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Interview Recap of Jeff Jarrett on Between The Ropes

Posted: Jun 16th 2006 By: mikeiles

Between The Ropes
Wednesday, June 14, 2006
Central Florida's Sports Radio
AM 740 The Team
Simulcast online at
www.BetweenTheRopes.com

On Wednesday night, June 14, former NWA Champion and TNA co-owner Jeff Jarrett joined hosts Brian Fritz and Vito DeNucci (with Dickerman on vacation) live on Between The Ropes on Central Florida's Sports Radio 740 The Team to offer the state of the union on TNA and discuss the future of the company heading into its fifth year.

Don't forget that Between The Ropes and ECW Press will release the brand new book, Between The Ropes: Wrestling's Greatest Triumphs and Failures, the week of June 26. For more information and details on how to order beginning next week, visit BetweenTheRopes.com.

Jarrett opened with essentially a state of the union address on TNA Wrestling on the eve of its fourth anniversary event. He put over the relationship with Spike TV in the last year. He said there are several new shows in development at Spike and TNA is being given consideration there. Spike will be producing a "Women of Spike TV" special to air later in the year and several TNA knockouts will be featured, which will be filmed this weekend. Jarrett said international television distribution continues to grow, including programming now in Korea and soon in Italy. He said the TNA video game with Midway Games is in development. New actions figures are on the way, including a 'Masked Fury' line with Sting, Abyss, and Shark Boy where you get an action figure and a mask. Live events are picking up and he expects touring to open up more in the fall.

The talk shifted to the Impact television program. Asked specifically if losing The Ultimate Fighter as its lead-in would hurt Impact, Jarrett responded, "I'd be foolish to say it's not going to have any effect. The UFC and the TNA audience do have somewhat of a crossover, but not entirely. I think as the weeks and months go on, we're getting our core audience just like Ultimate Fighter had their core audience. When Ultimate Fighter followed Raw, I think they did roughly one-fourth of the numbers of Raw. Raw delivered a great demo and delivered them great numbers, but they didn't hold close to all of those viewers. But it was definitely a great launching pad for the program and it got it in front of plenty of eyeballs. UFC is not for everyone. Wrestling is not for everyone. But wrestling, throughout its history, has appealed more to the masses much more so than a UFC type program. We're continuing to grow every step of the way on that."

When asked about plans to move TNA pay-per-views out of Orlando, Jarrett stated they are very close to making an announcement on the first step of taking the PPV's on the road. He said that recent house shows in Detroit, Philadelphia, and Wayne, NJ have him confident that wrestling fans are ready to see TNA tour. He said touring for TNA will pick up significantly in the fourth quarter of the year.

Jarrett was asked about Rhino's recent decision to turn down WWE and stay with TNA. "I think actions obviously speak louder than words. Rhino said some words after that match [last Friday in Philadelphia] that you could tell were very heartfelt. In short, my view is Rhino didn't want to go relive the past. That was a part of his life that he learned an awful lot, was given a great opportunity. I think he took advantage of that opportunity. But not all of his memories of that past were pleasant. I think he weighed the options. I think the actions speak louder than words. The proof is in the pudding. He absolutely knew that TNA was his best opportunity, where he wanted to be, where he wanted to make his home, and felt it was the best for him. I certainly have got to agree with him."

The discussion shifted to TNA's identity as a wrestling promotion, particularly off Paul Heyman's recent comments in the Miami Herald where stated TNA was not even a consideration to anyone in the wrestling industry and the company has failed to brand itself as anything but scorned WWE castoffs. After being read the quote, Jarrett shot back, "Paul's being Paul. I knew Paul when he first came to Tennessee years and years ago. He literally idolized Eddie Gilbert, Tommy Rich, Austin Idol, Jerry Lawler and he's carried that with him since the day he left Tennessee. Paul is a guy that just needs to worry about Paul. He's got a lot on his hands right. Vince McMahon is running ECW. He's gonna run the show up there. Re-quote the first part of the quote because Paul needs to really worry about Paul because I don't think Paul has a clue what he's talking about when he talks about TNA...[after the quote is re-read]...It's not a consideration to anyone in this industry? Go ask Rhino that. Is Rhino not in the industry? And if we're not a consideration, it sort of boggles my mind that every opportunity WWE gets to file off any kind of legal letter, they do. It's truly a David vs. Goliath story. That's their prerogative. That's how Vince McMahon does business and he has all of his guys that work for him with that mentality. Vince is very successful. He's going to make ECW successful in spite of Paul."

Asked if he saw the debut of ECW on Sci-Fi, Jarrett said he has seen only the opening segment and the girl dancing so far. He didn't see The Zombie's promo, but "I've heard some impersonations. Some guys that were actually on that show or part of that show called and left me some pretty entertaining voicemails impersonating that interview. I guess there wasn't much to that interview."

Jarrett closed by putting over Samoa Joe and his success in his first year with TNA. He plugged that Impact will air on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday this week on Spike TV. This Sunday will be the Slammiversary pay-per-view featuring the King of the Mountain match for the NWA Title. For full details on everything, check out TNAWrestling.com.

To listen to the Jeff Jarrett interview and the entire June 14 edition of Between The Ropes in streaming audio or to download the full show in MP3 format to listen to on your iPod or MP3 player, visit the show online at http://www.BetweenTheRopes.com. Don't forget that Between The Ropes: Wrestling's Greatest Triumphs and Failures will be available in book stores the week of June 26. Details on how to order are available on BetweenTheRopes.com. Join us for Between The Ropes for two hours every Wednesday night at 10:00pm ET on Central Florida's Sports Radio 740 The Team and worldwide on BetweenTheRopes.com.

Credit: Steve Gerweck & Gerweck.net