Even if TNA gets jump started, the WWE will not be its only competition. There is a vast network of independent wrestling promotions around the country with enough common wrestlers among them that has virtually reestablished the territory system among fans all over North America. Most old school wrestling fans and wrestling historians remember or at least know about the time before Vince McMahon nationalized the WWF, when smaller areas had their own major fed with travelling wrestlers coming through them. The best wrestlers became stars in several territories and built their reputations on individual appearances rather than one, centralized company distributing television featuring them nationally.
If you think about it, the indies of today are doing the exact same thing. Guys aren't just confined to their one corner of the country, and many wrestlers, both on the high end and the lower end, get exposure at several arenas around the country. Real up-and-comers or guys who never even got a shot with the bigger companies for whatever reason too. In the period of time between the WWF going national and the emergence of SMW and later, ECW, indie wrestling was a very depressing place, where local guys didn't have much of a future and shows were booked around whatever former WWF/NWA/WCW/JCP guy was showing up to win in front of the local crowd.
It took two wrestling visionaries, Jim Cornette and Paul Heyman, to use the indie fed as a tool to build stars locally and give fans in the Smoky Mountain or Mid-Atlantic regions an alternative to what they were getting on Monday or Saturday nights on TV. Both companies had great impact on the wrestling world. SMW was very influential in that it gave us wrestlers such as Chris Jericho, Lance Storm, Kane, Bob Holly, Chris Candido and Road Dogg. ECW's accomplishments don't need to be mentioned here.
While those indie feds fading into history ended with ECW going national, their model lived on with feds such as NWA Wildside, CZW and eventually, ROH. Slowly but surely, the indie feds in the Aughts built histories and traditions to the point where their stars today are known by a good amount of wrestling fans all across the country, and to the point where now, a guy like Nigel McGuinness gets a boffo main event push right from jump in TNA.
Honestly, I don't see their growth abating. While companies may come and go, there will always be a crop of wrestlers looking to make names for themselves, guys who are too small or not muscular enough to warrant a look from the WWE, guys future endeavored from the WWE who need a place to rehab or continue careers.
Furthermore, with the Internet becoming more and more a part of people's lives, it will become even easier for people get familar with the feds and stars of the indie circuit. That way, when Claudio Castagnoli makes an appearance for F1rst Wrestling in Minnesota, people don't have to rely solely on word of mouth. They can check out Chikara's Podcast-a-Go-Go archives and see clips of Claudio wrestling in Easton and Philadelphia. They can check out Youtube for Claudio footage from feds as diverse as PWG based out of SoCal to FIP based in Florida. They have the ROH Video Wires to see him cut promos. They can follow the man himself on Twitter and get updates from him as to what he's doing, etc. etc. Then, when they see Claudio live at the arena and become fans of his, they start to seek out even more material than they can find online, which leads them to buying DVDs featuring him. Then, they're more aware of other stars, like Chris Hero or Eddie Kingston, which creates demand from the local consumer public to bring them to Minnesota.
This kind of branding creates complete and total awareness amongst the wrestling community, giving fans the resources to check out not only the stars of tomorrow for the WWE, but the guys that are making people talk today. Again, the Internet isn't what it used to be. Back in 1999, it was for a small portion of wrestling fans, but today, I would gamble that most of, if not all, wrestling fans in America have the Internet and can use it to find more than just porn. As we become a more tech-based society and as our hunger for combat sports grows, people will want to find out about what else is out there instead of just what they find on USA, My Network TV or Spike.
(As an aside... there was an interesting note on F4W Online today that showed a decent amount of crossover between people who bought Bragging Rights and UFC 104 among the people they polled... maybe there are more fans of both now than just of either sport in particular)
While the indies won't rise up as this conglomerate to compete with the WWE, there's little doubt in my mind that their growth period is far from finished. As the demand increases for alternatives of wrestling, gate and DVD sales will only rise for the Chikaras and AAWs of the world, among others. While the WWE will almost certainly continue to dominate the pro wrestling market, it's very likely that a thriving territory system like what happened before mass nationalization will spring up and give local markets something else to latch onto when they just want something to do and they're either not feeling the WWE or they're not getting another WWE show for months. While it may not signal another boom period in wrestling, it shows that these are healthy times with a much better outlook than when McMahon bought out all his competition 8 years ago.
