Don Callis recently took part in the weekly Impact Wrestling media call and delivered his “State of Impact” address.
From fan feedback to ratings, Impact Wrestling appears to be on an upswing. Callis broke down the promotion’s future and recent history during today’s State of Impact address.
.@CyrusOverHuge is the guest on this week's Media Teleconference as he delivers a State of IMPACT address. Listen along with it NOW!
Callis immediately began the call by addressing the storyline situation involving Sami Callihan. Last week on Impact, company officials only chose not to fire Callihan due to the urging of his rival, Eddie Edwards. Tomorrow night on Impact, Edwards and Callihan will face each other in a street fight hosted by House of Hardcore.
“Some people see help as being told what to do and they don’t like it,” Callis explained. “That’s probably the nicest thing I can say about Sami in that situation, at this point.”
Callis touched on the relationship between Impact Wrestling and Lucha Underground. While the next season of Lucha Underground is set to begin airing later next month, many of the promotion’s stars have become regulars on Impact programming. SEScoops had the chance to ask Callis his thoughts on Impact’s relationship with the rather unique Lucha Libre promotion.
“With respect to the Lucha Underground relationship, I think that’s been one of the more exciting stories in the wrestling business the last 3 months,” Callis stated.
“I think us and LU doing this is is symptomatic of what’s going on in the wrestling business,” Callis continued. “We have broken the traditional old school wrestling paradigms of ‘you only work with who you work with’.”
Stars such as Brian Cage, Johnny Impact/Mondo, Taya Valkyrie, Sami Callihan/Jerimiah Crane, and many others now compete for both promotions regularly.
Callis also gave a couple of updates on the company’s X-Division. In response to a media question, Callis stated he is not looking to separate the division from the rest of the roster. The recent signing of former WWE Cruiserweight Champion, Rich Swann, to the division also was addressed by Callis.
“As you probably know, his wife works for us and was an advocate for him coming in,” Callis explained. “He’ll be at our next set of tapings and he’s going to get an opportunity in the same way other talent that come in gets an opportunity to show what they can do.”
