What does the low rating for iMPACT really mean?

"Last night's episode of TNA Impact averaged a 0.93 rating, which was down from last week's basement-level 0.96 rating and the lowest rating since the August 14, 2008 episode averaged a 0.87 rating.

The TV ratings trend for the Sept. 3 episode at least showed a nice pattern of building toward the peak quarter-hour rating at the end of the show.

This week's show, up against the NFL's opening game, peaked in the third quarter-hour with a 0.97 rating and finished with 0.87 and 0.92 quarter-hour ratings in the final 30 minutes."

Source: www.TNAinsider.com

Let's try to keep a lid on the knee jerk predictions of doom and gloom, okay? This was to be expected. TNA recently took the focus off of most of the "name talent" and put it on the younger wrestlers in an effort to start building new stars. The problem with that is most of the young guys that are now in the spotlight have been buried and made to look like complete jobbers by the ex-WCWWECW veterans for the last year. So now the audience has been conditioned to think that the home-grown TNA stars are not important. It's going to take a while to reeducate the fans about that.

Right now TNA is in damage control mode. They're trying to repair the harm that was done to the credibility of the young roster by the one-two punch of the Jarret/Mantel creative regime and the Main Event Mafia. Making a concentrated effort to develop the younger talent is going to be an investment in the future, but realistically, they're probably not going to pop a huge rating with these guys any time soon, and certainly not when football is drawing 20 million viewers on the other channel when iMPACT is on.

Frankly, this damage was self-inflicted by the short-sightedness of the previous head of creative. If the veterans in the locker room hadn't been destroying the credibility of everyone who wasn't them for the last year TNA might not be in this position now, but they were and they are.

TNA needs to stay the course and be patient. They're not going to draw big ratings over night, but if they continue to build their future, then at least their company will HAVE a future.