For the past few years, Jeff Jarrett had spent most of his time trying to find a permanent home for Global Force Wrestling. After he sold his ownership stake in Impact Wrestling (a company he also helped co-found), he started Global Force. The company taped over a dozen episodes in Las Vegas and had several live tours, but was never able to find a network or streaming service to pick up the series.
GFW eventually had a cross-promotional storyline with Impact for a time, and when Jarrett returned to head up the creative end of things after Impact’s sale to Anthem, the companies announced an official partnership. Since that time, GFW titles have been defended on Impact television. But as of Wednesday, it looks like GFW will be absorbed whole cloth by Anthem. In a press release, Anthem announced its intent to acquire Global Force, and Jarrett will be added to the executive board of Anthem Wrestling Exhibitions.
The full press release:
Anthem Wrestling Exhibitions LLC, a subsidiary of Anthem Sports & Entertainment Corp. and parent company of IMPACT Wrestling, announced today that it has entered into an agreement to acquire Global Force Entertainment, LLC d/b/a Global Force Wrestling.
Jeff Jarrett, the founder of both IMPACT Wrestling and Global Force Entertainment, will join Anthem Wrestling Exhibitions as a member of its board of managers, equity owner and Chief Creative Officer.
“We are thrilled to be joining forces with Anthem as a partner to build the business,” said Karen Jarrett. “This partnership will be complementary of our strengths and bolster our capabilities to grow the IMPACT Wrestling brand. Ed Nordholm as President and Jeff Jarrett as Chief Creative Officer make a great tag team”
“We are excited by the progress we have made with IMPACT Wrestling since acquiring the business in January,” said Ed Nordholm, president of Anthem Wrestling Exhibitions. “Jeff and his team have been instrumental in this success and we are pleased that we have reached an agreement on the basis of which we can combine our businesses to continue to grow. Slammiversary XV will be a fitting occasion to bring the promotions together and merge the titles under the new IMPACT combined belts. By combining our resources and talent, we can produce the best product for our global audience.”
It’s hard to tell what this means at this point. Anthem may intend to shop Global Force as a separate brand or additional television show, and the development of “Anthem Wrestling Exhibitions” seems like a sign they may be trying to build a network of promotions, which would include Impact, GFW, World of Sport in the U.K., and possibly a league for the Indian market. But that’s all purely speculation. Only time will tell!
