical factor is that it was the second episode of a four-hour TV taping, with the first taping heavy on storylines. The writing crew would have been stretched very thin on ideas to book four hours of storyline-heavy TV. It still doesn't excuse JBL-Jericho being thrown out there with no pre-match build-up or explanation for why the Rumble re-match was occurring on free TV, though.

Extending out the Backlash analogy, last year's PPV did OK business. The problem is that it followed Mania, which costs $10 more, and PPV customers were getting the bill right at the time of deciding whether to order Backlash. WWE booked a very strong card for Backlash, as they have for No Way Out. There's a Cena-Orton WWE Title match, two Elimination Chambers, and Flair's career on the line. (By the way, Flair was money last night. Great to see that.)

But, does a stacked card matter? It didn't for Backlash. I don't think it will matter for No Way Out. I'm convinced the Rumble did very good numbers based on the hype, but customers are getting that cable bill and might not be willing to turn around three weeks later to spend another $40 on No Way Out.

WWE did the right thing, in that case, by simply presenting a good wrestling show last night. They weren't going to convince any more people to order the PPV who hadn't already made up their mind. For free TV viewers, the benefit was an outstanding wrestling match between Shawn Michaels and Jeff Hardy following outstanding promos by Cena, Flair, and, of course, the incomparable Santino Marella.

Updated Monday, February 11

Another month. Another over-booked TNA PPV getting in the way of solid effort from the wrestlers. There are moments of hope, then TNA suddenly pulls the carpet out from under the show with the usual batch of overbooked run-ins, interference, and inconsistent rule applications.

Thinking back on this show, I'm reminded of the best films of all-time, "Shawshank Redemption", which I re-watched on Saturday night. The plot is that Tim Robbins's character is in jail serving a life sentence for murder. Morgan Freeman is also serving a life sentence, which put him in prison years before Robbins ever walked in. After decades in prison, Robbins tries to convince Freeman that there is hope, but Freeman tells him that hope is a dangerous thing that drives men crazy.

That hope is what seemingly drives TNA viewers to Impact every Thursday night and 2 percent of those same viewers to the PPVs once-a-month on Sunday nights. Hope that there will be a great pro wrestling match in the middle of the densely populated thickets of overbooking. Hope that this will be the month that TNA tosses the book out and just lets the wrestlers tell the stories in the ring.

But, last night was another show with lost hope. Oh, there were signs of an escape from the bonds of over-booking, but it's merely false hope if you look at how TNA's PPV are in the exact same spot as three and four years ago.

At the end of Shawshank Redemption, Robbins's character escapes prison through a secret hole that he spent most of his jail sentence carefully manufacturing every night. But, to reach freedom, he had to maneuver through tons and tons of human waste down a tiny drain that pressed his face close to the waste. The symbolism is what made the movie, as Robbins finally maneuvered down the 500 yards to freedom and ended up on the other side, out of prison. Robbins had hope when Freeman didn't.

As it relates to TNA, the hope is that eventually TNA is going to push and pull and crawl and force their way down that escape hole and reach the end of that 500 yard tunnel to freedom. That, maybe there is light at the end of the tunnel. That, maybe TNA can take us through this stretch of bad booking and show us what 2008 pro wrestling can be about with a roster of very hungry and very good wrestlers.

But, TNA seems to be stuck in the tunnel. They can't go the extra 500 yards to the end of the tunnel. It's dangerous on the outside. It's dangerous to re-think 2008 pro wrestling instead of settling for the same bad booking that was a trademark of the dying days of WCW.

Every PPV keeps them stuck in neutral. They're in the same spot in the tunnel - surrounded by crappy booking. They keep looking back. Back to Memphis in the '70s. Back to ECW in the '90s. Back to WCW at the very end of the whole deal in the early 2000s.

Morgan Freeman's character was stuck in jail for decades. He gave up hope because it was easier to stay in prison where things made sense; where life on the outside as a civilian again was a scary thought. Right now, things make sense for TNA in their current time machine. They're comfortable booking from eras that died long ago.

But, TNA has all the personnel to promote shows that fit today's wrestling marketplace. The problem is they just can't turn away from the past and look forward to 2008 - to the end of the tunnel - where there is freedom from debilitating booking.

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