TNA - No star is bigger than the company/ A look at age.

“TNA brought in two rock stars, and look at the company now! Dixie often points out how hiring Jeff Hardy and RVD started a whole new era, why do some of the wrestlers not see it? Too, young, too green, too selfish to have the correct perspective. Whereas some of the TNA "stars" are lucky to get recognized walking around the studios, Jeff and myself live like actual celebrities, signing autographs and taking pictures EVERYWHERE we go.” "This is a very exciting time. More people watching TNA means more people exposed to the other wrestlers on the card too...as long as they're good enough to hang around with the rising standards."

"Now I'm a bigger star than the company actually because TNA doesn’t have the name brand recognition yet."

These are two comments from the one and only Rob Van Dam… (or RDV… if you’re TNA t-shirt designers)

I absolutely 100% couldn’t believe my eyes when I read that interview. Rob Van Dam is a part of my top 10 favourite wrestlers, but is his ego that big that he has to go around saying things like that? It’s probably the weed talking to be honest. Either way, that’s a great way to fucking bury the company Rob.

Chris Jericho has said time and time again that TNA will NEVER be competitive with WWE until it BELIEVES it is the number one company. If you mention/take shots at WWE on Impact… that makes you look secondary. If you involve WWE Hall of Fame rings in storylines… that makes you look secondary. If a wrestler believes they are bigger than the company they’re in and the rest of it’s roster… guess what? That makes you look secondary. Hell, it makes you look terrible.

If RVD mouthed off like this in WWE, he’d be seriously de-pushed or perhaps even fired. Being TNA, they wont do a thing. They haven’t even fired Jeff Hardy for the Against All Odds debacle.

Rob Van Dam has lost a ton of my respect.

In addition, Hulk Hogan claimed on twitter a few days ago that he would hire ‘Macho Man’ Randy Savage ‘as part of creative, if he could.’ Really Hogan? Really? You just know that he’d step back into the ring eventually and we’d get another addition to the catalogue of wrestlers that won’t grow old gracefully in TNA. TNA love to re-hash the past, they could put on Hogan vs Savage from Wrestlemania 5 in 1989 if they wanted.

Think about it for a second, we’d have Hogan (57), Savage (58), Bischoff (55), Flair (62) and the TNA champion Sting (52) all in top spots in TNA. The key demographic that TNA are going for is of course the 16-35 year olds. How the fuck are we supposed to relate to these guys that are old enough to be our parents or grand parents?

Looking deeper into the roster you’ve got Kurt Angle (42), Jeff Jarrett (43), Scott Steiner (48), RVD/Christopher Daniels (40), Mick Foley (45), Hernandez (38), Abyss (37) and Doug Williams (38). Matt Hardy is 36…

I would love to ask Dixie Carter how she expects to build a wrestling company with guys who aren’t even in their key demographic age bracket. Any poster you see for TNA has Hogan, Flair or Sting front and centre, hardly the faces you want for an edgy and vibrant youth product.

TNA’s main event should be propped up by AJ Styles, Samoa Joe and The Pope (32), Jay Lethal (25), Eric Young (31), Matt Morgan (34), Beer Money (34-35), Kazarian (32), Motor City, (27 & 29) along with Mr Anderson (35)… THESE should be your guys TNA with SUPPORT from some of the guys mentioned above.

Instead we get the old guys front and centre with support from the younger guys.

This brings me back to my original point. RVD claims he is bigger than TNA, Hogan claims in his autobiography that anyone looking to make it big needs “titan training.” In other words, Hogan is of the opinion that anyone who has not been successful in the WWE cannot main event a company, Sting being the exception. He apparently still thinks this way.

I’m of the opinion that if TNA doesn’t bring these guys to the forefront and try to build themselves as the ‘new generation’ of wrestling… they’ll be out of business by 2012.

I’ll be watching Lockdown, it’s usually a decent pay per view (especially in TNA’s early days) and I think they’ll be a couple of good matches. I’m just not looking forward to Ric Flair continue to embarrass himself and blade within 30 seconds of his match starting.