Storm’s Title Run Says Something About TNA

When a wrestling promotion makes the decision to put a title around your waist for the first time, it’s a risk.

Sometimes it’s a calculated one. Usually, performers have been pushed and built-up to the point where the audience knows it’s just a matter of time till they win gold. The initial title runs of performers the likes of Stone Cold Steve Austin, Goldberg and John Cena were can’t miss opportunities WCW and the WWE used to make the most of these performers surging popularity.

Sometimes, a push is done so well over time that fans yearn to see gold around someone’s waist. For example, Tommy Dreamer’s first ECW title victory was an incredibly short one, but one that fans of that company begged for, for nearly a half decade.

If these situations sound different from the way TNA does business, it’s because it is.

Neither one of these situations is the case for new TNA Champion James Storm.

With no push or even mention or indication to his possible rise through the ranks, he beat Kurt Angle for the TNA World Title. For a company already in a huge hole, putting the strap on anyone is a huge move, but one with no success as a singles competitor as well, is a statement.

Can it work? Of course. Stranger things have happened before and the business of professional wrestling is a strange one built on new ideas and pushing the envelope. But for a company that bills itself on having the best wrestlers in the world and not doing much of anything resembling wrestling on their signature program over the past few weeks, you’d think TNA would play it safe and win back their fans before they did something so brash.

What this says is that TNA acknowledges Storm’s hard work as one of the best tag team performers of this generation, that his contributions to the sport mean something. While this is indeed the case, as aside from Angle and AJ Styles, he’s the best best worker TNA has, it figures that the lazy and quick to try something else creative team in TNA would do the rash thing, rather than the smart thing.

That’s not to say that Storm would never have been the type of singles performer that could hold a World Title, but now we’ll never know, right? It would have been a much easier decision to make had Storm at least won the TV title or had a couple of singles matches where he dominated and showed the fans his routine. At this point, it’s a safe assumption to make that no one aside from TNA diehards even know what Storm’s finishing move is. That’s not how you market, promote or introduce a new World champion.

In the end, that’s TNA’s biggest problem. While they should be applauded for breaking rules and challenging the fans concepts of who a champion in their company is, it doesn’t mean they’ll make any money or draw a higher rating this way. So while TNA loyalists feel this could be a changing of the company’s guard, it could just be another terrible decision, made by a company that seems to be making them at nauseam the past few years.

For a company desperately trying to make its own luck, it may have a lot to be sorry about over the next few weeks.