Warning: The following post contains MAJOR SPOILERS about Impact Wrestling and various TNA Championships and wrestlers.
During last week’s numerous Impact Wrestling tapings in Bethlehem, PA TNA did title switches for all of their titles. Bobby Roode became the new World Champion, James Storm and Abyss won the tag titles, Havok won the Knockouts title and then dropped it to Taryn Terrell, and Low Ki ended up with the X-Division Championship after Samoa Joe was “not medically clear” to compete.
The reason TNA made these shake-ups primarily has to do with their future on television. There are only a handful of stars still on guaranteed long-term contracts, all of whom will be grandfathered into any moves TNA makes to a new network.
Regardless of where TNA ends up – and there are at least four networks in the discussion right now, with no contract signed yet – the goal is to do a live taping at the Manhattan Center on January 7, which would be the first episode of Impact Wrestling after the Spike TV deal expires. With so many financial unknowns, the roster is essentially frozen and a lot of the talents worked the last set of tapings on a per-appearance pay system.
Essentially the company wanted to make sure the titles were on wrestlers who they knew would be appearing on the 1/7 taping. The Wolves have a short-term deal, Havok was brought in at a time when no one is getting new contracts, and while not much is known about Bobby Lashley’s status with TNA, Bobby Roode is signed through August of 2015.
