2019--The Year That Wrestling Was Reborn

Just a few months ago I was not alone in the thought process that wrestling as we knew it was dead. Thanks to the stagnation of a company that so many of us grew up on and supported over the years, there wasn't much to be excited about. Everything from the storylines to the shows themselves have been formulaic for years if not decades. An alternative has been long overdue. While there have been other options in recent years, over the past month two new entities have given wrestling fans hope in what can only be described as a true rebirth of the squared circle.

For over a year die hard and casual fans alike have been abuzz over the company that would become All Elite Wrestling. The promotion, led most visibly by Cody Rhodes, has managed to ostensibly pick up where WCW Nitro left off on TNT nearly two decades ago. With an underlying theme of giving the fans what they yearn for in a wrestling promotion, Rhodes, The Young Bucks, and Kenny Omega are leading a band of relatively young talent who are tearing up rings on both cable and YouTube. Peppered with veterans like Chris Jericho, Dustin Rhodes, and Jake Hager (the former Jack Swagger), the company has enough name value to attract fans who don't necessarily follow the indy scene and its darlings.

Attending their fourth television taping in Pittsburgh, I was pleased to see that the atmosphere was completely different from similar events held by WWE in the past umpteen years. Fans were engaged throughout the show with very few backstage skits for the live crowd to be bored by. With a few exceptions, each individual character seemed to be someone that the audience was invested in. Perhaps the latter two dark matches (all of which air on AEW Dark, a YouTube program) were out of place in terms of match order, but I can't imagine that any fan left feeling ripped off.

While I enjoy AEW, I feel that more variety is needed on their roster. There's a place for "flippy" wrestling, but at this point there's just too much of it from match to match. This critique brings me to what is my current favorite wrestling program, NWA Powerrr. The brainchild of current NWA owner Billy Corgan, NWA Powerrr is a weekly one hour studio wrestling program in the grand tradition before the sport moved completely to arenas. The first taping occurred over two nights with about eight weeks worth of shows completed. Those shows air for free viewing on YouTube.

I'm not only biased towards NWA Powerrr due to the classic format, but I truly enjoy the variety of talent presented as well. Up and comers are coupled with guys like current NWA World Heavyweight Champion Nick Aldis, Cowboy James Storm, Aron Stevens (the former Damien Sandow), Trevor Murdoch, and Ken Anderson. All of the names that I just mentioned are men who never quite seemed to get their due previously on the national scene. They thrive here, drudging up memories of stars from the '70s and '80s who once plied their trade in very similar studios. Sure there's a lot of jaw-jacking going on, but it helps to invest you into the issues that these stars are fighting over. These aren't silly skits over stolen wives and high school boyfriend-girlfriend drama. These are issues over being the best in the business, aka winning championships and having integrity.

Due to the length of the episodes, NWA Powerrr keeps you wanting just a bit more as the classic wrestling television shows did. Seeing as that the promotion will be looking to pay-per-view buy rates for success, this is exactly what they need to do. Along with AEW, so far there has been little presented to insult the viewers intelligence. I'm not ashamed to suggest trying either program to lapsed fans. That's something that I haven't been able to say in a long while. As far as AEW goes, who doesn't want to give it a try once they find out that Tony Schiavone is back in the fold? Speaking of the former voice of WCW, he may just be the MVP of the professional wrestling world in 2019. Who would've imagined that?

Is WWE dead? Not by a long shot. Due to SmackDown moving to Fox and a general feeling of the beginning of a new era, I tuned into both that program as well as Raw for the first time in two years. I have to say that neither program is truly for me anymore, but that may not be the same for everyone. NXT remains a fun product, though it still has the looming overproduced feeling of WWE. Regardless, the company as a whole is home to many amazing talents who deserve admiration and support. WWE also has the best female roster going which really shouldn't be a surprise due to the immense size of the company.

The talent throughout the entire wrestling world is a huge part of what makes this new era so exciting. One of the biggest thrills of being a wrestling fan when there were different viable options promotion-wise was to see where the stars would end up next. We now have chances for those "what ifs" to happen again. It's truly an exciting time and a throwback in every sense of the word.

And how about merchandise? So far we have a lot of t-shirts. There are also a lot of enamel pins, the coolest two being that of the NWA World and National Heavyweight Titles. Certainly with all of the national buzz I see an action figure deal coming for AEW sooner than later. With its unique format, it's a bit more difficult to see what lies ahead in memorabilia as far as NWA Powerrr, but my mind runs wild at the thought. If ECW could have a toy line, so can the little studio wrestling show that could!

I am positively energized as a wrestling fan. That is a sentence I could not have imagined typing just a few short months ago. There truly is something for everyone out there now. From AEW and the NWA to WWE and all of its many brands. MLW is making headway and Impact Wrestling is still chugging along as what almost seems to be an island of misfit toys. ROH is still running, though with considerably less buzz, and I have a feeling that NJPW is about to challenge AEW by diving even further into the American market. And hey, don't forget about lucha libre!

Now, if we only had time to watch it all...

Glory: The Last Hurrah Of TNA Trading Cards?

You may recall that I wasn't exactly pleased with the last series of TNA trading cards from Tristar.  The design and feel all seemed very rehashed.  To be fair, it's a rut that the Topps WWE trading cards have fell into more than once, so in no way is the blandness confined to one company.  Around the time that I reviewed that set, Tristar announced that their next set, TNA Glory, would contain "On-Card" autographs.  For many collectors, especially those focused exclusively on cards, this was great news.

Most autographed cards from the majority of sports and manufacturers in the past decade or so have utilized stickers.  The talents autograph the clear stickers which are later attached to the cards by the manufacturer.  It's an easier way for the cards to be autographed by stars who are often hard to pin down.  I prefer obtaining my own autographs, but many card collectors will only accept the signed cards that are inserted into the packs and boxes into their collections.  Although it takes a great deal of the personal feel out of collecting, it's still a lot of fun to pull these cards.

With each Tristar TNA product, retailers that actually sell the cards seem to grow fewer and fewer.  Target and many local card dealers do not carry the line anymore despite still being listed on the Tristar site.  For most collectors, buying a hobby box has become the best way to collect the new TNA sets.  With the past few sets, buying a box has insured that you will collect a full base set of cards and obtain a number of "hits" that include various forms of autograph, limited, and relic cards.

TNA Glory once again promises greatness right on the box.  3 autographed cards are guaranteed, with at least one promised to be one of the new "On-Card" autographs and another card featuring multiple signatures.  Also promised is an authentic Slammiversary 2013 autographed ring mat card or a TNA event-worn clothing card.  I think anyone would prefer the autographed mat in this instance. 

Unlike last time where my pulls were rather lackluster, I was pleasantly surprised.  While it didn't compare to my Hulk Hogan and Sting pulls of the past, anytime you end up with five autographs from a box, it's a good day.  Especially when four of those autographs are from female stars.  The female autographs will almost always be more desired by collectors in the same respect that ex-Knockouts and Divas always do well on the autograph convention circuit.  Whether it's a matter of taste or a sign of some lonely days and nights on the behalf of the collectors, I'll leave for you to decide.

The on-card autographs really do look nice, especially since a blank area was left on the card for the star to sign.  James Storm and Christy Hemme are a good, middle-of-the-road, pair of on-cards to pull, and definitely trump what could've been...see Rockstar Spud.  The double autograph, a dual signed card of Gail Kim and Velvet Sky, is another one that any fan would be pleased with.  These autographs also feature different color foil designs.  Some collectors have been known to try and track down all of one color for sets.

My favorite pull is the Slammiversary 2013 autographed ring mat card.  Taryn Terrell, formerly WWE Diva Tiffany, was the signature and photo on my particular pull.  The card is very thick, and features a large piece of mat to fit the full signature on.  Seeing as that Terrell defeated Gail Kim in a highly touted match that evening makes the card all the cooler.  It certainly beats the days when relics would be inserted into a card and have little or nothing to do with the talent depicted.

The base set consists of 99 cards.  I'm a much bigger fan of this design than the previous set, and the All-American colors remind me very much of what a Great American Bash trading card set may have looked like.  Hogan, Sting, Jeff Hardy, AJ Styles, Kurt Angle, and the Knockouts are all here, as are King Mo, Rampage Jackson, and Tito Ortiz.  The final ten cards are Jeff Hardy art cards that form a mural of sorts when put together.  If Hardy's "Imag-i-nation" gimmick of the past is your thing, these are the cards for you.  The old Topps "sticker back" puzzle pieces these are not.

As always there are countless color parallels as mentioned above as well as other limited cards such as Sam Shaw-drawn caricatures.  Also as mentioned above, you once again pull a full 99 card base set among the twenty packs in the box.  This is a really nice feature that makes buying a box all the more worth it.  A base set itself will usually set a collector back between $15-$20, so in general it's more economical to just buy a box.

I'm much more satisfied with Glory than I was with Live.  I'll admit that it's partially because I obtained better hits this time around, but the fact that there were better guaranteed hits to begin with helped as well.  The design and photo choices are also a factor.  I am concerned for future releases due to changes in TNA.  With Hogan and Sting no longer in the company, the desirability of buying boxes for hits is going to diminish greatly.  Any autograph is nice to have, but the rest of the roster is extremely accessible for autographs in person.  Only the card collectors that demand "authentic" autographs are really going to want endless Bobby Roode autograph hits, and even those collectors are often driven by value.  Hogan and Sting were the reasons for the high secondary market prices of TNA autograph cards that Tristar so often brags about in press materials.  With those two legends gone, it's hard to predict the future of TNA trading cards.  "Cut" autographs of wrestling legends that are purchased by the company and inserted into cards is one avenue that could be explored, but that's purely my own idea.  As with most things TNA-related in 2014, time will tell...