Over the years, people have left wrestling companies for many a, shall we say, creative reason. From being caught smiling at the wrong time, to appearing in the crowd of their opposition’s TV show. Today I want to highlight one of the more bizarre ones, all of which started with an email, and a whole load of lies that were uncovered because of it. I’m talking about the last time Vince Russo left TNA, that we know about at least, because there were many people in the company who didn’t even know he’d been working there for nearly a year.
In this video, we’ll look at the firing of Vince Russo, and the email he sent that made the wrestling world point and laugh at TNA. We’ll look at the timeline of events, and whether or not it made an impact on them leaving Spike TV.
If it makes the prospect of this video a bit more bearable for you, I’m sure you’re expecting plenty of that word to show up, but I promise to only include it just once in the whole video.
In September 2006, Vince Russo was brought back into TNA as the head writer, and many of the most insane TNA matches and moments come from the era that followed. Kurt Angle and the tanning bed, the fish market street fight, and a barbed wire Christmas tree. Not to mention all manner of mad shit involving Abyss. One such match with a ‘last rites’ stipulation gave birth to a chant that would become very familiar on TNA shows, “Fire Russo”. For the next several years, Russo came across as being quite bulletproof. I feel like we all know that person at work who seems to keep failing upwards, well that was Vince. The chants went on for so long that many wondered just how he had lasted for as long as he did, and the answer may be Dixie Carter. We’ll get back to her. Before we get to the email, some background is needed to explain how we got to the situation.
Beginning of the end
The story really begins in October 2011, where after five years of being a leading voice in TNA’s creative, Vince Russo was removed as head writer, and replaced by Bruce Prichard. “Russo is still involved, but unlike in the past, the process is set up for Prichard to make major revisions and set the course for the big storylines and the larger outline of the shows.” Essentially Bruce would act like Vince McMahon, and be the filter of Russo’s ideas, much like it’s been said many times that Russo benefitted from having in WWF. As far as why Vince would accept this change, some theorised that it may have been a self preservation move. “Russo may have embraced a lesser position rather than waiting for TNA President Dixie Carter to completely cut ties with him. Despite negative reviews of Russo for years, Dixie has stayed loyal to him, but he may have feared that loyalty was running out.” Another thing that’s interesting to bear in mind as pointed out by Wade Keller, is that Vince would at least be working under someone he had experience with, and that may have made things easier, as Prichard and Russo worked together in WWF.
The new creative team came into effect with the October 20th episode of Impact, which was the show after that year's Bound for Glory event. This turned out to be a very clever time to implement major changes, as the show being post Bound For Glory meant that it drew over two million viewers. The episode after their biggest pay per view was often the highest rated of the year, but according to Figure Four Weekly, this year drew “the highest number in the history of Thursday nights for Impact Wrestling.” The critical reception to this was frankly more positive than usual, with even Bryan Alvarez, who was a well known harsh critic of the company for years, praising James Storm winning the World title, and beginning a new story with Bobby Roode. It at least felt like a fresh main event storyline to lead with. That's not to say that anything got magically better though. “Prichard’s goal was to slow down the pacing and have less happening on the show with the idea it would mean more. From that standpoint, the television is a lot better, but it’s still most weeks far from a great show. The same problems that were there are still there as a lot still doesn’t make sense.”
One very noticeable change that came in soon after Russo left the head writer spot was that Bobby Roode would become the first long term World champion the company had in many years, holding it for nine months. To put this in context, from the inception of the TNA World title in 2007 to me writing this in November 2025, Roode’s reign is still the second longest in history. The current record holder is Josh Alexander, meaning that for over a decade, Roode was number one. Bobby’s reign began within a month of Russo leaving the top spot in creative, and by the time he would lose, Vince would be gone from the company completely.
While the new writing team would last for a few months, Vince Russo would end up leaving TNA in February 2012. In the week that he left, Russo was the cover story of the Pro Wrestling Torch, but his absence wasn’t as celebrated as you might think. The story they led with made sure to point out that one man leaving wasn’t going to turn the creative around overnight, based on a poor review of that weekend’s Against All Odds pay per view. “So just as many TNA fans who had pegged Vince Russo as the primary problem in TNA over the years were celebrating news of his imminent departure, TNA showed that Russo was hardly the problem. He’s been blamed for a lot, but he can’t be blamed for the overpush of Garett Bischoff. Truth is, he’s been out of power for months.”
Almost like a sign of things to come, a week later the Observer would note that Russo had actually been gone for a few weeks, but it had been kept from the public and even from talent until after Against All Odds. “Nobody could figure out why people at TNA were not denying nor confirming it even though reports were everywhere and most knew, It is believed Russo’s son, who worked in production, also gave notice.” On February 14th at the Impact tapings after the pay per view, Dixie Carter would announce Russo leaving to the world on Twitter, which as you can imagine, was received as well as it was ever going to be.
In the report published in the Observer, Dave implies that this was in the works for quite a while, and his replacement had already been picked, “as when David Lagana left ROH for TNA, we were told specifically it was for a writing job and that he was going to likely end up as the replacement for Vince Russo.” In March 2012, Vince would publish his first official statement after leaving TNA, where he would complain that quote, “not one dirt sheet writer out their” and yes, that’s how the professional writer spelled it, “attempted to call me to get the facts. Everything out there is speculation, and it is so off the mark that it is comical.” As we would soon get confirmation of, those writers would in fact have his contact information, his email address for example.
The Email
It’s here where the story gets truly bizarre. On July 15th 2014, Mike Johnson of PWInsider would receive an email that he clearly wasn’t meant to. It contained notes that were intended for the TNA commentary team, Mike Tenay and Taz. Essentially, Vince emailed the wrong Mike, and he couldn’t have done it at a worse time. On July 15th Mike would publish the following statement. “As previously noted here on the site, Vince Russo has publicly declined to comment on PWInsider.com's story that he is still working for TNA as a creative consultant. Therefore, it was very interesting today that I received an email from Russo, who accidentally cc'd me in, featuring instructions and advice from him to Mike Tenay and Taz on how certain segments of a TNA TV episode about to be voiced over should be handled. That should put to rest, once and for all, any question that Russo is still involved and working for TNA.”
On the day that the news broke, Vince Russo would make a quite bizarre statement on his twitter. It’s no longer online for reasons we’ll get to, but according to PWInsider the now deleted statement read: “WOW---just amazing to see that anybody will print anything as TRUTH without checking into it. Nice to see the SWERVE still works!!!" Russo’s problem here, is that Mike had clear evidence that Vince sent him, and so Russo only looked worse by doubling down on his lie. On top of this, he was also attempting to discredit Mike and his colleague Dave Scherer, which they responded to by threatening to publish said evidence. Russo had lost.
Later in the day Vince clearly recognised this. He deleted his earlier comments and posted a new, more honest statement. He admits that he had been employed since October 2013 as a consultant to work with Mike Tenay and Taz on their commentary. He also says that part of that employment was a confidentiality agreement, which he intended to keep until he couldn’t anymore. In his reporting on the situation, Dave Meltzer notes that Vince still wasn’t being entirely honest, as he was only owning up to the work with Mike and Taz because that is all there was proof of him doing. It would later come out in the Observer that Vince was ordered to do this by John Gaburick, perhaps because enough damage had been done to TNA’s image.
The next day Vince would continue to address things on twitter, this time directly replying to fans, claiming that keeping his employment a secret wasn’t his fault, and admitting that it shouldn’t have been kept quiet in the first place. He also continues to have a back and forth with Mike Johnson. From their conversation, it seems that Vince emailed Mike to apologize, and also did publically. If you’re curious, Dixie never seemed to address it on social media like she had when Vince left in 2012. Unless something has been deleted, her only tweets from around the time concern the TV airing of the recent New York show, where the six sided ring would return, and she herself would be put through a table on Impact.
Initially it seemed that Vince’s biggest crime was creating a conflict of interest. While working for TNA, Vince was also regularly live tweeting his thoughts on shows from the perspective of an impartial viewer, and also commenting on TNA for his own website with more inside information than he was letting on. For example, this article where he praises Slammiversary 2014, and argues for Spike TV to give TNA better production resources. His comments on Spike TV will become important later. Further on in the same week that the news came out, Russo would continue to live tweet Impact, ending his thoughts with this rather galling tweet given that he had creative input in the show. (Jul 18, 2014
Thanks guys--been a blast. Would have done a few things differently---but we ALL would have. Remember--IT'S ALL SUBJECTIVE.) While all of this is deceptive, and you could even say unethical, it doesn’t explain why TNA wanted to keep Vince’s work confidential. The answer to this is because TNA had deals that may have been jeopardised if it was public knowledge.
Following the collapse of their relationship with New Japan, which was Russo’s doing by the way, TNA had built a relationship with Wrestle-1 in Japan, a promotion founded the year before by Keiji Mutoh. In the July 21st Observer, Dave Meltzer would note that Wrestle-1 had suspected that Russo was involved, and was not happy. TNA didn’t help matters at first by trying to dodge the question, “However, John Gaburick later admitted to Keiji Muto that Russo was working there, but assured him that Russo was working underneath him.” Gaburick also claims that Russo “didn’t have final say.” These concerns were caused by the way TNA’s relationship with New Japan ended, and Russo’s booking of among other Japanese talent, Kazuchika Okada, who interestingly, would win his first IWGP title on the same week that Russo left TNA in 2012. At this time, TNA had future IWGP champion Sanada on their roster representing Wrestle-1, and were said to be happy with how he was being used.
Aside from the company’s international partners, Russo could well have had an effect on an important domestic one as well. In August 2014, Dave Meltzer would begin to write about renewal negotiations with Spike TV perhaps not going as smoothly as TNA would hope. He cites two main reasons for this, the first being that Spike had put a lot of money into TNA, and had even paid for individuals like Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff to come in, and may have been feeling that they weren’t getting a sufficient return on that investment. The second reason is that they were lied to about Russo. “That’s why TNA was in such a panic when Russo’s e-mail accidentally was sent to Mike Johnson, because they had denied Russo was working there after Spike had made it clear a long time ago they didn’t want him involved. TNA had evidently figured if they didn’t tell anyone, that nobody would know.” As reported in this issue, on July 30th Vince would leave the company, seemingly forever. Depending on whose story you believe, he would seemingly go out tweeting one more lie. “Officially done with TNA,” later adding “Today they `suggested’ a break. I declined. Finality was better for me.” On August 11th, Meltzer, who likely still resented Russo for all of his terrible writing in WCW, wrote a long and detailed account of all that had happened, noting that Vince had actually been fired by John Gaburick.
Over the next few weeks, now that he was fired and had no confidentiality agreement, Vince would drip feed information out through the subscription service on his website. Here he would get TNA in more hot water with Spike, when he claimed that the network wasn’t as good a partner as they could have been. “Russo claimed Spike never correctly promoted TNA. When TNA said it wasn’t renewing the contract, several reports were that Dixie Carter said the same thing internally, blaming them for not promoting the product the way they promote Bellator (which they own).” These comments would lead to a response by David Schwarz, the then President of Spike TV. “We took TNA from a late night spot on Saturday nights, doing 500,000 viewers, to a two-hour time slot that did two million viewers over time. Spike went out of its way, not in just adhering to its contract, but above and beyond the contract. We paid Hulk Hogan, we paid Eric Bischoff, with our money. We financed many shows. We financed U.K. shows. We helped promote. We gave TNA a prime time slot of Thursdays from 9-11 p.m. I think his comments are way off base.” Schwarz continued by saying of Russo, “He’s somebody who thinks more of himself than really exists. Vince Russo never meant anything to Spike TV. He had nothing to do with negotiations. Nobody cares about Vince Russo at Spike TV. Nobody cares or knows who he is.” I imagine after some of the barbed comments Vince had made, this was likely said to belittle him more than anything else. As the TNA and Spike deal approached the end, you could argue that Russo was becoming a scapegoat of sorts, as there were clearly other factors in why TNA was not renewed, but the whole bizarre situation, and TNA’s attempts to cover it up didn’t help at all.
Even the man who broke the story, Mike Johnson, has gone on record saying that Vince was not a factor in Spike TV deciding not to renew, rather it was Dixie’s handling of the situation, and many more of her blunders. Mike specifically notes that Dixie wanted far more money than Spike was willing to agree to. “One source has told me she was seeking a $26 million dollar deal. Spike refused, wanting a lesser deal (I have heard $14 and $16 million) and Carter refused and held fast.” That's quite a large overvaluation of your company, especially when Spike didn’t agree by at least ten million dollars.
In November 2014, Spike TV would release an official statement about the relationship with TNA ending, now that the final air date of December 24th was scheduled. The statement is very gracious, and wished the company, and Dixie, the very best in their future endeavors very politely. As this article from the time posted on Cageside Seats notes, “It was important to Spike TV that they maintain a healthy image through the end of this partnership and they certainly did much better this time around than the split with WWE years ago.” And ECW if we go back a bit further. It's quite telling then, that they didn’t seem too interested in extending that courtesy to Vince Russo.
Ending
To give you an impression of just how secret Russo’s hiring was, one person who claimed to have not known about his hiring was part of the ownership of the company, Jeff Jarrett. On his My World podcast in June 2023, Jeff is asked about the story, and claims that he, who originally brought Vince into the company in the first place, only found out when someone slipped up in a meeting. Russo had rejoined the company in October 2013, and Jeff would leave in the following January. Jarrett heavily implies here that such deception was a big part of him wanting to leave the company that he co-founded.
I’ve given Russo a lot of flack in this video, but there’s one thing that Jeff points out that is worth bearing in mind through all of this, and it’s the key reason why Russo would have played his part. Vince did after all, have a family to feed, and whatever anyone thinks of his writing, his terrible terrible writing, we can’t begrudge him that.
Looking back all these years later, knowing the highs, and all of the lows that TNA has had since, Russo’s email blunder felt like a giant story at the time, but in the grand scheme of things didn’t end the world. It is however, one of the funnier TNA cock-ups, and certainly a unique one bro. See, only did one in the whole video.
When I started working on this video, this story was effectively Vince Russo’s exit from working with any wrestling company full time. As of early November this appears not to be the case, as Vince, who told the world he was leaving wrestling more times that Terry Funk thought about it, joined JCW. For all the criticism he gets, much of it deserved, I do hope Vince can end his time in pro wrestling on a higher note than the way he left TNA. It’s Vince Russo though, who knows when the next swerve might come.
Sources:
Beginning of the end
PWT October 12th 2011 Prichard coming in https://www.pwtorch.com/artman2/members/uploads/4/1224TorchNewsletterPDF.pdf
Oct 6th 2011 Torch, James Caldwell https://www.pwtorch.com/artman2/publish/TNA_News_1/article_54011.shtml
FFW Oct 26th 2011 Thursday ratings https://members.f4wonline.com/newsletters/figure-four-weekly/pdf-newsletter-oct-26-figure-four-weekly-rock-return-announced-vengeance-ppv/
PWT Feb 18th 2012 https://members.pwtorch.com/artman/publish/2011torchnewsletterPDFs/article_60109.shtml
WON Feb 20th 12 Leaves company https://members.f4wonline.com/wrestling-observer-newsletter/feb-20-2012-observer-newsletter-diaz-saga-continues-drug-test-failure/
March 2012 statement https://eu.news-journalonline.com/story/news/2012/03/01/vince-russo-statement/64264456007/
The secret consultant
PWInsider first reporting July 15th 2014 https://www.pwinsider.com/article/86940/the-final-word-on-whether-vince-russo-is-still-working-for-tna.html
PWinsider second reporting, July 15th 2014 https://www.pwinsider.com/article/86944/the-real-final-statement-of-vince-russos-involvement-with-tna-issued-by-russo-himself.html?p=1
FFW July 19th 2014 - First reporting https://members.f4wonline.com/newsletters/figure-four-weekly/full-color-pdf-newsletter-jul-19-2014-figure-four-weekly-g-1-preview-more-wwe/
WON July 21st Mutoh https://members.f4wonline.com/wrestling-observer-newsletter/july-21-2014-wrestling-observer-newsletter-kenta-wwe-ppv-changes/
WON August 4th Russo gone, Spike TV https://members.f4wonline.com/wrestling-observer-newsletter/august-4-2014-wrestling-observer-newsletter-whole-story-tna-and-russo/
Not responsible for spike https://www.pwinsider.com/article/88146/spike-tv-vice-president-says-vince-russo-never-meant-anything-to-network-thinks-more-of-himself-than-really-exists.html
Cageside Seats Nov 19th Spike Statement https://www.cagesideseats.com/tna-impact/2014/11/19/7250753/spike-tv-releases-statement-on-tna-leaving-the-network
My World, June 20th 2023 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cO5kgtjLcCI
In this video, we’ll look at the firing of Vince Russo, and the email he sent that made the wrestling world point and laugh at TNA. We’ll look at the timeline of events, and whether or not it made an impact on them leaving Spike TV.
If it makes the prospect of this video a bit more bearable for you, I’m sure you’re expecting plenty of that word to show up, but I promise to only include it just once in the whole video.
In September 2006, Vince Russo was brought back into TNA as the head writer, and many of the most insane TNA matches and moments come from the era that followed. Kurt Angle and the tanning bed, the fish market street fight, and a barbed wire Christmas tree. Not to mention all manner of mad shit involving Abyss. One such match with a ‘last rites’ stipulation gave birth to a chant that would become very familiar on TNA shows, “Fire Russo”. For the next several years, Russo came across as being quite bulletproof. I feel like we all know that person at work who seems to keep failing upwards, well that was Vince. The chants went on for so long that many wondered just how he had lasted for as long as he did, and the answer may be Dixie Carter. We’ll get back to her. Before we get to the email, some background is needed to explain how we got to the situation.
Beginning of the end
The story really begins in October 2011, where after five years of being a leading voice in TNA’s creative, Vince Russo was removed as head writer, and replaced by Bruce Prichard. “Russo is still involved, but unlike in the past, the process is set up for Prichard to make major revisions and set the course for the big storylines and the larger outline of the shows.” Essentially Bruce would act like Vince McMahon, and be the filter of Russo’s ideas, much like it’s been said many times that Russo benefitted from having in WWF. As far as why Vince would accept this change, some theorised that it may have been a self preservation move. “Russo may have embraced a lesser position rather than waiting for TNA President Dixie Carter to completely cut ties with him. Despite negative reviews of Russo for years, Dixie has stayed loyal to him, but he may have feared that loyalty was running out.” Another thing that’s interesting to bear in mind as pointed out by Wade Keller, is that Vince would at least be working under someone he had experience with, and that may have made things easier, as Prichard and Russo worked together in WWF.
The new creative team came into effect with the October 20th episode of Impact, which was the show after that year's Bound for Glory event. This turned out to be a very clever time to implement major changes, as the show being post Bound For Glory meant that it drew over two million viewers. The episode after their biggest pay per view was often the highest rated of the year, but according to Figure Four Weekly, this year drew “the highest number in the history of Thursday nights for Impact Wrestling.” The critical reception to this was frankly more positive than usual, with even Bryan Alvarez, who was a well known harsh critic of the company for years, praising James Storm winning the World title, and beginning a new story with Bobby Roode. It at least felt like a fresh main event storyline to lead with. That's not to say that anything got magically better though. “Prichard’s goal was to slow down the pacing and have less happening on the show with the idea it would mean more. From that standpoint, the television is a lot better, but it’s still most weeks far from a great show. The same problems that were there are still there as a lot still doesn’t make sense.”
One very noticeable change that came in soon after Russo left the head writer spot was that Bobby Roode would become the first long term World champion the company had in many years, holding it for nine months. To put this in context, from the inception of the TNA World title in 2007 to me writing this in November 2025, Roode’s reign is still the second longest in history. The current record holder is Josh Alexander, meaning that for over a decade, Roode was number one. Bobby’s reign began within a month of Russo leaving the top spot in creative, and by the time he would lose, Vince would be gone from the company completely.
While the new writing team would last for a few months, Vince Russo would end up leaving TNA in February 2012. In the week that he left, Russo was the cover story of the Pro Wrestling Torch, but his absence wasn’t as celebrated as you might think. The story they led with made sure to point out that one man leaving wasn’t going to turn the creative around overnight, based on a poor review of that weekend’s Against All Odds pay per view. “So just as many TNA fans who had pegged Vince Russo as the primary problem in TNA over the years were celebrating news of his imminent departure, TNA showed that Russo was hardly the problem. He’s been blamed for a lot, but he can’t be blamed for the overpush of Garett Bischoff. Truth is, he’s been out of power for months.”
Almost like a sign of things to come, a week later the Observer would note that Russo had actually been gone for a few weeks, but it had been kept from the public and even from talent until after Against All Odds. “Nobody could figure out why people at TNA were not denying nor confirming it even though reports were everywhere and most knew, It is believed Russo’s son, who worked in production, also gave notice.” On February 14th at the Impact tapings after the pay per view, Dixie Carter would announce Russo leaving to the world on Twitter, which as you can imagine, was received as well as it was ever going to be.
In the report published in the Observer, Dave implies that this was in the works for quite a while, and his replacement had already been picked, “as when David Lagana left ROH for TNA, we were told specifically it was for a writing job and that he was going to likely end up as the replacement for Vince Russo.” In March 2012, Vince would publish his first official statement after leaving TNA, where he would complain that quote, “not one dirt sheet writer out their” and yes, that’s how the professional writer spelled it, “attempted to call me to get the facts. Everything out there is speculation, and it is so off the mark that it is comical.” As we would soon get confirmation of, those writers would in fact have his contact information, his email address for example.
The Email
It’s here where the story gets truly bizarre. On July 15th 2014, Mike Johnson of PWInsider would receive an email that he clearly wasn’t meant to. It contained notes that were intended for the TNA commentary team, Mike Tenay and Taz. Essentially, Vince emailed the wrong Mike, and he couldn’t have done it at a worse time. On July 15th Mike would publish the following statement. “As previously noted here on the site, Vince Russo has publicly declined to comment on PWInsider.com's story that he is still working for TNA as a creative consultant. Therefore, it was very interesting today that I received an email from Russo, who accidentally cc'd me in, featuring instructions and advice from him to Mike Tenay and Taz on how certain segments of a TNA TV episode about to be voiced over should be handled. That should put to rest, once and for all, any question that Russo is still involved and working for TNA.”
On the day that the news broke, Vince Russo would make a quite bizarre statement on his twitter. It’s no longer online for reasons we’ll get to, but according to PWInsider the now deleted statement read: “WOW---just amazing to see that anybody will print anything as TRUTH without checking into it. Nice to see the SWERVE still works!!!" Russo’s problem here, is that Mike had clear evidence that Vince sent him, and so Russo only looked worse by doubling down on his lie. On top of this, he was also attempting to discredit Mike and his colleague Dave Scherer, which they responded to by threatening to publish said evidence. Russo had lost.
Later in the day Vince clearly recognised this. He deleted his earlier comments and posted a new, more honest statement. He admits that he had been employed since October 2013 as a consultant to work with Mike Tenay and Taz on their commentary. He also says that part of that employment was a confidentiality agreement, which he intended to keep until he couldn’t anymore. In his reporting on the situation, Dave Meltzer notes that Vince still wasn’t being entirely honest, as he was only owning up to the work with Mike and Taz because that is all there was proof of him doing. It would later come out in the Observer that Vince was ordered to do this by John Gaburick, perhaps because enough damage had been done to TNA’s image.
The next day Vince would continue to address things on twitter, this time directly replying to fans, claiming that keeping his employment a secret wasn’t his fault, and admitting that it shouldn’t have been kept quiet in the first place. He also continues to have a back and forth with Mike Johnson. From their conversation, it seems that Vince emailed Mike to apologize, and also did publically. If you’re curious, Dixie never seemed to address it on social media like she had when Vince left in 2012. Unless something has been deleted, her only tweets from around the time concern the TV airing of the recent New York show, where the six sided ring would return, and she herself would be put through a table on Impact.
Initially it seemed that Vince’s biggest crime was creating a conflict of interest. While working for TNA, Vince was also regularly live tweeting his thoughts on shows from the perspective of an impartial viewer, and also commenting on TNA for his own website with more inside information than he was letting on. For example, this article where he praises Slammiversary 2014, and argues for Spike TV to give TNA better production resources. His comments on Spike TV will become important later. Further on in the same week that the news came out, Russo would continue to live tweet Impact, ending his thoughts with this rather galling tweet given that he had creative input in the show. (Jul 18, 2014
Thanks guys--been a blast. Would have done a few things differently---but we ALL would have. Remember--IT'S ALL SUBJECTIVE.) While all of this is deceptive, and you could even say unethical, it doesn’t explain why TNA wanted to keep Vince’s work confidential. The answer to this is because TNA had deals that may have been jeopardised if it was public knowledge.
Following the collapse of their relationship with New Japan, which was Russo’s doing by the way, TNA had built a relationship with Wrestle-1 in Japan, a promotion founded the year before by Keiji Mutoh. In the July 21st Observer, Dave Meltzer would note that Wrestle-1 had suspected that Russo was involved, and was not happy. TNA didn’t help matters at first by trying to dodge the question, “However, John Gaburick later admitted to Keiji Muto that Russo was working there, but assured him that Russo was working underneath him.” Gaburick also claims that Russo “didn’t have final say.” These concerns were caused by the way TNA’s relationship with New Japan ended, and Russo’s booking of among other Japanese talent, Kazuchika Okada, who interestingly, would win his first IWGP title on the same week that Russo left TNA in 2012. At this time, TNA had future IWGP champion Sanada on their roster representing Wrestle-1, and were said to be happy with how he was being used.
Aside from the company’s international partners, Russo could well have had an effect on an important domestic one as well. In August 2014, Dave Meltzer would begin to write about renewal negotiations with Spike TV perhaps not going as smoothly as TNA would hope. He cites two main reasons for this, the first being that Spike had put a lot of money into TNA, and had even paid for individuals like Hulk Hogan and Eric Bischoff to come in, and may have been feeling that they weren’t getting a sufficient return on that investment. The second reason is that they were lied to about Russo. “That’s why TNA was in such a panic when Russo’s e-mail accidentally was sent to Mike Johnson, because they had denied Russo was working there after Spike had made it clear a long time ago they didn’t want him involved. TNA had evidently figured if they didn’t tell anyone, that nobody would know.” As reported in this issue, on July 30th Vince would leave the company, seemingly forever. Depending on whose story you believe, he would seemingly go out tweeting one more lie. “Officially done with TNA,” later adding “Today they `suggested’ a break. I declined. Finality was better for me.” On August 11th, Meltzer, who likely still resented Russo for all of his terrible writing in WCW, wrote a long and detailed account of all that had happened, noting that Vince had actually been fired by John Gaburick.
Over the next few weeks, now that he was fired and had no confidentiality agreement, Vince would drip feed information out through the subscription service on his website. Here he would get TNA in more hot water with Spike, when he claimed that the network wasn’t as good a partner as they could have been. “Russo claimed Spike never correctly promoted TNA. When TNA said it wasn’t renewing the contract, several reports were that Dixie Carter said the same thing internally, blaming them for not promoting the product the way they promote Bellator (which they own).” These comments would lead to a response by David Schwarz, the then President of Spike TV. “We took TNA from a late night spot on Saturday nights, doing 500,000 viewers, to a two-hour time slot that did two million viewers over time. Spike went out of its way, not in just adhering to its contract, but above and beyond the contract. We paid Hulk Hogan, we paid Eric Bischoff, with our money. We financed many shows. We financed U.K. shows. We helped promote. We gave TNA a prime time slot of Thursdays from 9-11 p.m. I think his comments are way off base.” Schwarz continued by saying of Russo, “He’s somebody who thinks more of himself than really exists. Vince Russo never meant anything to Spike TV. He had nothing to do with negotiations. Nobody cares about Vince Russo at Spike TV. Nobody cares or knows who he is.” I imagine after some of the barbed comments Vince had made, this was likely said to belittle him more than anything else. As the TNA and Spike deal approached the end, you could argue that Russo was becoming a scapegoat of sorts, as there were clearly other factors in why TNA was not renewed, but the whole bizarre situation, and TNA’s attempts to cover it up didn’t help at all.
Even the man who broke the story, Mike Johnson, has gone on record saying that Vince was not a factor in Spike TV deciding not to renew, rather it was Dixie’s handling of the situation, and many more of her blunders. Mike specifically notes that Dixie wanted far more money than Spike was willing to agree to. “One source has told me she was seeking a $26 million dollar deal. Spike refused, wanting a lesser deal (I have heard $14 and $16 million) and Carter refused and held fast.” That's quite a large overvaluation of your company, especially when Spike didn’t agree by at least ten million dollars.
In November 2014, Spike TV would release an official statement about the relationship with TNA ending, now that the final air date of December 24th was scheduled. The statement is very gracious, and wished the company, and Dixie, the very best in their future endeavors very politely. As this article from the time posted on Cageside Seats notes, “It was important to Spike TV that they maintain a healthy image through the end of this partnership and they certainly did much better this time around than the split with WWE years ago.” And ECW if we go back a bit further. It's quite telling then, that they didn’t seem too interested in extending that courtesy to Vince Russo.
Ending
To give you an impression of just how secret Russo’s hiring was, one person who claimed to have not known about his hiring was part of the ownership of the company, Jeff Jarrett. On his My World podcast in June 2023, Jeff is asked about the story, and claims that he, who originally brought Vince into the company in the first place, only found out when someone slipped up in a meeting. Russo had rejoined the company in October 2013, and Jeff would leave in the following January. Jarrett heavily implies here that such deception was a big part of him wanting to leave the company that he co-founded.
I’ve given Russo a lot of flack in this video, but there’s one thing that Jeff points out that is worth bearing in mind through all of this, and it’s the key reason why Russo would have played his part. Vince did after all, have a family to feed, and whatever anyone thinks of his writing, his terrible terrible writing, we can’t begrudge him that.
Looking back all these years later, knowing the highs, and all of the lows that TNA has had since, Russo’s email blunder felt like a giant story at the time, but in the grand scheme of things didn’t end the world. It is however, one of the funnier TNA cock-ups, and certainly a unique one bro. See, only did one in the whole video.
When I started working on this video, this story was effectively Vince Russo’s exit from working with any wrestling company full time. As of early November this appears not to be the case, as Vince, who told the world he was leaving wrestling more times that Terry Funk thought about it, joined JCW. For all the criticism he gets, much of it deserved, I do hope Vince can end his time in pro wrestling on a higher note than the way he left TNA. It’s Vince Russo though, who knows when the next swerve might come.
Sources:
Beginning of the end
PWT October 12th 2011 Prichard coming in https://www.pwtorch.com/artman2/members/uploads/4/1224TorchNewsletterPDF.pdf
Oct 6th 2011 Torch, James Caldwell https://www.pwtorch.com/artman2/publish/TNA_News_1/article_54011.shtml
FFW Oct 26th 2011 Thursday ratings https://members.f4wonline.com/newsletters/figure-four-weekly/pdf-newsletter-oct-26-figure-four-weekly-rock-return-announced-vengeance-ppv/
PWT Feb 18th 2012 https://members.pwtorch.com/artman/publish/2011torchnewsletterPDFs/article_60109.shtml
WON Feb 20th 12 Leaves company https://members.f4wonline.com/wrestling-observer-newsletter/feb-20-2012-observer-newsletter-diaz-saga-continues-drug-test-failure/
March 2012 statement https://eu.news-journalonline.com/story/news/2012/03/01/vince-russo-statement/64264456007/
The secret consultant
PWInsider first reporting July 15th 2014 https://www.pwinsider.com/article/86940/the-final-word-on-whether-vince-russo-is-still-working-for-tna.html
PWinsider second reporting, July 15th 2014 https://www.pwinsider.com/article/86944/the-real-final-statement-of-vince-russos-involvement-with-tna-issued-by-russo-himself.html?p=1
FFW July 19th 2014 - First reporting https://members.f4wonline.com/newsletters/figure-four-weekly/full-color-pdf-newsletter-jul-19-2014-figure-four-weekly-g-1-preview-more-wwe/
WON July 21st Mutoh https://members.f4wonline.com/wrestling-observer-newsletter/july-21-2014-wrestling-observer-newsletter-kenta-wwe-ppv-changes/
WON August 4th Russo gone, Spike TV https://members.f4wonline.com/wrestling-observer-newsletter/august-4-2014-wrestling-observer-newsletter-whole-story-tna-and-russo/
Not responsible for spike https://www.pwinsider.com/article/88146/spike-tv-vice-president-says-vince-russo-never-meant-anything-to-network-thinks-more-of-himself-than-really-exists.html
Cageside Seats Nov 19th Spike Statement https://www.cagesideseats.com/tna-impact/2014/11/19/7250753/spike-tv-releases-statement-on-tna-leaving-the-network
My World, June 20th 2023 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cO5kgtjLcCI
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