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Right now, it has been announced that TNA will have a show on January 4th, which is a Monday.  I'm probably not the only one that doesn't think moving their show is a mistake.  Apparently, people want to see a Monday Night ratings war again to heat up competition.  However, I think this is a major mistake by TNA management to try to garner more interest with Hulk Hogan's arrival.

The first issue in moving to Monday night is that some of their fans, who are attuned to TNA on Thursday nights, will probably miss the announcement for one reason or another.  More than anything, this is a huge mistake and undersight by TNA management.  The only way to compensate for potentially missing viewers is to heavily advertise on the USA Network to create more brand awareness.  Obviously, that's not going to go very far.

Second, when WCW initially moved to Monday nights to counter Raw, there was some legitimately good business reasons for Nitro to take that slot.  During that period, Raw was taped so the live Nitro show had a clear advantag in being able to spoil the taped results.  Also, this was prior to the massive growth of the internet, so the formula for occasionally spoiling Raw would work (although it did also provide some free advertising).  Along with that, Nitro would be able to counter each taped segment, since they could pre-plan the live TV show against a known quantity.

Third, and this is the critical point, TNA has a far inferior product than the WWE at this point in terms of name recognition.  TNA has done all it can by signing big name former WWE superstars (except Austin and The Rock).  However, their ratings have remained stagnant over the course of a year, clearly demonstrating that these names have provided little more value at this point.  The primary problem, as everyone has stated, is that TNA has done a poor job in building up a real sense of a brand.  Everyone knows that their method of competition is to copy what WWE is doing.  At this point, TNA could, for all intents and purposes, be a metaphysical extension of the WWE.

The problem does not exist with the talent.  TNA does have an excellent group of workers and they are clearly not at fault for the decisions of the management in TNA.  TNA does not have an issue with their core fans.  The issue has always been the booking strategies and definition of being the "alternative" wrestling show.

TNA is not an alternative when you compare WWE side-by-side.  Instead, they run parallel by near similar presentations.  That is, TNA emphasizes the dramatic aspects with too much talk and less action, which is what TNA was supposed to strive against.  What action does take place is actually better in some cases because the talent in TNA can often times outperform many of the wrestlers in the WWE, when it comes to pure athleticism.  However, the incessant emphasis on non-stop verbage de-emphasizes what wrestlers can do.

Instead, quite often TNA ends up doing more bad comedy than anything.  Unfortunately, in an environment in which mainstream media takes a condescending eye, bad comedy simply hurts the product.  Bad comedy only seems to satisfy insiders and nothing else.  WWE can get away with bad comedy because they embrace the notion that they are entertainment, with an emphasis on athletic abilities.  TNA is supposed to be action, so bad comedy adds nothing to the product.

Regardless, more than likely TNA will see neither growth nor that much of a fall by moving their show.  Unfortunately, the management will fail to understand, once again, why their numbers will continue to stagnate.  I am not condoning TNA as a company; everyone wants to see them succeed.  However, their methodology in thinking that they have enough as a rival is mind boggling.  They must realize that they have clear faults and need to address them asap for the company to be able to compete effectively.