83 Weeks with Eric Bischoff - Episode 395: The WCW Invasion Was D.O.A.

Episode Date: October 10, 2025

On this episode of 83 Weeks, Eric and Conrad head back 30 years to discuss how WCW’s talent roster was evolving during the development of Monday Nitro. Eric opens up about why he found it difficult to trust one particular talent hire and the lessons he learned from that experience. The guys also break down Eric’s Top 5 reasons why the WCW Invasion in WWE was a complete failure. Plus, Massive Heat’s Raj Giri joins the show to discuss how the new Nielsen rating system is shaking up the world of professional wrestling. TECHOVAS - Get 10% off at tecovas.com/83WEEKS when you sign up for email and texts. BLUECHEW - Visit https://bluechew.com  and try your first month of BlueChew FREE when you use promo code 83WEEKS -- just pay $5 shipping. HARRY'S - Our listeners get Harry’s Trial Set for only $8 + a Free Gift at https://harrys.com/83WEEKS  #Harryspod PRIZE PICKS - Visit https://prizepicks.onelink.me/LME0/83WEEKS  and use code 83WEEKS to get $50 in lineups after you pay your first $5 lineup! FACTOR - Eat smart with Factor. Get started at http://FACTORMEALS.com/83weeks50off  and use code 83weeks50off to get 50% off your first box plus free shipping. LEGAL BUDDY - Download the Legal Buddy App at http://LegalBuddyApp.com . Register today, use referral code LEGAL for your chance to win a $250 Amazon Gift Card. SAVE WITH CONRAD - Stop throwing money away by paying those high interest rates on your credit card. Roll them into one low monthly payment and on top of that, skip your next two house payments. Go to https://www.savewithconrad.com  to learn more.

Save with Conrad.com. Yeah, I'm Justin. We're up in Montreal, Tennessee. What got me to Save with Conrad was the 83 weeks podcast. I really wasn't thinking about getting rid of any debt. I just wanted, like, to cash out somebody in the house to do remodeling. But I did both, so that was pretty awesome. Worked out, right?

We redid the foyer, built pantry space. And it was like little eyes and ends when I first bought the house that I wanted to take care of. And we were able to take care of it. Yeah, paid off two cars and some credit card debt. So probably all in all, get everything. thousand dollars than that and then i got some 30,000 more equity out of the house and got so plenty of equity left over so payment's good i lowered my interest rate and a much better spot but i was super easy everybody is great very very awesome people francis and steve are great to work

with they were they're awesome made it for a very easy seamless experience i'd probably say all in all probably a thousand a month at least i'm lowered my interest rate especially the way the interest rates are right now, which is, you know, that's amazing. I'm Justin Brooklyn from Knoxville, Tennessee. I saved over $1,000 to save with comrade.com, and I did a lot of renovations with that money as well. And that's number 212-9-Aqual housing lender. Savewithconrad.com. I get such a kick out of that.

I forgot all about it again. It pops up. That's fun. We're going to have some fun today on 83 weeks. Of course, we couldn't do it without the Hall of Famer, the only man to put Vince McMahon on his ass, not once, not twice, but at least 83 weeks.

I think, by the end of the episode, you may campaign and petition our audience, because we would put it to a vote. Should we rename the show to 100 and some odd weeks? Let me explain. Earlier this week on something to wrestle, we talked to JBL about the news that broke, I can't believe this is real, 25 years ago this week, that WCW was for sale and the WWF was first in line. now this of course you might be thinking to yourself self

that happened in March of 2001 so what are we talking about in the year 2000 well in October of 2000 there was a report from multi-channel news that came out that said mandalay sports entertainment and world wrestling federation entertainment were both speaking to turner broadcasting about buying world championship wrestling now of course a couple of days after that mandalay comes out and says Actually, we are not trying to acquire WWE or WCW.

And that left only Vince McMahon in the race. And I guess as the story goes, Vince really wanted to purchase WCW in October of 2000. But let's remind you what had happened around that same time, Eric. WCW was obviously struggling. And the WWE had just switched networks. They had just switched from USA over to spot. And in the process, that sort of booted ECW off of the former TNN. So now ECW is displaced.

They don't have a home because, well, they got the bright, new shiny WWE object. But that meant that Vince had just entered into a new contract with Viacom. Now, when this opportunity bubbles up to the surface, you would think, oh, man, can you imagine? Vince McMahon's going to get his hands on Nitro on TNT and Thunder on TBS. he could finally do the brand split that we all kind of suffered through. It wasn't really a brand split with Rawl and Smackdown, but he could have really done it.

Except for that pesky little part of the contract that he had just signed with Viacom for the new switch to Spike that said that that was the exclusive home on cable for WWE content. Well, if WCW is purchased by WWE, now it becomes WWE-owned content, that is the parent company. So Vince had a new provision in this new clause or in this new contract that he couldn't override.

And he tells, as the story goes, Wade Keller at an XFL event, I wanted to pull the deal together, but I just couldn't make the money happen for Viacom. I guess Viacom either it wasn't willing to allow WWE to have programming on other stations or their asking price Vince felt like was just astronomical.

so we know it didn't happen. But it is interesting to think about what could have been 25 years ago, Eric, that 25 years ago, perhaps Vince in an alternate universe, could have owned Nitro and Thunder and Raw and Smackdown. And if he does that, Eric, wouldn't you imagine he would have tried to keep all of the contracts, not just cherry-picked? Wouldn't that have made sense at that point? who knows you know it that's a big question and you'd have to have a snapshot into what that even

look like from a financial perspective and then you'd have to know what his plans were with that brand in order to kind of fill out the equation so to speak there's a lot of options there man there's some serious you could probably create a eight-week club to sit around for two, three hours at a time talking about what could have been and fantasy books, so to speak, that kind of, that kind of an opportunity. It's wild. It's interesting to think because I know we as wrestling fans, we all consider the invasion to be the biggest fumbled angle, the biggest what if in the history of wrestling.

But I think a lot of us think that because, well, we didn't have the nitro set. We didn't have all of the top stars. But imagine in this alternate alternative universe, you know, we know it. didn't happen. But if all of a sudden you could hear the glass break on nitro and he walks down that steel ramp with the big bold WCW letters, man, that would have been wild, wouldn't it? Yeah. See what I mean? I mean, it's you can have a lot of fun talking about the what is and and then you know, so to get into, you know, ways of telling stories and, you know, great matchups that you might not otherwise would have ever imagined seeing at that time in the previous circumstances.

So yeah, you could have, you probably create a video. game with that somehow. Now, I do want to ask you about Mandalay Sports because we all know that you tried to put this deal together in late 2000 and early 2001 with Fusion Media Ventures. Do you remember anything about Mandalay Sports because your name is all over this? They're saying that you and Jason Hervey were the conduits for Mandalay. What can you tell us about Mandalay? That is true.

I think a couple people to remain unnamed. got a little trigger happy with the press release, to be honest. And I think it was an initial press release that came out that made it sound like Mandalay was financially involved, and they weren't. Mandalay Sports Entertainment was owned by a guy by the name of Peter Goober, G-U-B-E-R. Google him. Amazing character. His story and his reign on top of CBS at the time was legendary.

He was an amazing Hollywood icon. God, why am I telling you that? Sorry. Mandelaide. Oh, Mandelaide. So Peter owned that company. And Jason Hervey, along with the partner that he had at that time, both worked for Peter Goober at Mandalay Sports Entertainment.

That's how I became friendly with Peter through Jason Hervey and David Salzberg, his partner at the time, and develop my own relationship. So when the opportunity came along, when I asked Brad if you'd be interested in selling the company, and Brad said, yeah, or however that conversation took place, I reached out to Peter Goober through Jason, of course, respectfully. But basically I asked Peter. I said, you know, we have an opportunity to buy this thing. Is there anybody on your team?

I didn't think Peter would invest because we had talked about it before. I was doing a lot of business with Peter's company through Jason. So we were doing a lot of business together, but I got the impression that Peter wasn't really interested in a relationship beyond that. So I wasn't going to Peter for money or to see if he was interested in buying WCW. And I think that's where things got a little, you know, fun on some of the press releases. Peter really just introduced me to Brian Bedal and Steve Greenberg. And it literally was through that introduction that I ended up going into business with Fusion.

So that was the extent of the relationship. It was really just a conduit. I know you probably have no way of knowing, but I've got to ask. You assume that if Vince has a new relationship with Viacom, they're paying him a bunch of money to move his program from the Heritage Station that had been on for decades, it feels like, maybe not at that point, really, but close. I'm talking about USA and now we're going to Spike.

So we've got, you know, a new property and a new commitment and everybody's excited. Not too terribly long after he comes back and says, hey, I'd like to unwind that exclusivity. That feels like we're not exactly getting on. off on the right foot. No, it's, it's, it's the bulsiest thing ever. Yes. Because it wasn't like, even at that time, you know, we're talking about the, you know,

the media rights value, WWE now is almost incomprehensible for anybody that's actually been in the business for more than a decade. It's just crazy. But even, it certainly wasn't at that level back during the time we're speaking of, but it was still significant. And that's the deal that you would, I mean, you would be so grateful to get a deal like that. And then to go back in and say, look, you know, this marriage thing that we got, it's pretty good. But get this little thing over here on the side.

I'd like to do too. How about that? Oh, no, I know I said until death do his part and all that kind of stuff. Well, just, just spend a little time over here in a corner. No network wants to hear that. They don't want their investment, at that time, a significant investment. If you're looking at this purely from a network executive's perspective, they're buying a brand, they're buying a property,

but they're buying the brand that comes with it, and there's a difference between having exclusive control, so to speak, in terms of distribution over that brand, and sharing that brand with others. There are relationships like that, but they're nominal and cost compared to an exclusive brand relationship, whether it be sports or in this case, sports entertainment. So, yeah, it's a balsy move. It was a balsy ask. And you didn't get it, but balsy.

The timing is incredible. I mean, you're in Alabama, and I know you're on the moon right now, it's October 9th. And to think that that happened 25 years ago this week, they started on the new channel, September 25th. So you're talking two weeks later, my man's like, I know we just got here, but you've got two or three episodes in the can. Look, it's like the metaphor I was laying out for you. It's like they're still on the honeymoon.

Yes. I'd like to open the relationship. What? What? We just got to Hawaii. What are you talking about? Unbelievable. Only Vince McMahon. That's crazy. I love it. Legendary. I do want to ask hypothetically, if they would have merged, obviously there would have been a lot of redundancies.

So there would have been some back office layoffs and he would have probably consolidated some talent. But do you imagine that the invasion angle would have fared better if he actually had TB, and T&T and he really had Thunder and Nitro and he had access to the full roster or respectfully would they have fumbled it anyway I think there's

really two answers there I think the first answer is going to be probably the most accurate but you'd have to leave some room for the second they'd have fumbled it anyway because of the second reason they just wouldn't have been as committed to it creatively.

It's still, and I believe this to this day, I don't believe the stories about burying WCW guys. Yes, that happened and probably was to an extent true, but it's also right of passage whose team are you on. There's a psychology behind it too. You want to know how committed this talent is to you, just like they want to know how committed you are to them. It's a two-way street.

So I could see situations where guys were put in less than great spots as a gut check. What have we got here? Team, kind of team, not a team player, move along. I don't know that that was the case. But regardless of that, to the extent that that was true, whatever that was, there just would have been the creative, emotional commitment. to the potential just because of the way that they perceive the brand itself. They're still in denial, dude. There are still people who are friends of mine that are in denial

and on certain aspects of how it all went out. And that's fine. I mean, it's like, I don't care. But that feeling, that attitude amongst some of the real veteran veterans, Is it still there today? Trust me. We kick their ass to the point where they were almost down. And that leaves scar tissue or perception issues.

It is what it is, man. Fun. At least some of the newsletters were reporting at the time that if Vince got control of WCW here in October of 2000 and there really were two companies, you've got raw and smackdown on one side you've got thunder and nitro on the other side that perhaps jim ross would have been put in charge of wcw at the time we know that he ran talent relations we know that he's obviously had a hand in production being the voice of the league for so many years how do you think jim ross would have fared in your seat if he got that

opportunity and call it october of 2000 i think he would have fared very well because he He would, technically, yes, he would have been in my seat. Operationally, he would have been in an entirely different company that he was already comfortable with who already trusted Jim and gave Jim a lot of responsibility. So had Vince tapped Jim, which I believe he probably absolutely, he most likely would have tapped Jim for that role because it would have been an extension of his existing.

role. It would have just made sense. And I think Jim would have absolutely lived up to the task if for no other reason and obviously his work ethic chief among them and loyalty right there with work ethic. If he's in, he's really, really in. Or at least he was then, for sure. And he wasn't WCW2 while he was there. I think he would have excelled at it. I do want to ask.

It would have been super interesting to see what a Jim Ross ran organization looks like. Yeah. And again, it's not a Jim, that's not a Jim Ross ran organization. I mean, Jim would have been running it, yes, but that was the WWE operational model, which is a very unique model because it's a unique business. But it was well developed and finely tuned under Jim as well. So Jim would have rolled that right into WCW. Once you were the frontrunner with Fusion Media, we'll call it 2001 a few months later.

Were you ever able to get any sort of feel for how the talks with Vince had gone? Was that ever even discussed? Never even discussed. Keep in mind, everyone, I wasn't, you know, I brought Brian Bedal to the table in Steve Greenberg. I brought them, you know, well, performed in our partnership. and then made the offer as a company, as an entity, and that was what started that process. But once that offer was made and the negotiations began,

I was out of that. That's not my world. You know, I would have been excess baggage at that point. I wouldn't have had really a vote because I'm not an attorney. So I didn't get a lot of visibility into the deal-making process or really hear any of those types of discussions. I was involved in helping to raise money because I think Brian and Steve put in

five million of their own as seed capital and then went out and raised an additional 15, I think, in a round, because I was part of, I wasn't a part of the seed round. Those discussions, I wasn't a part of. But the subsequent rounds, I was a part of that dog and pony shell on Wall Street. So that I had some visibility and access to, but not any of the negotiations are talking about the deal. I do want to talk a little bit about Nitro 30 years ago this week, too.

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Decovis, point your toes west. I love those. Point your toes. Where did you point your toes? Where are you right now? I'm in Bismarck, North Dakota. Welcome everybody to beautiful downtown Bismarck. Lori and I are driving from Cody.

We left this morning and we're driving to Minneapolis to spend a weekend with my brother and sister. Good deal. Well, I hope you guys have a safe trip. I also want to ask a little bit about Nitro 30 years ago. I can't believe this is real. But October 9th, 1995, you guys were at the Rosemont Horizon in suburban Chicago. I actually want to ask you about the Rosemont Horizon.

Historically, that was always a WWE building. And it feels like they had a stronghold on that building for what felt like forever. But I think that may have been one of the first buildings to flip, thanks to your old pal, Zane Breslin. right i was i was going i was hoping we were going to point that out but yeah that was uh zane was zane was he was pretty wired in chicago i zane lived in colorado but he was very very wired into chicago so that was all zane broslop i do want to ask you you know we know that eventually you guys make the switch with uh rosemont horizon and united center i mean you have a big opportunity

to start running mega shows there during the Nitro era, Dennis Rodman and all that jazz. But how difficult was it to get some of those buildings to switch from being a historic WWE building to now becoming a WCW building? It was all about the dollars. Okay. It was all about the dollars if we were competitive financially and, you know, because the building is there to make money too. They want to sell as many concessions as they can.

They want to rip in all that merchandise. They want to sell as many, you know, Cokes and Pepsi's or whatever it is they're selling at the food counter, concession stand. That's how they make their money. That's where the margins are in that business. So if you can drive enough attendance

to feed all of those line items, you can get in there. And in some buildings, there was a personal relationship or a business relationship. It was a very close business relationship. That was more political, really. Was it legal in the true sense of the word?

Yeah, you probably could have thrown some red flags and, you know, maybe got into, you know, an injunction here, there, and a lawsuit. But you'd end up spending so much money and probably get nowhere over the course of seven or ten years. So it just becomes, is it worth a fight? Is the juice worth the squeeze? And in some cases it was, and we did. And we did okay, as we did here, and in Chicago in general, and in other markets. And in some cases, we couldn't, like Madison Square Garden.

There was nothing going to fix that. There was no numbers I could put on the table that were going to influence that decision. That relationship ran way too deep, and it wasn't going anywhere. I do want to ask you, and Lord, I'm not trying to get anybody in trouble, but I just want to mention something I've heard through the years that occasionally there were relationships with the people who worked in that building and the companies that were booking them

and maybe the liaison, the middleman, he may or she may or may not have gotten a kickback. Have you heard of that before? In every business, I mean, sure, it's the entertainment business. You can probably start at the top of any genre of entertainment work your way down and find the same fact patterns, of course. But you get to the point where, you know, sometimes, like I said, it's worth it. It's worth a fight.

If the market is there, and that's an important market, you need it for strategic growth or tactical growth, yeah, you fight for it, and you'll get it. It's just how much you're willing to spend to do it. How often did you have to arrange those? had it envelopes we'll call it did we at turn yeah none that you knew of but you knew what happened behind the scenes no i didn't know that are you suggesting that i knew it turner it was happening behind the scenes if you if that's what you're implying no i never the thought never occurred to be well i just know in radio you know you're at least familiar with paola i mean so

I'm thinking that same thing may happen. Yeah, I'm very familiar with it, but it doesn't mean because it exists. Everybody does it as a course of business, but it does exist. Right. It's interesting to think about how much of that may have been, you know, closed door, back door dealing stuff like, hey, they have the exclusive, but for the right amount of money, I can make it go away. You know, there was one, I mean, the only one that I'm really familiar with is

Madison Square Garden because that was the only building I really wanted to get into. I just wanted to prove a point. And financially, we would have lost our ass, but that wasn't the issue. At that time, it wasn't that important. From a television branding perspective, it would have been a high value opportunity, despite, you know, probably a negative cash flow for one night when we're making record revenue 51 other nights of the week or 51 other nights of the year. So it had tactical value and we were willing to fight for it.

We just couldn't get it. And MSG in particular, it wasn't so much cash in a bag. I mean, that's a nice thing to talk about. And, you know, conspiracy theories are always fun. But this one at Madison Square Garden was structured in such a way that it involved an option within the contract between, and I'm really digging back in my memory, between MSG and WW, there was some form of an agreement whereby WWE had the option to get, to book, and so in other words, if WCW came in and said, oh, we want to come in on December 21st, MSG would

have to go to WWE and say, hey, now, we've got a date open here. Do you plan on running? Oh, yeah, I'm going to run that day. Or I'm going to run a week before or a week after. That's what you're talking about. Yeah, okay. First ride and refuse this later, but drive it all day. Yeah, so it wasn't so much money to bag under the table as it wasn't in your face.

Everybody can read it and it was legal and you can fight it. This is a perfect example. No, it wasn't Paola. I'm not implying that. That's fair at all. But what it was was a very deep. relationship that allowed that agreement to be put in place in the first place because it's unusual and that's the part where an attorney can go I don't know that smells a little funny to

me why I think we could run this up the flagpole see if we get a jury to agree great five hundred thousand dollars and six years later you're going to find out whether you win or lose it's just not worth it Eric I've heard through the grapevine let me lay it out a little more plainly but I appreciate that the first ride of refusal that was a great bit. I had no idea that that was like a bucket with WCW. I mean, seriously, like the idea that we could have had a nitro from Madison Square Garden and never even crossed my mind. That would have been awesome. Um, but I do want to ask because I've been under the impression, or I was told that sometimes you have individual promoters who are going to advocate

for a town and push for a town and maybe there's one building over another. And that they company themselves, I'm talking about the building up, the operations managers, at the building may pad the pricing a little bit the company pays it and then the local promoter gets a little cash envelope at the end of the night which i thought was like wow dude i've heard of the skim off the top of the gate but the idea that we're actually creating margin with the rental fee just kind of blew my mind there i mean that's interesting i don't know where this is all coming from or who you're talking about specifically but it's it sounds to me like if we're watching a movie about, you know, the early, what we'll call it, 70s, early 80s,

Elliot Mernick kind of promoters running around the southeast. Oh, yeah. The Jerry Jarras, too, by the way. Oh, yeah. Yeah, it existed, like I said, in probably every form of entertainment, but particularly in professional wrestling because of the touring aspect of it. and you've had an opportunity to kind of figure out a way to make an extra buck you're in there and some nefarious way but get away with it sure happen all the time

I'm sure sounds like it sounds like somebody's describing a scene in a movie let's talk about nitro 30 years ago today as we're recording this the dark matches that night at the rosemont horizon where paul orndor feeding the renegade dd p beating Alex right. Eddie Guerrero over Dean Malenko. What a match that must have been. And the taskmaster gets a win over Randy Savage. When we actually start the show yourself, Bobby Heenan and Steve McMichael, they're all wearing Bears jerseys. I love seeing this. It does make me a little sad to realize I'm speaking to the only person still alive in the shot. But it was a cool moment to sport that Bears jersey next to Mongo, was it not? Yeah, and I'm also feeling some kind of weird

pressure now that she's just reminded me. It's like, man, I better go out and run three miles tomorrow morning before I drive the rest of the way to Minneapolis. I mean, no stake for me tonight. Let me mention, the first match on the show

was Sting and Shark. It only goes about two minutes. Sting gets the win. We've talked about almost everyone in WCW through the years, but you and I have not spent a lot of time talking about John Tenta. I feel like amongst the online fan these days, he's more and more appreciated now than he ever was back then.

You got to know the real life John Tenta a little bit. We only hear positive things. What was your experience like with John Tenta? One of the most gentle human beings I've ever been around. Respectful, just a gentle, kind soul. and I know there was probably another side of him here or there and he is a sumo wrestler he liked contact he was a tough guy

and that's what made the contrast so unusual for me because he was a physically imposing guy and he clearly wasn't a bodybuilder but it didn't matter he still looked like he could carry a truck on his back if that's what he needed to do but at the same time he was just like soft spoken and gentle so that's really all i know of him is just a very nice person to be around so that's your opening match sting over shark coming up next on nitro is saboo beating mr jell

now mr jell is the real life jerry lynn considering what you're going to do with the cruiserweight division i can't help but wonder why didn't you see long-term value in jerry lynn did he have something else going on or i mean it feels like he would have been such a natural fit with guys like chris jericho and eddie guerrero and dean malinko and i can't help but think how his career may have looked a lot differently we know he enjoyed great success with ecw but it would have been a much bigger national star i feel like if he had that wcdb platform why wasn't he here long term i do not know to be honest um it is curious I mean, he's from, he's a Minnesota guy.

Yeah. Which is probably how he ended up there in the first place. Because I had a soft spot in my heart from, and because the talent coming out of Minnesota was actually pretty good. So, and I knew who he was. I was aware of him. He didn't come in cold. So I'm not sure why he didn't stick around. I don't know if there was, I don't think there were contractual issues, perhaps there

were. I wasn't aware of them. I don't think there were injury issues, but could be wrong about that or wrong, you know, right guy at the wrong time, which is pretty likely. You know, he's here through some of 97, but it feels like he winds up working a lot of syndicated shows and WCW Saturday night. I just can't help but think, man, he would have had some absolute bangers with some of those luchadors. And we know what a great match he had, almost on repeat yeah i mean because that's kevin sullivan booking there you know i mean that wouldn't have been i wouldn't have been booking that level not to be disrespectful but i was a really only focus on you know the top and maybe what's just below the top of the card um in terms of you know

day-to-day creative so i don't i don't know what the read was but you know it was a kevin call ultimately let's talk about his opponent that night saboo you know you made a a big push for him there was a promo for him that aired on the very first nitro he was on the second nitro he's only here for a few months it the rumor in any window was he was here just on a per appearance deal and then i guess there's been different versions of the story that when he got a contract offer it was for that same kind of low ball per appearance deal was Sabu someone that was on your radar and and do you think that perhaps these are two guys that in the boom era of nitro that was still to come because we're 30 years ago at 1995 But when you think about 96, 97, 98, it feels like those two guys could have been major players for you. I didn't trust Sabu. Okay. Simple as that.

It wasn't about his work. It wasn't about his character. He had a reputation. I was well aware of him. I had watched some of his stuff. It was, and by the way, Kevin Sullivan talked me into this one. This was not me going, wow, I can't wait to get my hands on Sub. It was the opposite of that.

Like, I wasn't dead set against it, but there was some selling going on. So it definitely was a Kevin call. In terms of the offer, I've read the same thing, so my bias just kind of leans towards what I read, which is he got a low ball offer, he didn't like it, was offended and left, is what I remember. What I remember reading. I actually don't even remember the incident, but I do remember reading about it. Eric, just so I'm clear, are you in a hotel right now? Yeah.

Yeah. You know, a lot of guys, when they go to a hotel every now and again, they say to themselves, self, I wish I had some blue chew. Guys, into the room dig first. Blue chew's not just the tablet. It's a cheat code for your crotch, stronger, harder, longer lasting. Like somebody gave your downstairs a pep talk and a gym membership, I'll tell you if Mrs. B's with any airshot, she better look out.

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choose from hundreds of top podcasts offering host endorsements or run a pre-produced ad like this one across thousands of shows to reach your target audience with Libson ads. Email Bob at Libson.com to learn more. That's B-O-B at L-I-B-S-Y-N dot com. Hey, so the rest of the Nistra I want to run through here. Sting's going to come out to the ring with Lex Lugar. They're going to call out Randy Savage. you start to see some, I don't know, maybe clues that Lex is not on the same page with Sting or sort of shouting at each other a little bit here. It almost feels like we're teasing a Sting turn because Sting is going to call Lex pathetic and not the total package.

I don't think you're teetering on that idea of turning Sting heel, but it is interesting verbiage. I know you guys weren't necessarily scripting the verbiage, But just to be clear, in 95, there was no discussion of maybe turning Sting heel, right? No, no. This is really the baby faces trying to find their edge. Okay. I've talked to you about this before on the show.

One of the concerns early on, like very, very early on, when the NW, like two weeks after it was formed, right? The logo came out. The black and white videos came out right about that time. I remember Sting coming to me and he pulled me aside and he said, you know, I don't know what to do. I said, what do you mean? You don't know what to do because what we're doing here, you know, the heels, you know, getting cheered. That's cool and all. But as a baby face, it's kind of getting awkward because it's not the formula.

It's reverse psychology in a way, right? It's the opposite of what you work and train and develop the skill to get the audience to do, what you want them to do, when you want them to do it. Now all of a sudden, that electrical current has been completely reversed. So it was, I think it was Lex and Randy to agree as well. Certainly saying trying to find that edge is that milk toast stuff was wearing off fast. backstage we see Chris Benoit stepping out of a limo. I know that some people are just not Chris Benoit fans, and I get that given the way the end of his life happened and all that he did.

But this is interesting with the benefit of hindsight because you're not giving this sort of backstage in a suit with a limo entrance opportunity for guys like Eddie Guerrero or guys like Dean Malinko. Were you able to identify something early on that made you think, Hey, this guy's different. This guy, he's not going to be, quote, quote, just a cruiser way. He is going to be next level. Did you see that back then?

I saw it initially. I mean, I was very excited about Chris. Keep in mind, my first exposure to Chris Benoit was in New Japan. Right. Over a course of a year or two, I had seen him multiple times on some of the big shows and immediately fit that cruiserweight kind of rough idea, right? I like that style. I like the pace of those matches.

It was different than the pace of everything else that we would see on our show. And that's exactly what I was looking for. So that's why I brought Chris over with Eddie and Dean. They came over as a package. And they were there to negotiate as a package because we negotiated right in front of each other. They all got the same deal. so um saw a lot in chris but this push where chris is going now that we're discussing that's kevin sell it's what kevin saw and chris and obviously look at you know kind of protracted

story that they developed for each other they got really crazy yeah this go inferno is still a relatively new character here but he's going to find himself dancing around during hawk and big bubba's ring intros about a minute into the match he's even dancing up on the apron it pisses hawk off so he's going to jump down and start beating the tar out of disco inferno he winds up getting himself counted out i'm bringing up disco here because this is a young guy a new character at wcd getting really a lot of tv time in the early days of nitro who would have been a big advocate for disco behind the scenes for him to get this much TV, Tom. Is that a Kevin Sullivan thing? It feels like

Holkster would have really like discos Gehick. No, it wasn't Hawkser. It was DDP primarily. With buy-in from Sullivan. Sullivan saw it. He liked the entertainment of it. And look, I know it's you know, fun to beat up on Glenn Gilberti, but in the ring

Ben Gilberty was pretty damn good. His character was over the top in goofy as Fiazuck, but he did it so well, you still hate him for it to this day. Yeah, he did his job. He understood the assignment. So much respect for that.

But that would have been, that really would have been, DDP pushing to Kevin and Kevin probably tapping out saying, okay. Because DDP really is relentless. I want to talk about the, the big interview that happens here. Hulk Hogan's going to come out for an interview, and fans are booing incredibly loudly

when Mean Gene introduces him. He's going to come out Sands mustache. We talked about that last week. He's already had the mustache shaved off, but he's got a black outfit on, a black bandana, black shirt, black pants, even a black neck brace, and he's going to start ripping into the New York promoter's ego, and he's talking about the giant. This is sort of the start of what I guess we would call the dark side, a pole, what was supposed to be the end game here because he drops it several weeks later at the

World War III pay-per-view and I don't know if that was the original plan but I guess I want to ask two things what was the original plan of dark side of falcomania like what was the end game supposed to be if there was one and then secondly is it nights like this where he's a baby face and he's getting booed so strongly do you think that's in the back of his mind when he decides less than a year later, okay, let's do it. Let's turn heel. Maybe. I never thought about it until you just laid it out that way, but maybe. And I don't remember any, I don't remember any discussion. It's like he showed up wearing all black. What? I just saw him backstage. He was wearing his jeans and this cut off t-shirt.

It was red, and he was yellow and he had red shoes on. He looked like a rodeo clown, but a big, strong one. no he just went on his black stuff what i don't and jimmy too i mean wow so i don't remember how or why that happened or why it just disappeared i could have here's my guess he's getting a little he's he's feeling it out he's getting a sense that maybe it's time to do something and he just decided he was going to go out there and throw a little chum in the water and see what happens that's i would put a lot of money on that because there was no creative end game discussed like i didn't even know it was going to happen so that's my guess i do want to ask you about the main event because we've got um rick flair and arn anderson

in a cage and rick is aren't is going to beat flair with a foreign object in the cage Filman's trying to interfere. Flair's going to knock him off the top of the cage. But when it's all said and done, there's like two or three minutes left in the show and the announcers are left to sort of fill that time.

Now, I know years later, we would have an overrun and we're trying to get people to stay tuned and have a really strong lead-in for the next show. But that's going to start happening in 96 and 97 and 98. But in 95, we're ending a few minutes early.

And I'm wondering, A, was it a problem with with back timing the show or B, was it deliberate because we're trying to convey a sense of realism? Because if this were a quote unquote shoot fight, they don't always end right before the show goes off the air. Are you trying to add some realism in there? Is it mistimed? Are you trying to just, you know, filibuster and promote the next show or what was the strategy here?

What happened? I don't remember, you know, what I can't honestly say what the strategy was for this episode, but it was kind of typical of an example of some of the things that I would do to reinforce the fact that we were live because we were the first ones to go live every week. People forget about that because it was a long time ago. But prior to Nitro launching and going live every week, WWE was live one week, tape the next. Live one week tape the next. So they alternated. We decided to go live every week. because we saw the value in live television.

And we thought that might give us an advantage over the WWE, slightly more market share as a result of being live, whatever. So we made that because it was a financial investment too. It was more expensive to shoot live every week than it is to alternate live tape. Significantly so. But we decided it was worth the risk. And it was. where else what else are we talking about well you know we're talking about how you ended a few minutes

so part of that strategy i'm sorry i got lost in that part of that strategy is to do things to remind people that the show is live so they're not just telling him live we're live we're live that works for a while and then they start tuning that shit out hard enough to get people who really listen to announcers anyway and when he starts saying the same shit over and over and over again people begin to tune you out so we wanted to do things to remind people to this show was live and sometimes uh i used to say i used to give an example but it's crude so i won't say it here but um use your imagination but please having sex is interesting if it's live Like if you can get, you go to the Discovery Channel and you get one of those macro lenses that the scientists use where you can see all kinds of shit, you can never see any other way, and you're zooming in and you're seeing for the first time ever how flies, or excuse me, how fleas actually mate.

Now, if you're interested in science and what's the word of studying of insects, is it an entomology or entomology, what? whatever it is. You study bugs and shit. This could be really interesting, right? Like you'd watch it because it's fleas and it's live. They're actually procreating for the first time a human being is seeing how this happens. Some people, it's their thing. So we went live.

We did things to reinforce it. I'm sorry. I've been too much fun. No, no, no. I love when you have fun. meanwhile what you're up against that night on monday night raw not that good we get a big six man tag with yoko zuna owen hart and the british bulldog taking on the undertaker sean michael's and diesel and a six man that's a great match it's a long match but it's only one of two matches

that we see that night we also see fat two get a win over skip but these are quick short matches and then we've got lots of highlight packages you know we're going to see brett hart versus Isaac Yankham but that's just a clip from SummerSlam so it's interesting to think about all the recaps all the back all the backstage vignettes all the packages but there's really only two matches so this may be better than most weeks really accentuates the difference between live and taped I mean it's just it's not great stuff but interesting and it kind of that might have been very I mean this format as you just laid out is very unlike at that time.

Yes. It's a very different format. The reason for it is probably them reacting to me giving away finishes. I can't give away a package. I can't, you know what I mean? I can't ruin a show that I haven't been able to see and edit. I didn't even think of that.

Wow, that's interesting. I wanted to talk about the ratings that night, because the previous week you won, which is another reason I think they may have, said, hey, let's show multiple Brett Hart matches in here. Maybe that'll help. Both shows score a 2.6 rating.

And that's usually where people leave it. But I want to remind you that Nitro in this era had a replay. WWE did not have a replay. So Brandon Thurston over at WrestleMania where big fans of Brandon's work, he did the math recently. I don't know if you've seen this here. But if you include the replay,

the West Coast replay of Nitro, then Nitro's winning streak actually started three weeks earlier than when we normally start counting it. And now it also goes a whopping five months later than what we've been counting all the way to November of 1998. So I'm saying all that to say.

Eric, next week, we may need to introduce the world to 100 and some odd weeks. Let's do it. Isn't that great? We could put, you know, 83 over 183 or whatever it is, so it looks like a blood pressure thing. It's unbelievable to think about. How have you, that was in front of us this entire time.

But if you're really counting the number of people who watch Nitro, why would you not include the replay, right there? No, you'd absolutely, I mean, look, if you wanted to argue this in court as to why it's, it's ethical and accurate. it to do so. I'm going to step just a bit into the weeds. When you look at that head-to-head nitro

raw number, at that time, the ratings worked is if you could hold a viewer, of Nielsen viewer, for more than half of 15 minutes in total, then you got the quarter hour.

Basically, I think that's how it worked, right? So what you were happening, what was happening at time is so many people were watching raw and night show that you got one person going eh i'm going back over here and i'm going back over here they were there was so much cross trafficking in terms of going from one show to the other on people's remotes that there's a lot of duplication in that number now it's always been how much there's no way to to determine at that time, there was no way. Maybe you could have researched, spent a couple of million dollars to

try to figure it out. But at that time, in terms of what was really accessible to us, you couldn't really go too far beyond quarter hours. So pick me up. Where were we? We're talking about the rating for the replay. Oh, for the replay. So here's the argument for the replay. That would have been a totally unduplicated number. That number for the replay was a real number because there was nobody going back and forth. That just happened to be that measure of audience west of the Rockies, right? That was a real number. Whereas the original play number, there was a lot of duplication in that number.

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All right, Eric, we've had a lot of fun talking about these top fives. specifically we've been talking about what worked in the WWB and what didn't work in the WWE and now we're going to break down the top five reasons that the WCW invasion angle failed we've talked about this from an end to NWO perspective but I think we all know when we teased it at the top of the show what if Vince had gotten control of Nistro and thunder on T&T and TBS the whole thing would have looked a lot differently well that was in October of 2000 by July of 2001 we're here. The invasion pay-per-view that year sold more pay-per-views than anything except

WrestleMania, and it was a high watermark for years to come. So clearly, fans were excited about it, but that was until we saw it. It's maybe the biggest what if or what could have been in the history of wrestling. Do you agree with that? Yeah, if you, if you think about it, the potential that it had, it could have been one of the biggest things ever. Well, let's jump right into it. At number five on your list of the top five reasons that the invasion angle failed, you put too many moving parts. I guess you felt like the alliance was kind of confusing because you've got Stephanie McMahon as the quote unquote owner of ECW and Shane McMahon is the owner of WCW. And then team alliance is led by stone cold Steve Austin like

the bread and butter of the WWE. It just feels weird. Like when you It was ridiculous. There was no, there's no, there's no, there's no, there's no why. And what little why there was with regard to shade and his motivation and Stephanie hers was so poorly developed and executed, it just wasn't believable. There was no way you could buy into that storyline with, without Philly stupid. It was that cheesy. And it could have been really, really good.

That's what I said early on. I know I was babbling to a degree, but it's about the commitment to it. If you really are committed to that idea and you really see the potential and I'm willing to spend the time and stay focused and really make it as good as good be, or is this just something to get us through the next pay-per-view or the next three paper views? If it's just two or three pay-per-views, that's fine. There's nothing wrong with that business strategy, but the story and everything else is going to get serviced accordingly.

If it's potentially a WrestleMania next year, eight months from now kind of story or a year from now, then it's going to get a whole different kind of commitment and attention and development. So this idea could have been a big WrestleMania-type level of story. if that was the commitment to it, but it certainly was not. And that's why you saw what you saw. I got to tell you, Eric, the thing that took me out as a fan the most,

Stephanie McMahon runs ECW. It's just, I don't know that there could have been worse casting if you tried. No, and I love Stephanie. I have nothing but respect for her. She's really an impressive woman in a lot of ways. very talented but that picture we know she's in her you know

hook her dress with her curly hair and you know looking like she's hanging out of the bar that's just not her character no it's just not her it's like like you said it's really really bad casting

that's not the role you put that woman in right that's just the beginning let's start let's start with that let's go to number four on Eric's top five reasons

the invasion angle failed you tell me there's no true invasion atmosphere there's no suspense or build up what do you mean here Eric there's no tension there's no conflict there's no pretense of conflict there's no story

we just covered that there is zero anticipation that's what we're talking about here there is less than zero reality nobody's buying into why this is all happening you got no story you got no anticipation you got no reality looking for a surprise somewhere down the road and yeah you're going to give us action but right now you're batting one out of five and that sucks two out of five is painful three out of five will let you keep your job four out of five you're looking pretty good five out of five you're going to print money for about two and a half for three years this was barely a one

Eric I realize that I'm about to suggest something that you're going to make fun of and laugh out and I get it but I want to ask anyway I'm tired Conrad it doesn't take much to make me laugh tonight. As a fan, one of the things that I felt like watching this was, hey, it's just WWE with different logos. It looked the exact same. I'm wondering, and I realize you'd be sacrificing some ticket sales, but if you had a raw setup, like the entrance ramp and the Titan Tron and all that, maybe it's scaled down a little bit, but you have that on the left side. And then on the right side, you had a nitro set. Yes, you would have sacrificed some tickets, but you could have maybe had hour one is raw, hour two is

nitro and it could look different or you could alter weeks like if this week it was raw but next week it was nitro i know that could be a little confusing but at least then it feels like a battle but if it's the same raw set the same raw announcers the same raw production the same raw lighting the same raw ring it just feels the same it is the same yeah it's just different roles different characters and roles. It's still WWE. And the story, even before I went, you know, when I joined WWE back in 2019, in a weeks and months leading up to that,

I don't know how I was doing some kind of an interview, perhaps a podcast. And somebody asked me to explain, you know, my take on the current WWB product at the time. And I said it's cookie cutter. It's like watching cookie dough coming out of a cookie cutter machine. You like the cookie dough. Everybody loves cookie doughs, cookie dough.

But it's the same cookie dough every single time in the cookies that come out, look the same, taste the same, smell the same, go into a package that looks very much the same. There was such a sameness across the board in the entire WWE presentation at that time that it really stood out to me. and i don't know well sorry i was going somewhere i forgot i'm really tired i've been up since one o'clock this morning so i'm beat i think in the future maybe we don't do any more late night 83s no man i mean i i feel fine i drank about two pots of coffee on the way here so

i'm i'm not going to fall asleep on you but i drift off in my head well let's let's see if we keep you focus for number three on your top five reasons that the invasion angle failed you wrote wcw was made to look inferior i mean i guess that's true from day one wcw was booked to look inferior so where do we go right well that goes back to some of the you know the the the perception and the attitude amongst a lot of veterans who damn near saw their lives you know get turned upside down by WCW and Nitro. Those feelings for a core group of people were very, very real. Because the fear was real.

The fear of loss was real. The fear of the future was real for them. So, yeah, they ended up winning. They bought the company and on the surface, everybody loved everybody. Hey, we're glad you're here. Buck or father. You know?

It was, look, I felt it from some people. It took Kevin Dunn forever to warm up to me. He was nice in my face. Don't get me wrong. It was always professional. And I could tell that he wanted to get to know me, but. Now, it took years. And then we got along great, but it took a long time because he still had that feeling.

We did see Booker T, you know, defeat Kurt Engel. and he would go to a no contest with the undertaker. But I do feel like we were looking at some of those photos there, Booker T. If he would have been victorious and beaten the rock, don't you think that could have made Booker T in the minds of a lot of WWE fans? It was certainly elevated them.

And I think Booker T was certainly worthy of that, that opportunity. You know, he didn't get it. But certainly was more than qualified for it. It would have been interesting to see what cut, because Poker T's got a massive personality. He drips charisma.

I mean, he's one of those people that when he walks into the room, and he's not like, he's a big guy. I mean, obviously he's a very big guy. But he's also one of those cats that when he walks into the room, whether you're looking in his direction or not, you're aware that he walked into

the room. He's got that kind of aura and magnitude of character. So he could have made it. He persevered despite some really bad booking. I think myself and a lot of others were just lost that he did not beat Triple H at WrestleMania a couple of years later. It felt like from the beginning they were trying to put him in the mid card.

But hey, the cream always rises to the top, but all worked out for Booker T. Let's take a look at number two on Eric's top five reasons that the invasion angle didn't work. And this is probably the biggest one or maybe second. second biggest one for me too. He wrote, The Invasion became a WWE story, not WCW versus

WWE. And I'm sure you're talking about Vince versus the kids because that was sort of a subplot of the whole thing. And instead of getting Eric Bischoff and Paul Heyman, you know,

trying to do some sort of a debate with Vince. And we know that would happen later. When we see three McMans arguing about WCW, ECW and WWE, I'm kind of like, Dude, it's no different, I know I say this a lot. It's no different than if you've ever been to a movie that loses you in the first five minutes, that's it.

You're done. You're out. You're going to sit there. You're going to waste two and a half hours or two hours watching the movie you know is going to suck. That's what this was. They never even got through an act one before this thing bombed because it was just not believable. it was it was creatively insulting even looking back at it now

and everything looks cheesy 20 years ago right in the time you think you're doing cutting out of shit you look at it 20 25 years later it's so cheeseball but even with that in mind this was really cheeseball I think we can all guess what number one on Eric's list of the top five reasons

that the invasion angle didn't work work is easy lack of wcw's top stars no sting no goldberg no flair no nash no hogan no hall no eric fish off we do get you know what conrad now that you say that i apologize for interrupting you but this is important maybe that's why they did what they did because they didn't have the brands yeah i mean i'm sitting here but you know busting their balls for what looks like really bad casting and creative, but if you don't have access to the characters that you really wanted to play those parts, you work with what you've got. Or you just don't fucking do it. Because you know what I'm not going to do later? I'm not going to go say, hey, Megan, let's make

some chocolate chip cookies. And she could say, well, we don't have any chocolate chips. And I could say, well, let's just put something else in there. Let's just put some, let's put celery in it. Well, no shit. It's not chocolate chip cookies without chocolate chips. It's not a WCW invasion if you don't have WCW's top stars. Like, there you go. Let's call it a pro invasion. Let's tell them thunder's invading.

Uh-oh, here comes WCW Saturday night, down the ramp. That's what it was. Yeah. Now, you're right. That's,

you're absolutely right. There's no arguing that. Well, there's also no arguing that when they finally did have a chance to bring in the big names, we'll call it 02 and 03. It feels like the timing had missed. You know,

the magic moment. had evaporated and i know that we often say this in and sales and certainly in entertainment timing is everything and i think that's that if they would have done this angle a year or two later maybe it had a greater success rate don't you think no they would have i mean just think about it they brought me in i can't remember how far after that after this following july so they started july of o one you're you're there in july of o two one year after the invasion angle starts, here you come. They could have easily rekindled

it then, but they made a decision to go in a different direction. Once they brought me in and there was, other than me, putting myself over in the first segment, the first time I grabbed the microphone, all I did was walk out and tell the world what a

wonderful promoter I was. Put myself over for about 12 or 15 minutes. Once I was done with that promo, other than a few side comments here or there, you know, being the brunt of a,

you know, of a joke. You know, is that how you used to do it in WCW more of a, you know, a little punchline? There was no reference to it. It was dead.

It was dead by the time I got there. And if they were going to do it, they would have done it then. Speaking of the invasion storyline, Eric, someone who found themselves in the WCW ECW, ECW Alliance was an individual. You had not spoken.

to for several decades until you sat down with him over at ad-freeshows.com. We're talking, of course, about Raven, who shared some surprising details about what happened in the days following his walkout from WCW. Let's take a listen. You know, it was a big life decision, you know, do I, do I stay quit or do I go back, you know, and plus I had the meeting with Brad Siegel on the following Monday. I met him out, and then I started talking to him, and I ran some ideas by him, and he really liked them and uh you know i well you know plug myself basically and he said and so he scheduled a

meeting for me on monday morning after that after that weekend that we were that i quit on and um so i still went to the meeting and uh he asked me a bunch of stuff like did you felt that i buried you there in that meeting but i never did all the only thing that i said that was negative towards you was i thought you were staying with a pat hand too long you know with hogan and and the same guys had been on top forever you know staying on top but other than that Matt, I didn't have to say a bad word about you. And because I still felt, you know, whether you, whether I called me out, I walked out the door or not, that, you know, that I respected you and I respected your work and respected

what you did for the business. So I didn't, like I said, the only thing I felt was that you played a pat hand too long. Well, clearly you were right about that. I always felt like there was some animosity there. And I kind of felt like it might have stemmed from that. That's what I had heard. You did a great fine, but, you know, who knows what... I'll be honest with you, Raven.

You talking about a meeting with Brad is... If I knew about it before this moment, it somehow got deleted from my mind. Because this is the first time I've heard that. Oh. All right. Well, then... I'd be a little hot at Brad because the idea of Brad having a meeting that he didn't ask me about or let me know. Because I...

He wasn't my boss. at that time. So for him to meet with my talent in a separate meeting without giving me a heads up first, I'd have bit slapped him verbally. But I don't, this is the first time I heard about it.

Check out the full sit-down interview with Eric and Raven right now. It's exclusively over at ad-freeshows.com. And while you're there, we've got a ton more Bischoff bonus waiting for you. Exclusive bonus episodes, watchalongs, live interactive Q&As, and a whole lot more fun from EasyE,

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That's code 83 weeks, 50 off at factormeals.com slash 83 weeks, 50 off for 50% off, plus free shipping. That's factor meals.com slash 83 weeks, 50 off. It's time for the wrestling news update with Raj Geary. All right, let's welcome into the program. Raj, Geary, Raj, what's going on, man? How are you? I'm good, man. How are you guys? Man, we're excited to have you on. There's so much news. I can't wait to jump into it with some criminal news. And according to TMZ, we saw a few weeks ago that Roger Jackson was arrested.

I guess he's been formally charged with battery. Allegedly, if he's convicted, then he could have a seven-year prison stint. But I'm hearing that he pled not guilty. Is that right, Roger? Yeah, he pled not guilty in Thursday for attacking Stuart Smith at a at a wrestling event in Knox Pro Wrestling event back in August. He was arrested back in September, released on $50,000 bail. And based on the charges, he could face seven years in prison if he's convicted. So he's due back in court in November at the end of November for preliminary hearing in the case. So I mean, it should be interesting. I mean, everyone saw what happened. Basically, there was a backstage incident with Rob. and Stuart Smith. Stuart Smith smashed a beer can on his head. You know, kind of thinking he was working, it was one of those things where it was still kind of strange when you, if you don't know you're working,

maybe don't smash a beer can on someone's head, but regardless, that does not give anyone a reason to assault someone, like we saw he basically gave an Arne Anderson spinebuster later on in the show. So A.J. Mana, who was at the show, told Roger Jackson, he calmed them down. Roger Jackson, Stuart Smith actually shook hands before the show. And then A.J. Mata basically told Roger Jackson that later in the main event, he could get his receipt at the end of the match. And once the match concluded, as we all saw Roger Jackson went in, gave him the spine buster, and just connected with over two dozen unprotected punches to the head.

And it caught serious injuries to Stuart Smith. luckily he's okay and yeah so that that is ongoing and your way he's getting convicted he will never get convicted he should plead not guilty i'm sorry that story is so freaking bizarre on its surface like we all know about it news of breaks and we're kind of you know to one degree or another we're all associated with the culture some more some less but all nonetheless associated with the culture and therefore become somewhat kind of numb and as crazy as this is, it's not nearly as crazy as it is to the people who aren't used to hearing this kind of crazy. It's nuts.

And it wasn't just Raja. The whole scene is nuts. Well, he couldn't hit him in the head with a can of beer if you don't really work. Explain that to a jury and hope that all of them are going to agree with you. There's no jury out there that's going to. to hear this story, as bizarre as it is, and have them all agree on anything, it's a waste of time. He'll get sued civilly.

But can you imagine trying to argue with this in front of a jury? I think if the immediate response was Roger throwing punches, that's a different thing. But the fact that it happened later, he livestreamed the whole thing, was talking about how he said he was going to F him up during his live stream, during his live stream, during that match he's like watching me go eff him up so is after people on a jury will be going yeah he deserved it damn yeah i mean there is that but you know he was he spent several days in an intensive care i've got to tell you i'm like i'm not emotionally invested but i'm thinking somebody comes up and you know i mean it's embarrassing it's it's degrading it could hurt you it's taking

liberty i'm i mean i'm justifying anything but you You can understand it. That's the point. You can't justify it, but you can understand how it happened, and it's not just his fault. In my opinion, I'm not on the jury, so it doesn't matter. I agree. And I do think that A.J. Mata telling, you know, Roger, who is not a trained pro wrestler, that he can get a receipt, even though he said that, I don't know how in any world you could think that means you could just destroy a guy. but that's that's a that's a that's a different conversation by the way but wow well we're going to

stay tuned we want to hear from you guys what do you think will happen will raja wind up serving a sentence or will this just be i mean i could see this being house arrest or i mean he can plead this down it is my best guest don't you think this is california so okay so i He didn't have anybody's head in his trunk. He'll be fine. It's California. Yeah. Well, let's talk about something everybody in California is talking about right now.

Mr. Geary, the ratings have changed. And I can't wait for you to tell us exactly what's changed, how it's affected all the other programming out there. And more specifically, how has it affected wrestling? Man, it's been brutal for wrestling. I mean, just beyond anything we've ever seen, whenever Nielsen changed their methodologies or anything in the past, we've never seen a huge, drastic shift like we're seeing right now. Basically, the old Nielsen rating system.

And Eric, you know this better than anyone. Back in the 90s, that Nielsen rating system was like a pool of like 5,000 people. And they've added more and more and more. And right now, it had been a pool of about 42,000. thousand subscribers that they use, basically their sample size, that make up the total audience. So 42,000 people basically up until now had kind of determined what shows, you ad rates and what shows remain on TV. Last month, Nielsen rolled out the big data and panel system, which started being reflected in the ratings last week. And the big data includes streaming

and out-of-home viewing with real-time trends from 45 million devices. So way, way, way, way more devices. But with those devices, for instance, like when we're watching on Netflix, right, we're not putting in who's watching with us. Like if I'm watching Netflix with my entire family, Netflix doesn't know that with their numbers. They just know that this household is watching this show. So what they're doing is they're combining that with the old panel system

with the demographics and things like that. So those Mielsen numbers were, you know, Me and my, me and three daughters are, you know, are watching karate kid legends. And they get that from the old system and kind of combine it with this new system of 45 million devices. And so theoretically, this new system should be way more accurate because you're adding so many, so many more devices. And most sports have seen an increase in rating. We just saw it last Friday with the WNBA finals. They're up a huge year over year, but Smackdown, their rating was their lowest ever tied with one on FS1 as far as 18 to 49.

Their AEW Dynamite last week, they did their lowest number ever. This past Tuesday night, you know, AEW Dynamite, NXT went head to head. NXT actually destroyed AEW and just kind of goes to, Eric, your prediction back in the day about how NXT, would start beating AEW regularly. We don't know the max numbers, obviously, but this new system includes all these streaming devices and the numbers went down. So, and starting next year,

we will have the max numbers included with this data. So it's just been a disaster for wrestling. Every show has done their all-time lowest. I wonder why. Because it has, you know, all of the makings of a really good novel, right? It could be a conspiracy, right? I mean, professional wrestling is eating up a lot of ad dollars, right?

It's taking up a lot of space. You make it a little tough on their advertising by crunching their numbers just a little bit. It would make life easier for sports and other forms of entertainment. I'm not saying that that's happening. But why else would it happen? If it's not, what explains it? I mean, that's the million dollar question. I mean, the one thing is maybe Nielsen oversampled the demographics that probably are more

likely to watch wrestling. Maybe lower income. I'm by that. We're oversampled than, you know, because that's the one thing that the NFL would complain. It's funny. NFL is the one that really complained about. the old rating system, even though they destroy everything in the ratings, they still felt that they were being undercounted.

And they were right. The new system, the football numbers have gone up and all the major sports are going up. Most shows have stayed about the same. And then, yeah, so kind of going back to that, I think the demographics were probably overcounted that cater more toward the rest of the crowd. That's the logical explanation. I could see that. Yeah.

well and here's why i mean have either of you guys gotten one of those diaries in the in the mail before i got one and they sit you a dollar like i got you fill out these 14 sheets of paper and here's a crisp one dollar bill yeah i open my mail over the trash can because i know a bunch of it's going to be junk mail so nope no thanks no thanks no thanks no thanks i get to that see what it is pull the dollar out trash i'm not filling that out so i buy what you're saying mr gary I think that makes total sense. Absolutely. And to your point,

when I got one of those meals and letters, you know, like a couple years ago, and it was like, you have to wear this device nonstop. It's going to be tracking everything, you know, that every sound that's coming in,

it's going to be paying attention and it's going to pick up what you're watching, blah, blah, blah. But, you know, it's a little big brotherish. So unless that extra money is really appealing to you, you're probably just going to throw that in the crash.

Yeah. I'm speaking of something else that everybody's been talking about this week. I want to get your take and Eric, you may have some insight here. I don't know if you heard, but our old buddy Kevin Nash went on his podcast earlier this week and explained that his statements, his royalty checks that he's been getting from WWE forever.

They're different now. And he says this started really when the TKO purchase first happened. And he said he got a pretty good check. the last distribution period but this one he described as being rotten and when he called Sean Waltman on the phone Waltman answered laughing like oh you must have got your royalty check Eric have you noticed the difference I mean Kevin says specifically he used to get a breakdown of the individual items on on a royalty check so it would say this many NWT shirts and this many ladies NWT shirts and that sort of thing and I know that's a sore subject for you

you weren't getting your NWO cut like you deserve. That's not a short subject. I laugh about it all the time. But, but he says now it just says NWO intellectual property, but there's no breakdown. So obviously, Big Kev,

he, he wants some forensic accounting. And I get that. There's been an established baseline of, hey, here's what to expect. And now there's been some sort of a paradigm shift. Eric,

I've never gotten a royalty thing like that from WWE before. Is that the way yours look as well? Have you noticed the change? I haven't noticed the change because I don't look at them. Okay. And I don't mean to sound, you know, like I'm arrogant about it. It's just that they're not, for me, they're not significant enough checks. I got you.

You know, it's, you know, once a quarter, I'll get 15, 20 grand, and I'll look at it and just out of curiosity, what's moving. But I throw it right in the garbage. I don't track it. I'm not trying to manage it. To me, it's mailbox money. It's like, oh, wow, I can't forget all about this. Because usually I do. I don't even think about it.

It's not budgeted into anything. It's just when it shows up, it's like, oh, wonderful. But I don't track it. So if there has been a change, I probably wouldn't even be aware of it. Raj, have you heard anything like this? Or did you hear it for the first time through Kevin Nash like everybody else did? That was the first time I had heard it. But I know in the past, like when the WWE, when they switched to the

network. I remember talking to Jesse Ventura because he had the famous lawsuit. And, you know, he talked about the royalties. You know, obviously that led to his departure from the company, him suing and all that. So every time there's a shift in technology, change in ownership, things change. And that's where you really got to have the eyes, you know, the eyes, eyes dotted and the T's cross because things are going to change. And as technology has changed. And as technology is changing. changing the way royalties work, you know, DVD sales, DVDs are almost extinct now. They're not going to be around in 10 years. It's just constantly changing. So it's just tough, you know, but, you know, hopefully with TEP, you know, and I agree with Conrad. I do think you should be getting that NWO royalty merch. But if it's a significant change, you know, I know Triple H is his buddy and he mentioned that, but it's probably worth taking a look at and just making the call because, you know,

maybe they could change some things here and there. I want to ask you, too, Raj, about the news about, I don't even know if this is a story, but people get really excited about breaking down how many were actually in the building. And I think this all started with WrestleMania 3. And I know that there's been a lot of people on the wrestling observer train where Dave would always say they say this many people are in the building but that's not the real number this is the real number there was always this silly back and forth argument well now we're hearing months after the fact that perhaps the numbers that were first reported for AEW they wound

up being a little different and I guess there was some sort of a trust involved here what's really going on there rush yeah I mean they basically had said that they had they were going to have an estimated attendance of 33,490. That was what they projected back in February. And then they ended up with 23,759 with 21,973 spectators. So that's basically what the, that's basically like the turnstile numbers, right? Like the people that were actually scanned through the door, more or less the official number. And then you have other people like it suites and things like that that add to the bigger

number. So yeah, so Tony Kahn had kind of said they were, you know, they were going to be at around 29,000. It ended up 219 to 237, depending on which number you want to use. I think a lot of people, you know, you're kind of used to inflated numbers from Vince that he kind of really started it. But I think a lot of people just didn't expect Tony Kahn to also do that. So it is, an inflated number and and it is what it is you know uh it didn't so a lot of people didn't think tony a lot of people didn't think tony con would inflate a number i didn't say me okay but others do think that evidently that's funny too that's pretty funny and so uh they're gonna because of that the funding is going to be uh reduced uh it's 29

percent below the estimate that they gave back in February. So they're going to see about it. You know what's really weird about this, Raj? It's like, who cares? I agree. This is the dumbest thing to be a thing. I've heard of it a long time. It's like, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute, why are you people so invested in this

number versus this number when they're both really freaking good numbers, by the way? Yeah. So let's just call it as paid. It is what it is, folks. They're both really good numbers. So what is the issue? I don't get it. So I think what happened was with the original All-In, they were claiming the record, right?

AEW, they were claiming that they did $88,000 or whatever, and that they had beat WrestleMania 32, which turned out to not be the case. And I think because of that, that made attendance for these All-In shows such an issue. So Tony started it. So Tony started it by doing what most people don't. think he'll do which is inflated number right yeah pretty much morons what's wrong with you people yeah it's just been an interesting week and it's been a kind of a bad week you know i i mentioned the ratings earlier we saw uh with nxtt and dynamite nxte doubled dynamite in the ratings

when they went head-to-head on t this is fifth time in the row that they went head-to-head nxte winning every time this time almost you know almost doubling them in the demo as well they beat a by 71%. So it's just been kind of one of those things where it's been kind of a rough, a rough little time for AEW, especially with the ratings change. And I think people just looking to pile on because there have been all those years where the numbers have been kind of inflated by other reporters and, you know, people running with imaginary numbers. And now you're starting to see the real numbers. Dave Meltzer, he's talking about you, bitch. But, you know, now you're really seeing this, how ridiculous that thought of dynamite beating raw, if you count the max numbers, how ridiculous that is.

And, yeah, it just kind of like the chickens coming home to roost, is that the thing? Yeah, so, you know, I know we all really feel like it's best to have multiple strong promotions at the same time, want to see them both doing one. well, but new rating system is rough for both. So we'll, we'll see where it goes. Well, and it's worth mentioning, you've got a two and a half million dollar gate at least over 21,000 tickets sold. It looks like from this reveal that just was made public, there's a more favorable merchandise split.

I don't think a lot of our listeners maybe even know that, but when you sell merch in a big venue like that, usually the venue gets a piece of the merch. I mean, that's just part of the buildings agreement. So they got a really favorable split on high ticket items. And that was where, you know, the bulk of the money is going to come from. And, you know, I know I probably shouldn't be saying this, but Starcast was hugely profitable, hundreds of thousands of dollars and profit. So there's a pile of cash coming in.

And now allegedly, there's still a $700,000 influx of cash from the state. Like, I guess it was originally a million and now it's 700. Like, Eric, I'm with you. There's no other way to frame this than hugely successful. Yeah. it's but I guess it's just something for people to argue about yes it's just it's the lowest vibrational dopamine hit available to mankind but there seems to be a market for that so and i and again i do think there are and i hate to say it but there are certain reporters out there that really feed

into it and they were like how all in was a huge success the saturday nights made event was a flop even though it was the first time Saturday night's main event was ever number one for the night, you know, in the demo. And, you know, just kind of feeding that, you know, feeding that energy to where people jump on stuff like that because of that, you know, that stuff that's put out there. But, I mean, and it's funny because guys like that call other people grifters and the connoisse, but that's exactly what the individual you're referring to, Dave Beltzer, is, doing this is how he generates revenue it's not on facts and information and actual contacts and

research and knowing anything really about the business it's his twisted distorted reality of the business and this personal bias is all wrapped into one vomit of a perspective of a business he really doesn't understand but is convinced a lot of low-thinking people that he does that's his business it does create an atmosphere where people care more about attendance than ratings who probably otherwise wouldn't care yeah well roj we appreciate you jumping on with us is there anything else in the news you want to hit today and if not where can where can folks find you no it's been a busy week but uh as always check out mass of heat on uh watch podcast heat at watch podcast heat and on youtube we had gail kim on this past week myself matt morgan and jack farmer we talked to gail about the contract regarding Kenny Omega and Rio. So we discussed all that. We had Maven Huffman on last week as well. So check that out.

It was a fun show and leave your feedback. It's a new show, so we want to see it keep growing. So we appreciate you guys liking it, subscribing, and leaving a comment. So find us there. Very cool. Thanks, Raj. Thanks, guys. Take care.

Week. Hey, right now I want to brag about prize picks. I'm such a big believer in this. I've got to tell you, I have a lot of fun with all. all of my friends at the office and my favorite watering hole. It feels like every guy I know has got this on their phone. And if you don't, what are you waiting for? Go right now and check out price picks.

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that's code 83 weeks to get $50 in lineups after you play your first $5 lineup prize picks. It's good to be right. Now it's time for our YouTube comment of the week. Last week we talked about your top five

WWE acquisitions and a lot of people were surprised that Lex Lugar wasn't on your list. Is there a reason that Lex didn't make the cut? I mean, he should, he's definitely an honorable mention and a guy that I really thought about because if I really camp out and think about it for a little bit, go into the weeds in my own head. Lex Lugar was really a pivot point. Lex Lugar was a response to a massive amount of research that I began to understand during the course of the research that we did leading up to Nitro.

that the audience really above everything else when it came to professional wrestling. If you ask them all of the attributes, what draws you to this product, and you look at the laundry list of things that people are attracted to at the very top of surprises. The anticipation of surprises was always near the top. And Lex was my response to that learning experience, quite frankly. It was me remembering those focus groups. And listening to people in their own words describe what they liked about professional wrestling.

Not my perception of what they liked. Not what somebody who's been in the business for 20 years tells me they like, but what I can see and hear directly from them because it's a different way to read the audience. You get different ideas as a result of that. So that's exactly what Lex Lugar was. And it was also the minute he walked out there, it defined the fact that the biggest difference between nitro and raw is raw, we're live, and anything can happen.

They're not. That was the core message in everything we tried to do, but Lex Lugar was the first shot over the bow, so to speak, in our regard. Well, that being said, a majority of our listeners agreed with your list and the impact that those talents had on WCW, but a number of people had comments about one of your choices, and that's why we have this week's YouTube comment of the week. It's from Johnny Skinwalker, 4095, and he says,

Getting Piper was such an amazing coup. Getting a star of that level was insane. One of the guys that made wrestling mainstream in the 80s at the height of rock and wrestling, and he was such a great investment. Like Eric says, he's a crazy horse, but Dan, does he bring it every time? I think even now,

people are still just discovering how talented Roddy Piper was. I think he was overlooked because the shadow that Hulk Hogan cast was so large. But man, what a talent he was, right? Yeah, and I don't want to sound too, you know, theater school about it. But Rodney was a very layered character. Like, he was always the same guy, but there were different layers of him, depending on the angle and the storyline who he's working with. You know, he could go from that half crazy guy,

you know, to being very understated and intimidating and serious and make you believe it. So he had that range, you know, I guess that's a better way to say. He just had range in his characters, and he always kept him really interesting. he found ways to keep Roddy Piper really interesting. Sometimes it was wacky shit, but it was interesting wacky shit. Kept your eyes on him. Made you listen to him a little closer

because he was just that kind of guy. He drew you in. So yeah, I think about him a lot. He's a really special guy. Well, we want to talk about a special event this weekend. I can't believe it's happening already. But Crown Jewel, not in Saudi Arabia. but in Australia it's happening early this Saturday morning and Eric I know that

you're going to be glued to the television watching every minute of this I want very quickly to run through some of the matches and you give us your picks we've got John Sina and AJ Styles it's one of AJ's final it is a J's final match against John Sina we've only got a handful of matches left they're coming in cold but I'm kind of okay with that this is a dream match for a lot of people we've seen it before we're going to see it again you know they had incredible matches at money in the bank 2016 summer slam 2016 even royal rumble 2017 i mean these were big time stadium events and they're going to do it in john senna's farewell tour if you were booking this would you

book john sina over or a j styles i'd have to go with john we're we're coming down a home and we're sending people home happy let's go all the way with it and i think age is honored and thrilled with the opportunity to be in there and to do it. It's an opportunity of a lifetime for someone like AJ who's coming to the end of his own career at some point in probably the near future, near meaning one to five years. That being the case, this is such a magic moment for both of them, but for A.J. for sure. and John but AJ for sure what he that that was so happy to see that it's such a cool thing I don't know how it came about who went to who who who whatever I don't know how it happened

but however it happened it's a very cool thing I'm excited to see it too maybe the match I'm looking forward to the most uh the ladies are going to be in tag action Ria and EO against oska insane uh these ladies can do it all you got a lot of international talent and arguably the biggest female star they've got in rio ripply what do you expect here i expect hometown girl to shine yeah no doubt right that's what i expect to see because not because she's the hometown girl because she is a megastar on on and and she's ascending she's not there yet she's a megastar it's fun to watch good for her for the ladies we've got champ versus champ tiffany versus stephanie this is for the crown jewel championship you'll recall they've got this big monstrosity of a title and so we've

got the two champs from either brand battling for a new belt uh who do you like here tiffany or stepney stepney going all the way she's just got there's just there's that aura again there's that energy that vibe there's just that's something that lets you know without even knowing that that that's what that's going in our main event we've got the champ versus the champ it's cody versus set a lot of people are saying that seth is doing the best work of his career we know cody left with the crown jewel championship last year will he repeat or is it set's time what do you think eric this is a toss up for me because it could it could go so many different ways keep in mind we're what we're into october

we're already thinking about russamia right so is this just you know one of the open chapters in act one or are we closing up a chapter don't know find out there's a lot of options i don't know anything i say beyond this will be what i want to happen not what i think will happen so we'll let go at that john layfield and i will be live immediately following crown jewel this saturday morning check us out over at something to wrestle dot com if you want to interact with john and pick his brain about the event go check out something to wrestle.com immediately following Crown Jewel this weekend. He said it could go either way and there's a lot of different options.

It could go a lot of different directions. Well, that's why you need legal buddy. You know, life happens fast. One minute you're driving home from work and the next. You see those flashing lights in your rearview mirror. Your heart skips, your hands tighten on the wheel. You start asking yourself, what do I do now? That's when you need someone on your side.

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It's direct access to a lawyer who understands your situation and your community and one who can step in right away. Think about it. When trouble knocks, do you really want to face it alone? Would you rather have the confidence of knowing a professional is already on your side? that's the piece of mind legal buddy gives you and here's how easy it is download the legal buddy app at legal buddy app.com register today and use the referral code legal for your chance to win a $250 Amazon gift card life is unpredictable accidents happen tickets happen mistakes happen but when they do you don't have to go through it alone the legal buddy app always on your side download the app today and enter the referral code legal I want to give a special shout out to to some of our special ad-free shows members who've been with us a long, long time.

What about Art Gonzalez? He's been with us since April Fool's Day of 2020. We appreciate your support. Thank you for all that. Hey, brother. I want to give a shout to Sean. Luke slouts. I screwed your name up,

but I appreciate you being with us since 2022. Matthew Hawkins, he just signed up in late September. Been with us a couple of weeks. Appreciate you joining the club here, Matthew. Thank you for joining us. And make plans to join us on YouTube if you haven't already. If you're listening on RSS, it's a whole different experience when you check us out on

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that you heard. You could be next week's YouTube comment on the week. Any of those comments, any of those likes, it all helps the YouTube. algorithm. Caust you absolutely nothing, but greatly helps support this show. By the way, support this show by living us a five-star rating wherever you enjoy podcasts, whether you're listening on Spotify or Apple or whatever, rate the show. We greatly appreciate it. And have we mentioned that you can find 83 weeks on X, on Instagram, on Facebook?

And now it's even on TikTok. That's right. Eric Vischoff and 83 weeks are on TikTok. It's at real Eric Bischoff on TikTok. that's at Real Eric Bischoff on TikTok. And by the way, if your business targets been 25 to 54 years old, there's never been a better place or time to advertise than right here with us on 83 weeks. You hear some of the same advertisers week after week for years.

Why is that? Because it really works. And with our super targeted audience, there's very little waste. Go right now to advertise witheric.com and find out more about advertising here on 83 weeks. Eric, I think we got all the Bischoff out of you we could tonight. I appreciate you being a brave soldier. I love that you stopped in North Dakota. I've never actually spoken to someone in North Dakota.

So this is a first for me. Your bucket list. I hope you guys have a safe trip. And I can't wait to talk about Crown Jewel next week, man. It's going to be fun. All right. Thank you, guys. Thank you very much.

See you next week right here on 83 weeks with Derek Bischoff. Thank you.