Former TNA Wrestling President Scott D’Amore spoke with Fightful on a number of topics, including how Jeff Jarrett and Christian Cage are able to use their TNA entrance themes in AEW.
D’Amore said, “They are two unique situations. The Christian one, they actually debuted Christian with a knockoff of our knockoff, if you want to call it that. After the first night of using it, I was actually there in Jacksonville at the after-show with TK [Tony Khan]. He said, ‘What did you think?’ ‘It’s great. Why didn’t you just ask? We’d let you use the theme.’ Literally, I was still sitting at the table when I got a request in my email for it. We facilitated that one. The Jeff Jarrett one was unique in the sense that, that’s been Jeff’s music really since he left WCW. He used it in TNA. Jeff, when he was debut there, reached out to me. We chatted a little bit. I reached out to Ed Nordholm, we had a conversation. Jeff has a long storied history with IMPACT-TNA Wrestling. Ed and I were like, ‘What’s the downside to letting him using this theme?’ We’re not using that theme for somebody. You’re not assigning that theme to somebody else. It was a nice way to say — Jeff had his departure from the company. Thankfully, he’s in a great and amazing spot now, but it was tough times. What a great way to say, ‘God bless, go kick ass with what you’re doing now. Use the theme.’ It’s the same as when EC3 was leaving here early on in my tenure, Ed and I chatted about it. Why not let him take the EC3 moniker with him? It’s not Mexico. We’re not assigned a new wrestler to play the character EC3. Our thought process was, one, there is no downside to it. Maybe there’s an upside. If they make a wrestler, maybe it’s EC3 or otherwise. If they make Sean Ross Sapp, ‘We need to change his name because Maple Leaf Pro or IMPACT owns it.’ The talent can show up and say, ‘Here are the rights to Sean Ross Sapp.’ You go there and become a massive star, our product becomes more valuable. There is no downside to it, and there is a potential upside, as well as the goodwill of getting the investment from talent in saying, ‘I’m going to invest in building this name and this brand because I’m going to be able to carry it on with me.’ Jeff and Christian are unique because both are such important characters in TNA history. Jeff is the founder, that’s never changing. Somebody who has been instrumental in my career and somebody I consider a mentor and a friend. Christian is a guy I broke in with and is the guy I’ll always say, in history, when you look at TNA, the first person to ever say, ‘I’m leaving WWE of my own merit to go to TNA.’ It’s Christian. Without him, you don’t have the cascade of what TNA was able to build and grow to.”
You can check out D’Amore’s comments in the video below.
(H/T to Fightful for transcribing the above quotes)
