Jim Cornette likely finished with Impact, GFW name being phased out

Jim Cornette likely finished with Impact

Jim Cornette, who returned to the company last month in a new authority figure role “firing” Bruce Prichard, is already likely done with his role on Impact on Pop TV.

The company announced they would be running TV tapings in Ottawa from November 6-10 following the Bound for Glory PPV and Cornette is unable to travel to Canada. He had trouble at the border back in 2010 when assault charges from his record were found. While the charges were dropped, Canada has a very strict border policy.

A report by The Wrestling Observer Newsletter this week revealed that Cornette was really only brought back to the company as a favor to Jeff Jarrett to help out, with Cornette adding the booking helped “pay for my garage remodel by hanging out with old friends and cutting promos.” Cornette reportedly expressed concern about the future of the company going forward to Bob Ryder, something Ryder played down as rumors only. Either way, he appears to be done and it remains to be seen how they will explain his sudden absence on TV.

GFW name being phased out

As expected, it would appear publicly that the company is already phasing out the GFW (Global Force Wrestling) re-branding. The Wrestling Observer Newsletter noted that company officials have confirmed they will be phasing out the GFW name.

While attempts by Wrestleview.com to contact officials at Anthem were unanswered, we were able to confirm this report by the Observer this week and it would appear going forward that Anthem will refer to the promotion as Impact or Impact Wrestling.

The first hint of the change came last week when promotion for the Bound for Glory PPV on November 5 suddenly displayed the “Impact” logo instead of GFW. It’s pretty clear the timing had a lot to do with the “indefinite leave of absence” by Jeff Jarrett as the official GFW Twitter account tweeted out the original Bound for Glory logo on September 5, the same day the company publicly announced Jarrett would be leaving for now.

It should also be noted that the GFW Twitter account has gone radio silent since September 11 and is no longer promoting anything regarding Impact on Pop TV or the GFW Amped specials currently airing on Pay Per View taped two years ago. The actual re-branding of the promotion took place back in March when they completely dropped any references to TNA, Total Nonstop Action or TNA Wrestling during the introduction of a new regime.

Days before Slammiversary, an article in The Tennessean revealed the promotion would be re-brand as GFW going forward and that Impact would simply be the name of the weekly show as RAW or Smackdown is to WWE. The company then held a series of unification title matches at the Slammiversary PPV and began pushing the GFW name very hard, including introducing new title belts. That lasted until September with Jarrett’s departure.

Wrestleview.com even made an effort, in attempts to avoid branding confusion, to begin referring to the promotion as GFW and even categorizing our news around the name. It would appear the company is quietly going back to being referred to as Impact, even with the confusion among current staff including Josh Mathews based on a new interview. Also not helping matters was the fact that Jarrett still continues to own the rights to the GFW/Global Force Wrestling name, meaning they went forward with the re-brand without actually owning the full rights despite issuing a press release claiming otherwise.