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2:16

How's it going everyone? It's time for

2:18

another edition of Strictly Business with Eric

2:20

Bischoff here on the ad free shows and

2:22

podcasting networks. I am John Alba and

2:24

yes last week I flew solo, got a

2:27

chat in with AJ Francis, a very divisive

2:29

chat with AJ Francis based on the feedback

2:31

but we can talk about that a little

2:33

bit here too. But

2:36

this wouldn't be Strictly Business without Eric Bischoff

2:38

after all. Can't replace the man so I

2:40

decided let's bring him back. He's back with

2:42

us coming to us from the Bischoff

2:46

compound, the Casa de Bischoff man. How

2:48

you doing? I'm doing

2:50

good but I'm not sure that this internet

2:53

is working with us. Am I coming across

2:55

okay on your end? You're alright on my

2:57

end my friend. Alright well

2:59

then that's all that matters. It's not what it looks

3:01

like to me, it's what it looks and sounds like

3:03

to everybody else. So I'm doing great. Good to be

3:05

home. I spent a week in Minneapolis visiting my brother

3:08

and my sister. My brother just successfully

3:11

completed about six months

3:13

with a cancer treatment and congratulations. Thank

3:15

you and we decided once we got

3:17

the green light last Monday to jump

3:19

in our truck and head

3:21

back to Minnie and we spent a few days there and

3:23

enjoyed it. But good to be back home. First

3:26

thing tomorrow morning, Friday morning as we record,

3:28

I'm off to Hartford, Connecticut making

3:30

an appearance there and about to embark on

3:33

a very busy 60 or 90 days. It's

3:35

going to be crazy. Interesting

3:37

okay well I know your busy busy

3:39

travel days are behind you but you're very

3:42

much trying to take in the travel

3:44

that you do have and I know

3:46

you love interacting with fans so any

3:48

chance to meet Eric Bischoff guys make

3:50

sure you make that opportunity for yourself

3:52

because he always makes time for

3:54

the masses whenever he is out on the road. It's

3:56

great to have you back man like I said last

3:58

week had a chat with AJ Frans. He was someone

4:00

you had been wanting to bring back on the show

4:02

and you know, it's funny Eric I know you've gone

4:04

to no AJ a little bit, but he's

4:07

a very divisive figure in wrestling because

4:09

he's a promoter He's a self promoter.

4:11

He knows how to put himself over

4:14

and I think that confidence comes

4:16

across in a certain way to

4:18

some people But in 2024 if

4:21

you're a pro wrestler who's out there on the market

4:23

You got to know how to draw those

4:25

eyes and get attention on you and I

4:28

appreciate his real-world Experience with the NFL and

4:30

the A&E gig and how he's trying to

4:32

combine all that together I think

4:34

it's important man. You got to shoot your shot out there Yeah,

4:37

indeed And you know I've only really

4:39

had a chance to talk to to either

4:41

once on the podcast and you know I

4:43

felt like we were of similar

4:46

minds and philosophy when it comes

4:48

to professional wrestling So hey,

4:50

he's doing well for himself, man I see his

4:52

name and face just about everywhere I look when it

4:54

comes to wrestling and keep doing what

4:57

you're doing big man Yeah, no doubt about

4:59

it. So I want to thank him for hopping on

5:01

strictly business last week But it's great to have you

5:03

back Eric. We are doing ask Eric this week We

5:05

got a lot of great questions as we try to

5:07

do one a month here on Strictly

5:09

business I did want to chat with you

5:12

about a couple Business things that

5:14

did happen in the wrestling world before we get into some

5:16

of those questions We did get dynamite

5:18

this past week Which we're still waiting the rating as we

5:20

tape this it could come in while we're on air and

5:22

if that does happen We'll make sure we bring it to

5:24

you know, it's gonna be interesting I don't I don't mean

5:26

to interrupt you John. It's very rude, but I I don't

5:29

want to lose this point last week You

5:32

know when Mercedes Monet she made her

5:34

big debut and there was highly anticipated

5:36

everybody in the internet knew about it

5:39

Anybody that was watching a ew knew

5:41

that the event of course

5:44

Including the graphics promoting the event

5:47

was letting everybody know that Mercedes Monet

5:49

was going to be there So there

5:51

are those who since the rating came

5:54

in at? I'll call

5:56

it an abysmal level Given

5:59

The fact is so. Which was made of

6:01

Mercedes and so much anticipation within

6:03

the the The The the glue

6:06

fact I mean a fan base

6:08

for a w arm evidence operate

6:10

so the excuse was well nobody

6:13

knew she was com it. Really?

6:17

Okay, that's laughable.

6:20

But less is play along.

6:23

And will find out. Whether.

6:25

It was laughable, or whether it

6:27

was a valid point because of

6:29

the ratings don't move significantly. There's

6:32

no excuse. Me

6:34

excuse. Last week as well they were promoted. nobody

6:36

knew she was drunk. Again,

6:38

I'm sort of fly them

6:41

Allen Arm. But. Exists

6:43

I'm wrong. will find out when

6:45

the race tomorrow if they can

6:47

break nine hundred thousand Nine hundred

6:49

Fifty thousand God forbid given them

6:51

Mercedes will make reportedly I don't

6:54

know this is a fact is

6:56

being reported as she has the

6:58

highest paid female sports entertainment entertainer

7:00

in the industry. Now I don't

7:02

want to get while this justice

7:05

because I don't know what that

7:07

number really is. I'm sure there's

7:09

rang somewhere between three and five

7:11

million. Would. Be a gas.

7:14

And I could wrong about that. But think

7:16

of gloves that's a big red trying to

7:18

be three could be for could be flat

7:20

arm. And.

7:23

Will. Get a significant number this week

7:25

and there are no more skew. says.

7:28

Then he comes down to. Become.

7:31

Booking. Strategy. Or

7:34

lack thereof. Creative or lack thereof.

7:36

All the things I've been talking

7:38

about for two years had of

7:40

manifesting into what is become a

7:42

rather a. Dismal.

7:46

Outlook. right? now for

7:48

a w but i guess we'll find out

7:50

i guess that's one of the things i

7:52

like about doing this oh wait i'm at

7:54

thursday's we have that and those numbers to

7:57

anticipate snob just spent two minutes on this

7:59

diatribe and position myself and

8:01

my perspective on things. Now

8:03

we get to find out during the course of the show,

8:05

maybe, whether I'm right or whether I'm

8:07

wrong. Exciting. Yeah,

8:11

I talked about it last week on the podcast

8:13

a little bit where my

8:15

biggest gripe with the Mercedes stuff, I mean, I

8:17

thought she came out and she looked like a

8:19

superstar, acted like a superstar, but we've talked about

8:21

it so much here on this podcast, Eric. Show

8:24

structure where you have that clear a

8:26

story threading throughout where we saw

8:29

Mercedes once at the beginning of the show

8:31

and then as a surprise at the end.

8:33

But imagine if we had had Mercedes backstage

8:35

interacting with a few different women throughout the

8:37

course of the show. Imagine if we had

8:39

her interacting with John Moxley or Brian Danielson

8:42

to tell everyone in your audience that she's

8:44

as big of a star as they are

8:46

and reminding them that she could show up

8:48

again later in the night. I feel like

8:50

that would have reflected better. There's a

8:53

million different ways that they could have

8:55

created actual story and threaded it

8:57

through and constructed

9:00

that story within a story. That thread, we'll

9:02

just call it a thread, that thread with

9:04

Mercedes and you know what you want to

9:06

have happen at the end of the show.

9:09

You know the finish. Work backwards

9:11

from that finish and give us a couple

9:13

plot points along the way. It can be

9:15

something very subtle. It could be a look

9:18

over her shoulder at another talent, be it

9:20

male or female. It could be anything or

9:22

as you described it. There's a million different

9:24

things you could do that are better than

9:28

doing nothing. I mean I don't get it.

9:30

Tony Khan doesn't know how to produce television. It's

9:34

pure and simple. It's that fundamental. Well they

9:36

did change it up a little bit on

9:39

this week's episode where we had her in

9:41

the ring to start. Then there was a

9:43

video package talking about her journey since she

9:45

left WWE and they kind of gave you

9:47

a little teaser as to what's to come

9:49

with Willow and how her injury happened. Then

9:51

we saw them again backstage after there was

9:53

some physicality earlier. They

9:55

did adjust a little bit. We'll see if that's

9:57

reflected in the rating. was

10:00

really interesting about this show was

10:02

the third hour which they

10:05

moved Rampage over to be the third

10:07

hour on, you

10:09

didn't have to change the channel. It stayed

10:11

on TBS. And Brandon Thurston brought

10:13

this up and I think this has kind of been

10:15

reflected in a lot of the discourse that with

10:18

the WBD rights up this year and they're

10:20

still in the negotiation window, could

10:22

this have been a test of sorts to see

10:24

if there's an appetite for three hours of dynamite?

10:27

What do you think about that? I

10:29

mean, anything's possible and I

10:31

actually reposted Brandon's comment

10:33

to that effect on X. Respect

10:37

Brandon's work, he's very objective. He

10:40

looks at both sides of a situation or

10:42

an issue or in his reporting, at least

10:44

he's clearly playing it down

10:46

the middle as opposed to, you know,

10:48

unfortunately, some of the people that are

10:51

out there, specifically

10:53

Dave Meltzer is just becoming a

10:55

complete fucking caricature of himself. But

10:57

I'm here for it. I

10:59

applaud it. Yeah,

11:01

it's a good observation and it could

11:03

be true. I mean, I

11:06

would imagine if there is

11:08

interest in resigning AEW

11:12

to a new deal, there are

11:14

probably different discussions going on

11:17

on how best to maximize

11:19

the resource. What's

11:22

the best opportunity to maximize

11:25

gain, return on investment

11:28

for that property? And if looking at three

11:30

hours is a topic of discussion, well,

11:32

now you've got a valid reason

11:34

to give it a try and measure it and see.

11:40

I definitely foresee

11:42

this being something that

11:44

we see more of with more

11:46

experiments as to whether

11:49

people stick around. They've done battle the

11:51

belts after dynamite before or after rampage,

11:53

but not directly on the same network.

11:56

So I'm very interested to see

11:58

what carryover there is because also. So Eric, the

12:00

one thing we have to keep in mind here is

12:03

the main event, which was Christian Cage

12:05

versus Adam Copeland in the I

12:07

quit match, went against one

12:10

of the first four games for the NCAA

12:12

tournament. It was a great game that went

12:14

to overtime and March Madness is an event

12:16

that does huge numbers on TV every single

12:18

year. That's why collision is actually preempted this

12:20

week because we've got the first

12:23

and second rounds of the NCAA tournament over

12:25

on the other Turner networks and they need

12:28

the real estate for that. So interested to

12:30

see what kind of effect that

12:33

could have on things. Did

12:35

you guys have? Who was in the game? What

12:38

was it? Last night's game that

12:40

that did big numbers. That was

12:42

Colorado and Boise State. And

12:45

what were the ratings for that? You know, yeah, I don't

12:47

think we've gotten it in yet, but it was it went

12:49

to overtime. It was a really good game. And

12:51

it was there was no other game going on

12:53

at the time because you know off the top of your neck.

12:56

This is not a test. I mean, you know me well enough to

12:58

know I don't carry the shit around in my head. But

13:02

do you have any idea what would be

13:04

considered a good solid number for that opening

13:06

game of March Madness?

13:09

Let's see. I can tell you here. I

13:12

knew you could. I knew you had this shit. You're a sports

13:14

guy. That's a sport guy. Let's see. So

13:18

Tuesday's first four game because so there are

13:21

two sets of games. Tuesday's first

13:24

four game did almost two million viewers for

13:26

the prime time game. So I'd imagine it

13:28

was probably about the same for this one.

13:30

That's not that big a number. I mean,

13:32

I get it. It

13:34

is competition. This is a better game though. And

13:36

this one went to overtime for what it's worth.

13:38

If that's worth anything. If I

13:41

hear Jay Meltzer use that

13:44

as an excuse. I'm

13:49

just I'm going to need to take

13:51

an hour or two off and out of my day

13:53

just to roll on the floor and laugh. It'll

13:57

just be hilarious. Did you guys ever

14:00

experience that going against March Madness? I know it was

14:02

a totally different. No,

14:05

and I was gonna bring that up. We

14:07

didn't even bitch about going head to head

14:09

against WWE and Monday Night Football for crying

14:11

out loud. I

14:14

mean, come on, NCAA

14:16

basketball. I'm sorry.

14:19

It's a big property now, Eric. It is very different.

14:22

No, it's a big property and I'm not just missing

14:24

it as a property, but not the first couple

14:26

games, not the first couple rounds.

14:30

Your hardcore betting public sports

14:32

betters. Yeah, sure. They're

14:34

pounding beers at their local sports

14:37

bar at the sports

14:39

book over at a casino in Vegas somewhere,

14:42

but it's

14:44

just not a hot television property.

14:47

Not yet, it will be. It

14:49

definitely will be, but not now. And

14:51

no, we never considered

14:53

it. We never went, you know

14:55

what, we're gonna be up against a really good game

14:57

and March Madness, by the way,

14:59

was hot when I was a kid in college. So

15:01

it's not like it just got hot recently. It's

15:04

hotter now probably because of gaming,

15:07

quite honestly, and sports betting, which has changed

15:09

dramatically over the last 15 years. But

15:13

it was always hot, just not early

15:15

on. And even when it got hot,

15:17

we never adjusted our creative to

15:20

work around it. We never ramped

15:22

up creative knowing we were gonna be head

15:25

to head. We never, you know, benched anybody

15:27

because well, why burn

15:29

up a good storyline? Because we're gonna be

15:31

going head to head against the first round

15:33

of March Madness. Those conversations never took place

15:35

on the- I don't

15:37

know, last year's tournament averaged 10 million

15:40

viewers per round. So I'm

15:42

not sure- What is per round?

15:44

Is that per game? So you have multiple

15:47

games going on at once and you're

15:49

taking an average of all that. Okay,

15:53

that wasn't last night though. That's later on

15:55

in the season. That's later on. So that

15:58

will be starting today. Starting today. Okay. Well,

16:01

we'll find out. I love this. Let's

16:03

check in with Brandon Thurston and see what Brandon

16:05

has to say. The

16:08

strictly business correspondent. Hey, I got to say

16:10

this real quick here. And you know it's

16:12

all love here. It's all love here. But

16:15

I had like 15 people send

16:17

me the clip of you on 83 weeks saying

16:20

that I create stories for AEW in my

16:22

head. You do. And

16:24

I just want to say this, Eric. I

16:28

have nothing to gain. Nothing

16:30

to gain by

16:32

carrying water for any company.

16:35

It is not in my interest to do that. So

16:38

much more of my day is spent on actual

16:40

professional sports coverage. When

16:43

I talk about a story that I see

16:45

on AEW, on WWE TV or Recap, how

16:47

I interpret it, because we did it with

16:50

the Cody stuff too. That

16:52

is just from my experience of watching and

16:55

how I consume

16:57

and digest the content that I

16:59

am watching. And I'll always

17:01

say this. I will never tell

17:04

someone whether to think something is

17:06

good, bad, compelling, not compelling. All

17:09

I can talk about is how

17:11

it registers with me personally. I

17:15

don't give a shit to

17:17

make an excuse for a company on,

17:20

oh, this is great. This is bad. This is why you

17:22

should care. This is why you shouldn't care. I

17:25

just wanted to put that out there into the ether. Oh,

17:27

no, I know. It's much the same as like when I was

17:29

a kid and I would look up at the clouds and I,

17:32

oh, that looks like a cat. Oh,

17:35

I see an eagle. I

17:37

hate you so much. It's the same

17:39

thing. You know, you watch it and

17:42

you see what you see. When

17:44

I was seven and the spirit of the clouds, I get it. I

17:47

hate you so much. That

17:51

was good. That was good. Also,

17:54

one more order of business before we get to questions. How

17:57

about these bad boys? Remember, we talked about this in

17:59

the N.F. a few months back WWE

18:02

announced the 30 new championship belts

18:04

for Major

18:06

League Baseball. These are retailing at over $500 a

18:08

pop opening day. Technically,

18:12

technically started a couple days ago in

18:14

Korea. But how about those,

18:16

man? Those are pretty nice. You can pick

18:18

up yours now in WWE shop. It's in

18:20

partnership with Fanatics. Just more of this branching

18:23

out into the public realm and trying to

18:25

get those casual sports fans embedded

18:27

with the WWE branding, right? That

18:30

and making a shit ton of money. I

18:33

mean, I would like to know how much

18:35

revenue is created for WWE specifically

18:38

for their replica belts and

18:40

championship belts and these

18:43

kind of, I guess, souvenir

18:46

collectibles. I mean,

18:48

there's gotta be a massive number. Every time I

18:50

go to a big event, I'm seeing people walking

18:52

around with this stuff strapped over their shoulders and

18:54

they're not cheap. Some of them are

18:57

really, really heavy and they're nice. I mean, holy

19:00

smokes. I'd be curious, Brandon

19:02

Thurston, if you're listening, let's

19:04

do a little bit of research and find out

19:06

if we can. I'm sure

19:09

this is buried in the FCC filing

19:11

somewhere deep. You probably have to get

19:13

a forensic accountant to figure it all

19:15

out. But it'd be really interesting to

19:17

know, even if it's a guesstimate, how

19:20

much revenue is being generated strictly

19:23

out of all WWE

19:25

merchandise, specifically their belts.

19:28

That'd be a cool number to know. It's not

19:30

too shabby, man. Look at those. And the other thing-

19:32

No, it's classy. We observed this

19:35

last time with the NFL belts. The

19:37

WWE logo is not on them. So

19:40

you'd have to imagine that there's even more

19:42

price point for that, because

19:45

WWE is forgoing its branding on

19:47

these belts. So I'm interested to

19:49

see what that would be. No, I see

19:51

a WWE logo on top of the- At

19:54

the small top there of the Braves one. Yeah, I

19:56

see that now. Yeah, and also on the Philadelphia. No,

19:58

there's a WWE logo. Yeah, but um,

20:00

you know normally with their belts they have

20:03

on the plates like the where the Dodgers

20:05

logo It is on the right side there

20:07

and the Phillies logo. So yeah, that's that's

20:09

interesting. But they look great They're really cool.

20:12

Have you been following the Shohei Ohtani news, by the

20:14

way? No, I haven't So

20:17

this is nuts and I'll send you

20:19

some links after but is it nettier

20:21

than wrestling shit? Yes It's

20:25

like potentially a massive scandal that could

20:27

undo Shohei Ohtani So

20:30

his interpreter who in that

20:32

massive one billion dollar contract

20:34

that he signed His

20:37

interpreter was part of the

20:40

protections in it where Shohei

20:42

said that the team cannot fire

20:44

the interpreter And if they do he could void

20:46

the contract. There's a whole bunch of language in

20:48

the contract for that His

20:52

interpreter was fired this

20:55

week By

20:57

Ohtani's people out of nowhere and

21:00

now they filed a lawsuit against

21:02

him for claiming that He

21:05

stole money from Ohtani to

21:07

pay off illegal gambling debts

21:10

Except the money

21:12

came from Ohtani's personal bank

21:14

account with Ohtani's name on

21:18

These payments so there are

21:20

a lot of people out there and it sounds

21:22

like there's gonna be some investigations Who

21:25

are trying to suggest that this

21:27

is a fall job and that

21:29

Shohei was the one who was gambling

21:31

and the interpreter? Took the

21:33

fall for him saying no, it was me and I

21:35

was just using his money So

21:37

it's a it's a massive massive story

21:40

and I bet you there's gonna be some Investigations

21:42

in the very near future coming out of it.

21:44

Wait a minute. Wait, I'm trying to follow here.

21:46

So Ohtani

21:51

had a clause in his contract that says you can't

21:53

fire my interpreter Correct. All

21:56

right That's pretty interesting. But okay

22:00

But Otani

22:03

fired the interpreter. No

22:06

one knows why, except for there was a

22:09

massive amount of money that went to pay

22:11

off the gambling debt and people are suggesting

22:13

that perhaps the manager, being

22:15

as loyal as he was, and probably gonna get a

22:17

piece of change on top of it, decided

22:20

to take the fall so that the

22:24

adverse reflection, the negative reflection,

22:26

Otani, for being an

22:29

addict. That is

22:31

the theory. And Otani's people have

22:33

filed a lawsuit against the interpreter

22:36

claiming theft. So

22:39

Otani's people have gone so far to perpetrate

22:41

this alleged fraud as

22:44

to file a lawsuit? That's, they

22:46

are planning on filing a lawsuit is

22:49

my understanding. They are

22:51

alleging theft against him. And it's

22:53

wild, man. I'll send you some

22:55

links, but I know you got in the-

22:57

There's a chain of fucking shenanigans going on there

22:59

in the- Crazy. How in the

23:02

wacky world of baseball. Well, I know you were super

23:04

in on the Otani contract, so that's why I had

23:06

to bring that up too, because there's, oh

23:08

boy, could it be interesting here. But

23:11

we'll see, we'll see. As of now, he

23:13

has not been accused of any wrongdoing, but

23:15

I would imagine some investigations are ongoing in

23:17

the near future. Okay, Eric, we

23:20

asked people to send in their questions to

23:22

ask you about the business of the business.

23:24

So let's get into it. We got Brad

23:26

from Facebook. This is a really cool question

23:28

that I actually never thought about the logistics

23:30

of. He says, how

23:32

are airfares negotiated with all the

23:34

companies when there were wrestlers that had

23:37

first-class booking in their respective contracts? Not

23:41

sure I understand the question. It's no different

23:43

than some

23:46

of the talent who had first-class as part

23:48

of their agreements, it's reflected in their

23:50

contracts. The people that did travel was advised

23:53

of that. They know that. There's a list

23:56

of everybody who is first-class according

23:58

to contract. And if your

24:00

name was on that list, when they booked your flights, they booked your

24:02

first class. If your name was not on that list, then they booked

24:04

your coach. Where

24:07

was the money? Was the money, and

24:09

for WCW, was the money coming out

24:12

of the talent pocket for everyone

24:14

across the board? No, WCW, no, WCW

24:16

paid for all travel. That's

24:18

what I was going to ask because famously

24:21

WWE hasn't always done that. Um,

24:23

when you were a talent with WWE, were they

24:25

paying for your travel? Yes. Okay.

24:28

I'm not sure if that was one size fits

24:30

all because a lot of talent have gone on

24:32

to say that that was not the case for them. Yeah.

24:35

It may have been different because I

24:37

wasn't a wrestler. There

24:40

may have been different categories of

24:42

talent. Um, because

24:45

again, as a, as a GM, especially one that

24:47

only showed up one day a week in most

24:49

cases, it's not like I was out in house,

24:52

house show loops and things like that. There's

24:54

no opportunity for me to make merchandise

24:57

money. There's no upside opportunities for a

24:59

general manager for the most part.

25:01

So maybe that was the difference. I don't

25:03

know, but no, they covered all my travel.

25:06

Yeah. Okay. Good. Good insight

25:08

there. We got Mike Whitaker asking

25:10

since WrestleMania is a two night event. Do

25:13

you ever see night one and night two being

25:15

in different locations? Welcome

25:18

to talk about the ultimate small bill. We

25:20

watch podcasts title transference aired October 27th, 2004,

25:22

director James Marshall,

25:25

writers, Todd Slaffkin, parents, swimmer. I really

25:27

liked this episode and I'm surprised that

25:29

you don't like it as much as

25:31

you thought you did. I actually respect

25:33

your opinion more than I respect my

25:35

own in general. When

25:37

you say things are good and I check

25:39

them out, they are jump in now or

25:41

catch up on any of the past seasons

25:44

of talk bill on YouTube or wherever you

25:46

listen. Hi

25:48

there. Sorry for the interruption,

25:50

but are you enjoying this show on

25:53

Google podcast? You should know that the

25:55

Google podcast app is going away this

25:57

spring. That's right. Going away.

26:00

gone as in no longer available.

26:02

You can still enjoy this show

26:04

elsewhere though. Try out Spotify or

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Amazon Music or maybe tune it

26:09

is more your style. Whatever app you

26:11

switch to, be sure to follow so

26:13

you never miss the next episode.

26:15

And thanks for listening, wherever you

26:17

listen. I

26:22

never thought about that and

26:24

the logistics of it makes

26:28

my brain start to cook. So I

26:31

don't want to think too much about that part of it.

26:34

But I can't help it because it's kind of a cool

26:36

idea. Right? Especially

26:39

with overseas, you know, you know, PLE

26:41

is taking place overseas now. What

26:43

if you had, you know, a WrestleMania UK and

26:46

a... Well, timing would be different, but that's okay.

26:49

You could... Whoa! What if you could

26:51

do it, you know, and take advantage

26:53

of the time difference and have like

26:57

WrestleMania UK when that ends, you've maybe got

26:59

an hour or two break and then WrestleMania

27:01

starts here. I don't know what the... You

27:04

know, I have to sit down with a

27:06

map and calculator and figure out the

27:08

time zone differences and all that. But it'll be an

27:11

interesting idea. It

27:13

changes the perception

27:15

of the spectacle of it. When

27:17

you've got a major event taking

27:19

place in two different venues on

27:21

opposite sides of the globe, that

27:24

gives the whole thing a much

27:27

bigger field, isn't it? Yeah,

27:30

it really would be interesting to do it in

27:32

different venues. Now, WrestleMania has been done in the

27:35

past from different venues on the same day, but

27:37

doing two different venues on two different nights would

27:40

definitely be a different dynamic. It might... Wait

27:43

a minute, John, are you saying WrestleMania

27:45

has taken place in two different venues?

27:48

WrestleMania has been done from different venues

27:50

before on the same night, but

27:53

not on different

27:55

nights. So... What

27:57

was it? Do you remember? It

28:01

was WrestleMania The

28:03

die-hard fans are gonna kill me on this WrestleMania

28:06

I Want to

28:08

say it was WrestleMania for

28:11

perhaps It

28:14

or no, that was Atlantic City It

28:17

might have been two I didn't do

28:19

my research here. That's all right If

28:25

you walked around with that knowledge in the top of your

28:27

head So when somebody asks you like I just did and

28:30

you have that information without having to look for

28:32

it, you'd be weird You

28:34

you would there would because all that space

28:36

that's occupying that part of your brain should

28:38

be devoted to something else It means a

28:41

whole lot more not

28:43

only with the person but to humanity

28:45

and All

28:48

of us it was it

28:50

was WrestleMania too It was the Nassau

28:52

Coliseum the Rosemont Horizon and the Los

28:54

Angeles Memorial Sports Arena So

28:56

that was all on one night and they went to

28:58

different venues throughout the night So

29:01

they had different live matches in each one

29:03

of those venues all for that

29:05

event for WrestleMania to Wow That's

29:08

pretty cool. I didn't even know that yeah You

29:11

know kind of feels like a ripoff for the people who

29:13

pay to see it in person They're only getting a third

29:15

of a show in person. Maybe that's why they

29:17

never did it again Yeah,

29:20

but uh, but I think I do

29:22

think there might be something to different

29:24

venues on different nights There could be

29:26

something there. So well, and I think

29:28

you know today just from a consumer

29:30

perspective. I Hear

29:33

so many people who are diehard fans. I

29:35

mean, they're going to WrestleMania. They play their

29:37

entire year around it They budget for it.

29:39

They vacation, you know, they budget their vacation

29:42

time for it They booked their flights six

29:44

months in advance or longer But

29:48

even those people complain about

29:50

it's just too much you

29:52

know too nice of WrestleMania

29:56

in one venue in their long nights. So

29:59

I don't think I think just

30:01

because of the way everything has changed, I don't

30:03

think you get as much pushback, especially

30:06

if one was taking place overseas and one here in

30:09

the States. I think that

30:11

would be successful if they could figure out how

30:13

to pull it off. Really well at some point.

30:15

I do love that it's a seven o'clock start

30:17

time this year at Eastern. That makes life a

30:19

lot easier here. So I'm game with

30:21

that. It'll be done by two in the morning. That's

30:23

awesome. Now, dude, these

30:26

shows are manageable now that they're two days. They don't

30:28

try to do a seven hour WrestleMania anymore, which is

30:30

nice. Those

30:32

are brutal. Let's see here.

30:34

We got wrestling historian always ask great questions.

30:36

Says, would you normally handle WCW contracts when

30:39

somebody wants to join the company? If not,

30:41

who did? I

30:44

very seldom dealt with

30:46

contractual issues unless it

30:49

was something unique. Randy

30:51

Savage, Hulk Hogan. A

30:56

renegotiation, for example, with Bill Goldberg.

30:59

That was a little tricky. He wasn't

31:01

even due to be renegotiated. And we

31:03

ended up having to renegotiate with him.

31:06

So unless a contract was

31:08

very unusual or it

31:10

involved, trying to

31:12

think of the politically correct way of saying it, but

31:14

I don't give a fuck. Unless

31:17

it was relevant to

31:19

the contract negotiations were relevant to a

31:22

star of specific magnitude,

31:25

those I would handle, or at

31:27

least be kept very much in the

31:29

loop if I wasn't negotiating them myself.

31:33

I would be very much in the loop, like copied

31:35

on everything, made aware of every

31:37

phone call with attorneys or

31:39

managers or whatever. But that

31:43

didn't happen that often. When

31:45

you think about it, I would say

31:48

80% of the contracts were

31:50

negotiated or renegotiated without

31:52

my involvement. As long

31:54

as I fit within a budget, we had

31:56

a budget allocation. Somebody wanted

31:59

if Kevin Sullivan, for example, had somebody

32:01

that he really believed in and that person

32:03

was coming up for renewal, Kevin

32:05

would let me know. Well, talent relations or

32:07

Diana Myers, usually Nick Labros would have said,

32:09

hey, Kevin, this individual's got six months left

32:11

in their deal or three months left in

32:13

their deal, whatever the case may be, just

32:16

want to give you a heads

32:18

up so we could plan accordingly

32:20

creatively. So we weren't booking somebody

32:22

into a very, very significant opportunity

32:24

storyline-wise only to find out that,

32:26

oh, we have

32:29

to renegotiate because their deal's up next week. You know,

32:31

you didn't want that to happen. I'd

32:34

approve those, you know, but

32:36

I wouldn't get involved in them. Let's

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34:25

right interesting one here eric from d current

34:28

is there a market for wrestling companies to

34:30

offer pay-per-views as audio coverage similar

34:32

to wwf radio in the 90s

34:34

and wcw audio content through aol

34:36

it's a really interesting one eric

34:39

i don't traditionally think about radio play by play

34:41

of wrestling but it'd be pretty unique in

34:43

2024 what say you i

34:48

love the idea of it because i love

34:52

listening to sports on the

34:54

radio i

34:56

when it's done well when when you

34:58

have a really really good broadcast team

35:01

that is great at radio i

35:05

think it's a far more

35:07

enjoyable experience for me than

35:10

watching if i have an opportunity to

35:12

listen to a college football game or

35:15

to listen to an nfl game on

35:18

radio or watch it

35:20

on television i'll listen to it almost

35:23

every time now if it's a communal

35:25

thing and i get friends a family over whatever if it's

35:27

part of a party that's different

35:30

but if it's just a sunday afternoon

35:33

and this is typically how i

35:35

consume sports the nfl particularly is

35:38

if it's a nice fall day i jump

35:40

in my truck with my dog i take

35:42

a ride up into the mountains and

35:45

i listen to i listen to

35:47

games on cbs sports i

35:50

love radio color and play by play

35:52

absolutely love it and i miss it

35:55

and a lot of times you and i have

35:57

spoken about color and play by play and what

35:59

my preferences are. I'm not saying

36:01

it's good or bad, it's just what

36:03

I like. It's my taste, subjective. I

36:09

really, really enjoy when

36:12

you've got a color and play-by-play combination that

36:15

could also be doing it even though

36:17

it's for television, it could easily be

36:19

radio because they're describing things.

36:22

They're giving you a sense of

36:24

the excitement and being part of

36:26

the experience from

36:29

an audio level Grand is television, vision. We

36:31

got the vision part. That's cool and that's

36:33

entertaining, but really good

36:35

audio, really

36:37

well done color and play-by-play I

36:40

think is more entertaining for

36:43

me because now I get to engage

36:45

my imagination. If it's all

36:47

happening right there in front of me, I don't have to think

36:49

about it much, it's all right there. I see the guy, he's

36:52

got the ball, quarterback, he's going to run for, oh it's going

36:54

to be a long pass. I get it, that's fun too, but

36:57

there's something about listening to the description

37:00

of that play when it's done really

37:02

well that a lot engages

37:04

my imagination in a way that for

37:06

me is more enjoyable than just watching

37:08

it. Well, radio play-by-play

37:10

is all about imagery. You

37:12

have to paint imagery for the viewer,

37:14

for the listener because they have to

37:16

be able to see the play in

37:19

their head when you're describing it. And

37:22

when you do it with sports that

37:24

are super fast paced like hockey, for

37:27

example, hockey radio play-by-play guys in my

37:29

opinion are the most talented in the industry because think

37:31

of how fast the hockey game moves and how descriptive

37:33

you have to be. Guys are coming in and off

37:35

the ice in real time. It

37:38

is an incredible talent to be a

37:40

great radio play-by-play guy. So I think

37:42

if someone was doing radio play-by-play for

37:44

pro wrestling, you might,

37:46

Eric, have to sacrifice some of the

37:48

storytelling element of it in order to

37:50

provide that imagery for the person. No,

37:52

no, no, that's why you have a

37:54

color commentator. Your play-by-play guy

37:57

can rip and I used

37:59

to do it. I was good at

38:01

it, but that's the way I was

38:03

trained, basically, to, because I had

38:05

zero experience. I'd never sat in front of

38:07

a microphone before. And when

38:09

Vern was breaking me in, and I got

38:11

by the name of Mike Shields, and to

38:14

a degree Greg Ganya, there

38:16

was a lot of people that had input. Lee

38:18

Marshall, who is a sports broadcaster from

38:20

Los Angeles at one point, I

38:25

was probably mentored

38:28

to treat my play-by-play more like

38:30

a radio person would, than

38:33

what we're familiar with today. But

38:37

if you've got a good play-by-play guy,

38:39

and your color man is there to

38:41

augment and to weave the story in,

38:44

and advance the story while your play-by-play guy is

38:46

ripping it and calling the action and describing the

38:48

event and how stale the popcorn smells and what

38:50

kind of beer is smelled spilled on the floor,

38:52

you give me that vibe. I'm all in, brother.

38:55

I'm all in. You want to hear an interesting

38:57

point? You mentioned hockey, and we're

38:59

talking about pro wrestling. Did

39:01

you ever, this guy's a little bit older than you, you've

39:06

ever heard the name Ralph Strangis? He

39:10

was the play-by-play guy for the Dallas North

39:12

Stars for a long time. He

39:15

started in play-by-play with me in

39:17

the AWA. Oh, really? He

39:19

got hired out of

39:21

professional wrestling, Bern Gagne,

39:24

AWA. I think he got hired with the

39:26

Minnesota North Stars. They were still based in

39:28

Minnesota then. And then when they got

39:30

sold or moved to Dallas, whatever

39:32

the deal was, Ralph went with

39:34

him. And he was there for a long time. But

39:36

Ralph he cut his

39:39

teeth, learning how to do play-by-play under

39:41

Bern Gagne and Greg and Mike Shields.

39:44

Same time, same place I did. Interesting. It's

39:47

a little bit of trivia. If

39:50

I'm not going to say, it was probably around the early 90s. He went

39:52

over to Minnesota so that would line

39:54

up timeline-wise. That's interesting. Really

39:56

cool. Listen, man, if you can

39:58

do play-by-play well for pro wrestling... You can do

40:00

a lot of things because it is not an easy avenue

40:03

to succeed in. I honestly, I think it's

40:05

one of the most under appreciated

40:10

elements in the show. It's so, and

40:12

I think we've talked about this before, I

40:14

think that's, Color and Play by

40:16

Play, I think is

40:18

the one last

40:22

area that

40:24

could undergo a significant

40:27

overhaul and add

40:29

value and make the product better.

40:31

I mean production values, you're always going to,

40:34

there's always going to be new equipment, there's

40:36

always going to be new technology, there's always

40:38

going to be new ideas, because that's driven

40:40

by creative people as well. So you're always

40:42

going to have different

40:44

attempts to elevate production, but

40:47

I think in terms of the

40:49

overall presentation, Color

40:52

and Play by Play is the

40:54

weakest link in the

40:56

professional wrestling as the entertainment chain. It's

40:59

the one that could undergo the most transformation

41:01

and I think could improve the quality of

41:03

the product in a big way. And

41:06

getting back to the question that started all this, I

41:10

don't know if there's a market for it, but I sure

41:12

wish there would be. And I'd sure, I would participate. I'd

41:16

sign up for it. And I would

41:18

probably listen to it more than I would watch

41:20

it. I would probably be one of those guys

41:22

that would plug in the audio version and

41:25

watch it on television, but turned on the Color and Play by

41:27

Play on TV. Yeah. I'd be that guy.

41:29

Yeah, I used to do that for baseball games all

41:31

the time. I'll tell you,

41:33

man, it's amazing how much better Michael

41:35

Cole is with Vince McMahon, not in

41:38

his ear. Michael Cole is really showing

41:40

how good he is that he can

41:42

be the natural play by play guy

41:44

and facilitator traffic navigator that he is.

41:46

He's excellent. And some of these production

41:48

changes that Lee Fitting has brought in,

41:50

I know you posted about that one

41:52

tracking shot that they had, that they

41:54

went in between segments. I

41:57

just, that's the type of stuff that makes your

41:59

TV feel innovative. every week and keeps

42:01

it spicy too for the viewer. I really

42:03

dug that stuff. Let's

42:07

get to this one from

42:09

G Wrestling. If

42:11

you could have your time as executive of WCW

42:13

again, how would you set up your support staff?

42:15

Would you have hired more outside writers, have a

42:18

head of talent relations? How different would your overall

42:20

team look compared to how it was? It

42:23

would have looked a lot different. I would have overhauled

42:26

right at the very beginning. I

42:28

was soft. I never enjoyed

42:30

firing people, believe it or not. I

42:33

know because my reputation was

42:35

power hungry and through my way around. It's

42:38

the exact opposite. If I had

42:42

the chance to, I

42:44

mean literally go back in time and have the

42:46

same people in the same position, same situation, I

42:50

would probably have eliminated

42:52

60 or more

42:55

percent of

42:57

the VP director staff and

43:00

replaced them. Because I inherited

43:04

to a degree a incestuous,

43:10

is it the right word? What? A

43:15

group of people that had

43:18

been embedded in WCW from

43:21

the very beginning, and many of

43:23

them had been embedded with Jim

43:25

Crockett promotions. There was a culture,

43:28

there was not

43:30

nepotism, but favoritism. There

43:33

was history, good and

43:36

bad. All of that came

43:40

from Jim Crockett promotions into

43:42

WCW and existed when

43:44

I was there as a talent and continued

43:46

to exist once I got into management. By

43:49

the time I got to,

43:52

I don't even know if I was ever

43:54

exact, I think I might have gone from senior vice president

43:56

to president. I don't remember. But by

43:58

the time I, I, I

44:02

could have and should have made probably

44:06

no fewer than 8 to 10 major changes. But I

44:08

didn't because I thought I could fix it. I thought,

44:10

ah, they'll come around. You

44:13

know, they're all having all the success. They'll get

44:15

on board. People don't.

44:20

People that are people

44:24

that carry around resentment, jealousy, envy, all the

44:27

things that make one week, really. They

44:30

don't lose it. They

44:32

bury it a little more. They do a better

44:34

job camouflaging it. They're not as obvious about it.

44:40

And that didn't become apparent to

44:42

me until two days. And it

44:44

was late in the game and I'm talking about early 99

44:46

and I went, oh, my God, why are these people still

44:48

here? Oh, they're still here because I allowed them to be

44:51

here. And that wasn't just me. I

44:57

think any time someone

45:00

comes in either from the outside or in my

45:02

case, I might as well have been from the

45:04

outside, really, to take over and be

45:07

in control. The

45:09

people that were there long before them to

45:13

varying degrees are going to be resentful because it should have

45:15

been me or it should have been my friend over here

45:17

or it should have been this guy. He deserves it more.

45:20

She deserves it more. It's

45:23

human nature, unfortunately, but it's also one of

45:26

the reasons why when

45:28

executives come in or when companies

45:30

acquire other companies, it

45:34

can be a bloodbath, a

45:37

bloodbath, not a literal one. A

45:40

figurative of one. And I think I should have

45:42

probably had my own bloodbath at the beginning, but

45:44

I didn't. I

45:46

want to ask – My dog heard me

45:48

say blood. My dog heard me say bloodbath.

45:50

She got all excited. Let's go. See that? I want to

45:53

ask this one from Adam here. the

46:00

heels I don't know if you saw this Bellator struck

46:02

a deal with Warner Brothers discovery where Bellator's events are

46:04

gonna be on max so that's

46:07

a pretty interesting domino to fall there on

46:09

the streaming side for max Adam

46:12

asking it looks like a W is moving towards

46:14

having a pay-per-view every month or so how

46:16

much longer do you think a W can sustain

46:19

the current a la carte model especially at their

46:21

price point of $50 a pay-per-view hold

46:24

that thought stop this tape I want to make

46:26

sure I don't have a somebody

46:29

coming ultimately

46:32

it's the market that will determine that

46:35

you know and I

46:37

think the

46:40

additional content the

46:42

emphasis adding

46:44

another pay-per-view it's adding

46:47

more creative pressure to

46:49

a system in a process that's

46:52

already overwhelmed it's not working it's

46:54

not functioning it's not it's

46:57

not a well-oiled machine I'm sure it's

46:59

there's a lot of growth curve going

47:02

on people are learning people

47:04

are experiencing but it is a

47:06

mess and I don't think anybody can argue that if

47:09

you talk to like I know you

47:11

do people that are in a ew

47:13

and see the sausage making process that

47:15

occurs every time they produce television you

47:17

know what I'm talking about adding

47:21

more content is only going to add

47:23

more pressure to that

47:25

process and I I

47:27

think the overall quality of the product is

47:29

going to suffer and

47:33

then it's just going to be a

47:35

matter of watching the revenue and watching

47:37

it either grow every month or

47:40

start to deteriorate every month and the

47:42

market will determine how

47:45

much is too much we

47:48

did get the rating yeah

47:50

as we're on air some

47:53

some breaking news courtesy of the business of

47:55

the business the

47:57

rating that's coming from Russell Nomics 800,000

48:00

viewers this week. .27 for the demo. So last week was

48:03

$7.98. This week $800,000. Whoa,

48:10

that's an increase. There's a 2,000

48:14

more people. Oh my gosh,

48:16

they're on a roll. Mercedes-Monet

48:19

is a game changer.

48:22

We do not have the quarters at

48:24

this moment in time, but we'll see.

48:26

Who cares? It doesn't matter. The

48:30

interesting part about it that I should mention is

48:33

since we had the third hour effectively,

48:35

which was Rampage, the

48:37

third hour dropped

48:40

to, let's see, got

48:42

it right here. Oh geez.

48:46

541,000 for the third hour,

48:50

which was technically a different show, Rampage, and

48:52

.18 for the demo on that. I

48:56

mean, that doesn't surprise me because that's getting pretty late. Yeah,

49:00

it's getting late and it's abnormal, right? They

49:02

don't typically have a third hour. Creatures

49:07

of habit per se. The

49:10

people were not accustomed necessarily to that. But

49:13

what's fascinating about it, the finish of the

49:15

Adam Copeland versus Christian match occurred

49:18

right as the hour was crossing

49:20

over from Dynamite into Rampage. And

49:22

they actually dipped to black for like a second

49:25

and a half and came back up in the

49:27

different show right as the finish was about to

49:29

happen. It was very fascinating

49:31

how that ended up going down. They changed

49:33

the- And that sounds like they did that

49:35

very, very well. That sounds like it was

49:37

perfectly executed because that's what you would want

49:39

to do. You

49:41

would really want to carry the intensity

49:43

of that segment over to open up

49:45

your, or at least have the audience

49:47

on the edge of their seat for that next hour. But

49:50

holding an audience that long

49:54

is challenging for anybody. And yeah,

49:57

800 though. I

50:00

mean, everybody knew Mercedes is there, CEO is in

50:02

town. I

50:04

just, and I'm saying this not really as

50:06

a shot, certainly not to Mercedes when I

50:08

don't know her. She's, she had

50:11

an amazing career in WWE. She

50:14

was probably one

50:16

of the more successful talents there and

50:19

valuable assets there. The

50:23

difference though is in WWE, she was

50:26

created. She was

50:29

managed creatively. She

50:31

was protected creatively. What

50:34

do you mean by protective creatively, Eric? Let me tell you what

50:36

I mean, John. I

50:39

saw her promo. Was

50:42

it from last night? She

50:44

spoke last weekend, last night. So yeah, no, it

50:46

had to be last week's because I've been traveling.

50:49

It was horrible. Let me take that back. It

50:52

wasn't horrible. It

50:55

wasn't superstar. It

50:57

was a very middle

51:02

of the roster. Not

51:05

quite a journey person that kind

51:07

of not really a rookie, but

51:10

certainly not a seasoned veteran. And

51:14

we talked about that. It might've been with Conrad. You

51:17

know, you might've said something like, oh, I can imagine she

51:19

comes out and cuts her first promo. And I thought, I

51:22

don't know that I've ever heard her speak much

51:25

in WWE. She never did promos because

51:28

she's not good at them. And what's the first

51:30

thing that she does when she comes out? She

51:33

cuts that long ass winded promo. They did. I

51:36

mean, people were reacting to it. She's

51:38

there first time and spectacular presentation. She

51:40

looked great. She didn't look like a

51:42

superstar. No question about that.

51:46

But the quality of that promo in

51:48

terms of creating emotion and making me

51:50

excited about her, or

51:52

making me wonder what she's there to do,

51:55

just the overall quality of that promo was

51:57

a 6.5. maybe

52:00

on a scale of one to ten. And

52:03

that's what I mean by protecting you. Don't let

52:05

a talent that's not great at talking talk for

52:07

two or three minutes because you're

52:09

exposing them. She's

52:11

an excellent shit talker as a

52:13

heel and I

52:16

think that the character that she does

52:18

the whole CEO money-based thing it

52:20

lends itself much more to an

52:23

antagonist character than it does

52:25

a pure babyface character and

52:28

she comes into AEW as a pure babyface

52:30

and again

52:33

I think she came across very genuine but

52:35

it almost didn't seem natural to her.

52:37

This is my take. It didn't seem

52:39

natural because she's really just a fantastic

52:41

heel. She's a great shit talker. The

52:43

boss character she did in WWE was

52:46

all great heel work. That's what

52:48

got her really popular and maybe

52:51

it's a matter of not feeling quite

52:53

comfortable in that top babyface role

52:55

coming into a new company where she

52:57

was I don't disagree with you

53:00

necessarily in that I think she was kind of

53:02

left to be exposed in that situation and you

53:04

know maybe over time that changes and how they

53:06

present her the opportunities that she gets. I think

53:08

she's a great shit talker as a heel but

53:11

that is not what we're talking about.

53:13

So she's being booked poorly then because

53:16

you're not writing to her strengths you're writing to

53:18

her weakness. And I think that's something with wrestling

53:20

you have to do you have and it's something

53:22

Paul Heyman was always great at was accentuating positives

53:25

hiding negatives and that is

53:27

definitely something you need to do in wrestling but you

53:29

know look here's the reality to her she

53:32

was gonna come in as a babyface regardless even if

53:34

you as a character booked her as a heel the

53:36

fans were gonna cheer for her. So you

53:40

lean into that for a little bit let's see how

53:42

long that lasts and whether or not they

53:44

make a change I guess is yet

53:46

to be seen. We

53:48

got a couple more here I want to get to we got Eric says

53:52

Eric you talked previously about how

53:54

WWE has been on the leading or even bleeding

53:56

edge of things in the broadcasting space throughout its

53:58

history with syndication pay-per-view cable, OTT, and now

54:01

the Netflix Raw deal, what, if anything,

54:03

is the next big thing out there

54:05

that WWE could potentially lead the way

54:07

on, either for wrestling or entertainment

54:09

as a whole? I

54:13

don't know if this is the

54:15

right answer, meaning

54:18

I don't know if I understood the question quite clearly,

54:21

but we just got talking

54:23

about what can WWE do to lead the

54:25

way and to provide that

54:27

next evolution in terms of the

54:30

presentation, color and play by play. To

54:33

me, that's it. That's the

54:35

one thing that people haven't really

54:37

tweaked much. And

54:39

I think big opportunity there.

54:43

I also think the whole idea of backstage interviews

54:46

is so dated and

54:49

so ineffective to be

54:52

nothing more than a waste of time. I

54:55

think if WWE can,

54:58

they know how to do it, I showed

55:00

them. They copied a formula that I was using

55:02

in TNA. So they certainly, and it's not brain

55:04

surgery, I copied it from somebody else for granted.

55:06

And it's not like anybody invented it, certainly

55:09

not me, but I utilized it in

55:11

wrestling before anybody did, and it worked

55:14

effectively. The problem with

55:16

that style, that E&G kind of

55:18

plan a wall setting

55:22

and way of producing an interview is,

55:24

first of all, it's different, right?

55:27

That means you've got to train people differently. They

55:29

got to start thinking differently during a course of

55:31

a promo. It's got to

55:33

be thought through a little bit more. The

55:37

pre-production is a

55:39

little bit more, and the editing

55:41

can be a little bit more. But

55:44

the overall product is worth

55:46

it. There's nothing that WWE

55:49

does and makes an improvement upon

55:51

that isn't more work or more

55:53

challenging in some way, but you

55:55

weigh the benefits. And

55:58

I think... Finding a

56:00

new way to establish

56:02

the narrative outside of the ring, other

56:05

than backstage promos, would be a

56:07

giant leap forward. You combine that

56:09

with an overhaul of the philosophy

56:12

of color and play-by-play, the application of

56:14

it. I think you have

56:16

an entirely different product. So

56:20

on that front, Carmine asking, WWE has been

56:22

experimenting with new camera shots and graphics almost

56:24

every week since the departure of Kevin Dunn. What

56:26

are your thoughts on the new direction? I'm

56:31

obviously a big fan of it. Keep

56:33

in mind, I'm also a big fan of Kevin Dunn. This,

56:38

who's the guy that came in? Lee

56:40

fitting. Obviously a very, very talented person. I'm

56:42

sure there's a lot of people in WWE.

56:45

They're grateful that he's there. I would

56:47

be one of them if I was there. I'm

56:50

grateful as a viewer because now we're talking about a

56:52

camera shot that we wouldn't have been talking about if

56:54

Kevin Dunn was running the show. But

56:57

I cannot look at what Kevin Dunn has

56:59

accomplished in terms of elevating the production

57:02

value of professional wrestling over the course of the

57:04

last 30 or 40 years and

57:07

not give that man maximum amount

57:09

of props. Maximum.

57:13

But everything changes. Times

57:16

change, attitudes change. And

57:19

perhaps Kevin got so

57:22

comfortable that he wasn't excited about trying something

57:25

new and trying something different.

57:28

That usually that spirit of

57:30

wanting to try something different

57:32

is usually the domain of

57:34

30 somethings, 40 somethings. People

57:36

that have been in the business had some

57:38

success, have some credibility, but

57:40

want to push an envelope. Usually

57:43

your younger producers, directors, not really

57:45

quite film directors are, but television

57:47

directors, producers, they're not going to

57:50

step too far outside of the lines

57:52

because after all, this is a business and I want

57:54

to get hired when this show's over. So

57:56

you work within guidelines that are

57:58

pretty much established. within your genre.

58:01

But you get somebody that's really successful,

58:05

that's willing to take risks because he or she

58:07

knows that, hey, if you don't like it, I

58:10

can go somewhere else. Once

58:12

you get to that level in

58:15

your skill sets and your reputation, that's

58:17

where you generally find the, hey,

58:19

I know this has never been done before, but let's give

58:22

this a shot. Let's just

58:24

see what happens. And

58:26

that's where innovation comes from. Innovation doesn't come

58:28

from a boardroom. Innovation

58:31

doesn't come from a committee. Innovation

58:33

comes from one guy, one woman

58:35

who has an idea and

58:37

just says, fucking, I'm going to try it. If

58:40

it succeeds, great. If it doesn't, no

58:42

one's going to die normally. I

58:46

love that they make the product feel more

58:48

like an event. Like you get those arrival

58:50

shots of the talent coming to the arena

58:52

now, before some of the championship

58:55

matches, they have those like solo ISO shots,

58:57

whether it's staring directly into the camera. That

58:59

feels really cool to me. See, I mean,

59:01

you said the magic words. One of the

59:03

reasons why I've said many times, I prefer

59:05

in many

59:07

cases, the AW production

59:10

presentation, because it's gritty.

59:13

I feel like I'm in like the

59:15

fifth row up, you know, and I

59:18

can still see everything that's going on. You

59:20

know, I can see the cameraman tripping over

59:22

cables. I can see people

59:24

falling up in chairs over next to ringside. Like you

59:26

see all that stuff that you don't get to see

59:28

on TV, right? It makes you feel like you're actually

59:30

part of the show. You feel like you're in the

59:32

venue. Anytime you

59:34

can make people feel like they're in the venue, and that

59:36

goes to what we're talking about with play by play, describing

59:39

the smell inside of the venue. That's

59:42

a silly example, but it's true. You're

59:45

making people feel like they're there. However

59:47

you get there is the

59:49

magic of live television and all the benefits

59:51

that it provides. Last question

59:53

here, Eric, and thank you to everyone who

59:55

sent questions in. This one coming from Aaron

59:58

says A&E has been hit in the spot with these WWE

1:00:00

biographies will we ever see an Eric Bischoff

1:00:02

one and in his mind who else from

1:00:05

WCW deserves one? Uh,

1:00:08

they never you know deserves is a stupid

1:00:10

word. I never used that word in a

1:00:12

situation like this. Look,

1:00:16

there's a lot of interesting stories out there,

1:00:18

you know, I don't think somebody has to

1:00:20

be a major superstar to warrant a

1:00:23

biography. One just has to

1:00:25

be really really interesting. Whether

1:00:28

one comes from a unique

1:00:30

background and had a

1:00:32

unique set of struggles to get

1:00:34

where they're going or

1:00:37

perhaps were affected in an amazing

1:00:39

interesting way by their success or

1:00:41

lack thereof in the business. It's

1:00:44

always about the story. I've seen

1:00:46

some great biographies about people I

1:00:48

had never heard of that I

1:00:50

just stumbled across that

1:00:52

to me were fascinating biographies because you

1:00:54

feel like you're learning and now getting

1:00:57

to know this person and now I'm

1:00:59

cheering for them or against them and

1:01:02

it's the same psychology that one probably

1:01:05

would opt for at a

1:01:07

feature film or dramatic television series or

1:01:09

god forbid a professional wrestling show it's

1:01:12

all the same thing getting to know

1:01:14

the characters wanting them to succeed wanting

1:01:16

them to fail being emotionally invested one

1:01:19

way or the other that's that's

1:01:21

why people you know seek

1:01:23

out entertainment to scratch those

1:01:25

particular issues. So

1:01:28

will we get an Eric Bischoff one? Yeah,

1:01:30

probably not and I think it's

1:01:32

probably because it's been so much done already what are you

1:01:34

gonna learn? Okay, who's playing Eric Bischoff

1:01:37

in a biopic? I don't

1:01:40

even know anymore man I don't watch it you

1:01:42

know Tom Cruise. Tom Cruise? Yeah, Tom Cruise. He

1:01:44

could probably do the stunts. I can see. He's

1:01:46

got the right here. I can

1:01:48

see Russell Crowe being a good Eric Bischoff. He's a he's

1:01:50

a wee little fucker. You could pick Tom Cruise up put

1:01:53

him in your pocket and take him for a walk around

1:01:55

a block he's the wee little

1:01:57

lad but yeah he's a

1:01:59

decent actor. I think he could pull it off. Okay.

1:02:02

I'm just curious. Just curious.

1:02:04

Good stuff, Eric. I always love getting

1:02:06

the questions from the business of the

1:02:08

business faithful. It's going to be a

1:02:10

fun, exciting few weeks here as we

1:02:12

march towards WrestleMania. Can't believe we're already

1:02:14

here once again. And you're going to

1:02:16

be on the road. So be on

1:02:18

the lookout. Hey, everybody, jump on social

1:02:20

media and let's all listen to the

1:02:22

excuses Dave Meltzer comes up with as

1:02:25

to why Mercedes Monet only

1:02:27

got. What was it? A

1:02:30

thousand more viewers in last week, 2000 couple thousand. Let's

1:02:34

come on. The excuses are going to be, you

1:02:36

know what? I'm kind of interested about Eric, like Adam

1:02:39

Copeland and Christian

1:02:42

were the main eventers for this. You

1:02:44

know, those are two established former WWE guys,

1:02:46

right? And they're in Toronto, their

1:02:48

hometown and having this big blow

1:02:50

off main event. I'm

1:02:53

really curious if viewership went

1:02:55

up for that main event segment with the two equity

1:02:57

names in the main event or

1:02:59

if it leveled out. And we haven't gotten the

1:03:01

quarters yet as we await this. But what

1:03:04

is the drawing power of Adam Copeland and Christian

1:03:06

Cage at this juncture? I'm really interested. I don't

1:03:08

think it's what is. I don't think the question

1:03:10

is what is the drawing power of Adam Copeland

1:03:12

and Christian Cage? I think it's what

1:03:14

is the drawing power of anybody in

1:03:17

AEW because the creative

1:03:19

is so fucking bad. They

1:03:22

did to their credit. They did sell out the venue. They they

1:03:24

were they were. It's a

1:03:26

6000 seat arena. You

1:03:29

know, I know it's the smallest venue possible.

1:03:31

WWE runs non televised live events there.

1:03:34

I know. But before

1:03:36

Mercedes was announced for it, they

1:03:39

I think they had I got to look at Russell

1:03:41

takes I'm going off top of my head here. But

1:03:43

they added I know they sold close to

1:03:46

2000 tickets for a 6000 person venue once

1:03:48

Mercedes was added. So take care

1:03:51

of that what you will. Again, not carrying water.

1:03:54

Simply stating facts here. I'm looking at the clouds,

1:03:56

Eric. I'm coming up with what I want to

1:03:58

make up. That's all it is. Young

1:04:02

man screaming at the clouds. That's right. Guys,

1:04:05

go to advertisewitheric.com, get on board with us. Thousands

1:04:08

and thousands of listeners listen to 83 Weeks

1:04:10

in Strictly Business every single week. We'd

1:04:12

love for you to join us. advertisewitheric.com. Eric, you are on your

1:04:14

way to Hartford. Anything else you want to say? No,

1:04:17

man. Look, we've got some great

1:04:19

stuff coming up on YouTube. I'm going to be

1:04:22

interviewing, in fact, I got to jump on a

1:04:24

call with him real shortly, the author of a

1:04:26

book called The Six Pack. It's

1:04:29

an amazing book. It's

1:04:32

all about WrestleMania 3, and we're going to

1:04:34

do a long-form interview covering probably

1:04:36

each one of the chapters leading up to the

1:04:38

release of the book. People

1:04:41

are going to be fascinated by what they hear

1:04:43

and eventually what they're able to read. So,

1:04:45

be looking forward to that next week. I

1:04:47

think next Tuesday is our first episode on

1:04:49

YouTube. 83weeks.com. Go

1:04:52

there, subscribe, hit the notification button, because you're not

1:04:54

going to want to miss this. These

1:04:56

are going to be long-form, probably

1:04:58

two-hour episodes. Brad

1:05:01

did some amazing research. He

1:05:03

got access to information about

1:05:06

WWE, handwritten notes from Vince

1:05:08

Sr., Vince Jr., a lot

1:05:10

of the people behind the scenes, stuff

1:05:12

that's never been talked about before or

1:05:14

exposed before, and Brad has

1:05:16

it all. So, we're going to

1:05:18

be sharing a lot of new information. You

1:05:21

should ask him why they went from three

1:05:23

venues to the Silver Dome in consecutive years.

1:05:26

He'll probably be able to tell you. He'll probably

1:05:28

have some notes. I know, right, Dan? Thank you.

1:05:31

We will see you next time. Hey,

1:05:34

everybody. This is Dan Besparis, host

1:05:36

of Fantasy NBA Today, a daily

1:05:39

fantasy basketball podcast. We

1:05:42

cover every box score from every

1:05:44

game, every day, plus

1:05:47

bonus shows on buy-low opportunities,

1:05:49

players to stash, schedule analysis,

1:05:51

and really anything you could need to smash

1:05:54

your league into deliciously tiny

1:05:56

pieces. network

1:06:00

on YouTube or wherever you listen.