This week, Billy Corgan agreed to terms to purchase the NWA name and brand. Unlike when he tried to purchase Impact Wrestling, this deal does not come with an actual wrestling company or promotion attached, nor any talent or tape library. So fans and insiders alike are all just sort of puzzling out what exactly he’s going to do with the letters “NWA.”
Eric Bischoff was one of the first to weigh in on what Corgan might possibly be doing. On the latest episode of his Bischoff On Wrestling podcast, he called Corgan a “smart and creative guy,” but can’t figure out what he’s going to do with the brand.
“He must have a plan. I don’t know what it could be though. Without the tape library, without the streaming library, without the revenue that generates or the value of the library itself. The NWA has been around a long time. It’s been run through the mill. I don’t want to call it damaged goods because it is a legacy brand. There’s an upside there. Depending on what Billy’s strategy is there is a way to build on that legacy and kind of resurrect that legacy, you never know, there could be a great opportunity there. For the life of me I can’t figure it out.”
Similarly, in the latest issue of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Dave Meltzer reported that Corgan’s head writer Dave Lagana said “all options are open,” and that they plan to take their time working out a plan. The plan may or may not include running shows in 2017, and may or may not include creating a new, standalone promotion with the NWA name.
Lagana did say that one of the ideas on the table is to create some sort of media telling the history and legacy of the NWA and its world title from 1948 to 1983, which would definitely be a cool webseries, or whatever route they could choose to take with that.
Everything is up in the air at this point, and it’s likely to be a good while before we find out what shape Corgan’s NWA is going to eventually take, but as of right now, everyone in the industry is just guessing.
