After reading the spoilers, I have to ask:

With Spike running TNA ads calling them "innovative" and "a new breed" of professional wrestling, is Jarrett as Champ what TNA needed? I'm not trying to start another "Jarrett sucks as champ" thread, I want a serious discussion of the value of Jarrett as champ. If that's possible.

It's possible to say that Raven would have been a good idea. Most marks never got to see Raven as champ in ECW. They've seen him in WCW and in WWE, and it's possible that they really wished that he would've got a chance to really run with a serious title in the respective companies (wCw US Title reign withstanding). As a mark you see Raven with the belt and go "Dude, Raven got the world title? That's different." (I'd like to discuss this as well, as I'm a Raven mark, and I don't see how people can't find at least one thing to like about him. I will reiterate that I would like to discuss how a Raven title run would have been perceived, not whether there is nothing to like about Raven.)

With Jarrett, I see less postive reaction, especially after reading the spoilers. Looking through a marks perspective, the fact that Jarrett was the champ of a failing company isn't a viable argument. A more viable argument would be that the company was failing because of it's choice of champions. Whether or not Jarrett is a good choice of champion relies on the perspective of the fan on his character as someone who actually should get a title shot. Has Jarrett done anything that has been convincing of his qualification to be a champion? Will people tuning in for the first time to the company buy that he is holding a title of value? Will they be willing to give him a chance as a champion? Will they be willing to give a company with him as champion a chance?

Though your answer will most likely be a quick "no," remember how you thought before you were smartened up and answer as that person, not as the smark you are now.

From my mark POV, I've never liked Jarrett, and from smart mark, I hate him because he thinks he's big shit compared to everyone else. Back to my mark reasoning (2 most notable reasons)....

1. He was incredibly boring for nearly every match (I know now that it was because of the "Memphis" style of stalling your balls off and cheating with as much enthusiasm as killing yourself).

2. He did nothing to make his feuds worth a damn (most specifically in WWF with Ramon in 1995 and the Ahmed stuff in his brief return). He just didn't seem threatening enough to make me go "wow", not even as the "Don't Piss Me Off" idiot he became in 1998-99.

Overall, Jarrett just came across as uber-bland. In WCW, I had the same feelings, except he was the World Champion, and that scared me away from watching Nitro and Thunder.

Raven's a bad idea as a first impression champion. He still has the stink of his last WWF run all over him to a casual viewer.

With Jarrett a more casual viewer will say "hey I remember that guy, he used to be the I.C. Champ or was the World Champion in WCW." As much as we hate Jarrett as champ he was a better idea for an introduction into TNA than any of their other big options. He has the least amount of stigma attached to him as far as marks go. Plus judging from the first two shows he's only briefly seen on 10/8. It appears that the X Division will still get the brunt of tv time.

For some reason I've always been a bit of a Jarrett mark, and like him fine as a worker. Problem is (and I'm not just being a mindless IWC mark by saying this) that he is actually turning himself into a carbon copy of Triple H. People jokingly call him JJJ, but its true. He's playing the "heel heat, but not the good kind" role where he oversaturates, always holds the title, and just pisses people off, for real. I'm not sure of his last character that I liked...probably kind of the "Dont Piss Me Off/Slapnuts" dude where he wasn't so self-saturated in the way he is now.

Not sure what I'm trying to say. Anyone help me out? Probably not, cause everyone I know hates Jarrett.

To be honest, as a mark I felt that Jarrett winning the WCW title was a breath of fresh air at the time. I actually found him to be an entertaining heel in the WWF during 98/99 and thought he was doing a good job in WCW and was one of the reasons I was actually watching.

I didn't mind him in TNA until he won the title for the second time from AJ Styles. That really left a sour taste in my mouth and I didn't order a TNA ppv for months. Ironically enough, the next show I ended up ordering was the one where Styles won the title back in a cage match (which was cool, because the match was supposed to be with Chris Harris, not Jarrett).

Right now I'm so sick of the TNA version of Jeff Jarrett that I want to scream. He doesn't have that "cool" factor to him anymore that he once had (from the Attitude era) and he just seems like an aging has-been of a wrestler who wouldn't be headlining any other organization in the world.

See in my opinion, TNA should have went in to the Spike deal with AJ as the champion. The main reason is because he's a fresh face for TNA to attempt to market. They SHOULD try and come across differently than the WWE does and don't mainly feature guys that the average viewer has seen elsewhere 500 times.

Jarrett as a champion now though is a joke. If they weren't planning a title change in the next batch of Spoilers I have no clue why they decided to take the title off of Raven. I'm also not thinking that having Raven keep the title would have been the smartest thing either........but it would have been better than Jarrett at this point.

I'm semi-cool with Jeff coming in as champ, as long as he jobs ASAP, and never returns to the main-event. That could be even more dramatic than AJ starting off, because it would be like the old guard dying. We know that's not happening though.

With a fresh TV deal, they should do a tournament leading up to the title.

With any luck, they'll just kill Jarrett off in the first few months.

Much better... :D

Let's just face it: They gave Jarrett the belt so he could face Kevin Nash at the PPV. This would then bring in the "casual" fans.

The flaw being that most casual fans are over both workers. I told my fellow wrestling fan at work that the company brought in Kevin Nash and her exact words were: "Kevin Nash? Can he still wrestle?" Take this with a grain of salt, though, as she's also a Flair fan.