Various: Lance Storm on WWE & Impact Producer Differences, Kota Ibushi NJPW Update, Trademarks

Jun 9, 2022

Lance Storm Comments on Differences Between Producing in WWE & Impact Wrestling

A recent episode of The Ariel Helwani Show podcast had Lance Storm as the guest. One of the topics discussed included Storm’s thoughts on the differences between working as a producer in WWE and Impact Wrestling.

“Again, the experience I had when I worked with IMPACT the first time, it’s like, I liked everybody. I liked the atmosphere. There’s a really great team atmosphere and that to me is the real big difference maker that I noticed between when I was in WWE and not to bury WWE, they have their thing and live TV is different but, when you’re sitting on headset in WWE, it feels confrontational and when you’re sitting on headset in IMPACT, it feels collaborative. You’ve got the Director who’s asking, you’ve got Josh [Matthews] who’s doing — but it all feels like we’re all trying our best and if something happens that doesn’t go as perfectly as you want, it feels like we’re all just gonna try to figure out how we can make it better next time rather than feeling like you’ve been pointed out and chastised for something and it’s just, atmosphere is so much more rewarding when it feels collaborative than confrontational.”

Storm also gave his thoughts about Impact’s low viewership and small live crowds currently being the biggest hurdles for Impact’s television product.

“It’s both great and frustrating I think [Storm said about the state of the pro wrestling business], in that there’s so much of it, which is what I like least about the business currently is there’s just so much product and I don’t think it’s just wrestling. I think entertainment in general, whatever it is, ‘We have our fan base. Let’s give them as much as they’ll take and get as much back from them financially as we can,’ that — like there’s so much WWE product and there’s a lot of AEW product and there’s a lot of wrestling product. If you wanted to watch all of WWE, it’s like you’ve got your what? Seven — count NXT — seven hours a week plus specials plus, you know, if you actually wanted to watch ‘Main Event’ which still exists, that’s so much. In AEW, you’ve got your three hours but if you wanna watch Dark and Elevation, it’s like, that’s gotta be what? Seven, eight hours a week? And being a fan of anything is just so damn time consuming now and I think that’s why and it’s a real shame because I think IMPACT’s product is really good and its biggest hurdle is not enough eyeballs and you know, if you watch the show, the biggest detriment to the show is we don’t have the big, large, lively crowds but it’s like the product itself is really good and I think we’re a victim of so much content, that, you know, if you’re a wrestling fan, obviously you know WWE is the McDonalds of the wrestling business and it’s like everybody knows about that and watches it and it’s like, then there’s all those people that, again, if you wanna say AEW is Burger King just to make analogy. Someone will probably take offense to that but, and it’s like, that’s a lot of more content and we’re that third or fourth, depending on whether you wanna count New Japan or Mexico or whatever and it’s just hard to get eyeballs and it’s a shame.”

Transcript h/t: PostWrestling.com

NJPW Announces Pay Reduction & Other Penalties for Kota Ibushi & Two NJPW Officials

As noted before, New Japan Pro Wrestling talent Kota Ibushi recently accused NJPW’s management of “power harassment” against him over the past year.

NJPW recently announced that they have issued a three month pay reduction penalty for the months of July to September 2022 to Kota Ibushi over his breach of contract issues. This reduction was stated to be at 10% of Ibushi’s pay for that time period.

NJPW also announced that they have issued a similar pay reduction penalty to NJPW President Takami Ohbari over issues regarding his executive responsibility from Ibushi’s harassment allegations.

The company also announced that they have issued a similar pay reduction and a transfer to a different position in the company penalties to an unidentified NJPW official, Kikuchi, over his inappropriate comments towards Ibushi regarding Ibushi’s breach of contract incident.