83 Weeks with Eric Bischoff - Strictly Business #009: WWE sale to Saudi Arabia?

Episode Date: January 11, 2023

At the closing bell of 1/11/2023, Eric Bischoff & Jon Alba respond to the reports from last night that said WWE had sold to Saudi Arabia. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is strictly business with Eric Bischoff presented to you exclusively by podcast heat and ad-free shows.com. This is supposed to be a weekly show dropping every single Thursday, but at this point, we may as well just be a daily show. Hello, everyone. I'm John Alba, joined as I am every single week by Eric Bischoff. Boy, howdy. Eric, I think you and I should just kind of leave our stream yard up. perpetually and just hop on, hop out whenever we're... Yeah, it could be like the Jerry Lewis telethon of wrestling news, right? Oh my goodness. Well, first off, everyone, thank you for tuning into this live bonus edition of Strictly

Business. If you are an ad-free show subscriber, you got the episode that Eric and I taped yesterday with Raj Gehry from Wrestling Inc., which I thought was one of my favorites that we've done so far, Eric, and we had a great conversation. We were feeling good about it. And then bam, everything happened in the last 24 hours after just. Yeah, I jokingly said to you, man, all we need to do, if we need some, like, really big news to happen because there's nothing really going on,

all you and I have to do is drop an episode of Strictly Business with 45 minutes, something's going to happen. You know, I said, damn, I couldn't have happened two hours before. We could have included it in the show and been timely, but no, we have to wait for a couple hours and then do another show, which, by the way, I'm joking, I'm happy to do. I love to do it. Me too. Me too. I love doing the show as well. And the beauty is, guys, this is a live free presentation of Strictly Business. We got a ton of you tuning in as the minutes go on. Here's how you can interact with the show. There's two ways. Number one, you have to be subscribed to the 83 weeks YouTube channel in order to have your comments show up. This is live, Jerome Manley. This is live.

It's telling you out real time. I love that. Exactly. And we also guarantee we will read your chat. you send us a super chat. If you send a super chat to us here on 83 weeks, we will read your comment on air. Otherwise, you can feel free just a comment, but you must be subscribed in order to do so to the 83 weeks channel. Eric, so much has happened in the last 24 hours. And it's, it's literally been almost 24 hours since the first major piece of news dropped, which of course was Stephanie McMahon's resignation from not just the WWB board of directors, but WWE in general. I'm going to get into the semantics of it as we discuss here, but first off, your initial reaction when all of that went down.

Surprised, and after the surprise wore off, because it's hard to surprise me anymore and it doesn't last long in today's environment, disappointed. I was sincerely disappointed when I read that. You know, I think this, her resignation, look, for me personally, it falls into one of, two categories, right? Either we can take everything that Stephanie said at face value in her press release. And let's keep in mind that Stephanie resigned, although I think it was

position as possibly temporary, but leave of absence. Leave of absence, correct. It implied that it was temporary or that the door was still open. But her reason for doing so was basically to spend more time with their family. Now, as a dad and as a father who had two young kids that were in their preteens and preteens when I was the most active in the industry and working 16, 18 hours a day and traveling all the time and all that, you do. You come home from work one day and you look at your kids and go, wait a minute, what happened? 45 minutes ago, you're running around in your diapers. Now you want the keys to my car. Where did all that time go? And you, you know, you start really realize that you want to spend more time with your kids, particularly in their teens, because that's

a uniquely vulnerable time for kids, right? So I, and I took that out of face value. But if that was the reason for her initial resignation, I notice I say if, it's what I want to believe, right? Then it made perfectly good sense. And when Vince was forced to leave, to me, from my perspective, because I'm a glass half full kind of guy, it made sense for me for Stephanie to go, wait, I'm coming back in the role of co-CEO to protect her family and her father's interest because that's always been the relationship

that I perceived between father and daughter, and this is Stephanie, very, very close, right? So that made sense to me. But here's where it gets a little kabuki-ish, right? 24 hours before she resigned, she's in a meeting with employees convincing, communicating to everyone that, hey, status quo, man, I'm here, Paul's here,

Nick's here, you know, Vince McMahon is back, optimist bright, there's a big potential here, excited to the charge forward, yay, rah, rah, great team, and then 24 hours later, she resigns. And the reason I think that matters is because right now, with all of the nonsense it's floating around out there. And we're going to talk about some of that, right?

And when we go further into the show about the dirt, you know, the dirt that's floating around on the internet and the clickbait headlines and so forth. But at a time when in a transition like this with the publicly held company, you would want to be perceived as being as stable as possible. The market doesn't like uncertainty, right, or volatility. and at a time when it's extremely critical to at least create the outward impression that it's business as usual and this high power team is going to continue doing what it's been doing 24 hours later she resigns which is the exact opposite of that

that's where I'm starting to get a little more jaded in terms of what's really going on behind the scenes but I don't know man it's just so crazy but but again let's let's say I'm right. Let's say my first impression of what I want to believe is true is right. And now in her second press release, which you're going to go over, she explains that she's going to leave because basically WWE is in great hands. Well, think about this. If her intentions, her motivation early on was to resign to spend time with family, she came back because her father was forced out, one way or the other. Now her father's back. Does she need to be there to protect her father's interest. So is this all kind of lead us back to the reason Stephanie resigned in the first

place? And there's nothing kabuki-ish or Machiavellant about it. It just is what it is. That's what I choose to believe. But the fact that she resigned when she resigned, you know, if she would have resigned before she made that statement to the employees, I'd be really comfortable with that decision. But to do it a day after, it's kind of weird. There's one element of this, Eric, that I think is very important that you haven't mentioned. And that is that December 27th letter from the WWE Board of Directors in response to Vince McMahon's initial inquiry about being reinstated as the executive chair of the board. We covered this on a previous edition of Strictly Business two episodes ago, which you can find in our archives, 83weeks.com. And that is where the suggestion was made that Vince rejoin the board.

and in order to have a transaction of sorts, Vince would be the one entrusted to lead it. The board pushed back unanimously and said they do not wish to reinstall him unanimously due to non-public information that they had felt they were in a possession of that could potentially interfere with issues and the existing federal investigation into Vince. And I underscore highlight whatever you want to do. do that word unanimous because who sat on the board of directors at the time of this letter, Eric Bischoff, Stephanie McMahon, Paul Levec, and Nick Kahn. Now, does that mean that they necessarily each individually voted unanimously to send that letter of disapproval? They could have abstained from voting and in that case it would still be unanimous. But I do think that needs to be said because if there was a unanimous pushback from an entity that included Stephanie

McMahon of not wanting Vince back into the equation and now she resigns just a couple of weeks later after that letter is sent to me Eric it's just as a journalist you're told not to believe in coincidence and coincidence can happen sometimes but generally speaking there's always smoke to some sort of fire yeah but but we're just glossing over one really important two-letter word if nobody knows if Paul LeVec and Stephanie and or Nick, for that matter, abstained. Because clearly they have a conflict of interest in this vote. I mean, if you were going to play this in such a straight and narrow fashion, is I suspect because it's a publicly held company, you would

and not expose yourself to challenges from shareholders. you would avoid any appearance of anything that can be remotely considered a conflict of interest. And Paul and Stephanie would have, I would imagine. I don't know. But it's just as plausible to believe they did abstain for that very reason. Even if they agreed with the board, I'm guessing they would abstain. I don't know, man. I just think we're...

And we'll never know the answer to that. We'll never know the answer, but here's what I see. And even in some of the comments, you know, it's like somebody, Sam Fletz and out, Vince's, you know, WWE's crumbling right before our very eyes and it's sad. I take the opposite look, man. I think this is not only an interesting and fascinating time because there's such a big media story. Forget that it's even wrestling. It's a great media story and corporate story.

Because, again, we're seeing the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the. manifestation of vertical integration continuing to gobble up, you know, otherwise small companies. And now it's big companies gobbling up big companies. It's an interesting time. But the tendency is, and I see it everywhere, I'm not picking on Sam Flood, but the tendency is to, oh, it's all falling apart. Oh, it's going to be horrible. Oh, this is going to happen. Oh, that's going to happen.

And nobody knows. This could be the best thing that's ever happened to W. We won't know until we do, but it just seems like it's more interesting to talk about all of the macchiavellian potential that comes along with this. I'm trying hard not to subscribe to it, but I, look, I may end up being one of those people that went, holy smokes. I was hoping that wasn't it. Well, you have another word for that, right? The McMahon villain? McMania villain, yeah.

I was going to use it in the context of that conversation. But I'm afraid that it hasn't quite set into the, you know, pop culture vernacular. So I refrained. Producer Steve here real fast with a quick question from Brandon Carson. Eric, do you think Triple H will leave next? Man, that's a great question, right? I feel like there's a lot of variables still to unfold before we can answer that, right? Yeah, I'm not going to predict it.

I'm not going to predict anything anymore. I'm going to give observations and, you know, personal. impressions based on my unique perspective and relationships with some of the principles involved. But, man, I think anybody, I don't care who you are. I don't care if you've got a corner office on the 37th floor in Manhattan and you run a multi-billion dollar hedge fund. You fucking don't know what's going to happen either. So I, I certainly am not qualified to predict anything. But there's just interesting bits and pieces coming out every 45 minutes or so. Well, I could tell you this, right after Stephanie resigned, I got messages from wrestlers

across every major company, WW, AW, impact, even one from MLW, too, that had previous ties. And every single person, Eric, expressed to me, they felt that this was something that was not great for wrestlers because they felt that Stephanie was a conscious voice and someone who was consciously in the corner of talent, at least looking after them from a very human perspective. And they admired her abilities to do what she did as a businesswoman, but always felt that she kept their best interest as human beings in mind. Is there any perspective you can give for people from your interactions with Stephanie McMahon on the type of businesswoman she is and the impact that she made on the company? You know, I never worked with Stephanie in any kind of day-to-day

capacity when I came to business in my brief period of time there in 2019, Stephanie was involved in aspects of the business work that were completely, for the most part, on the day-to-day basis, remote for me. We would have occasional group meetings between television and creative and, you know, licensing, for example, in Stephanie's group, right? But it was rare. But here's, you know, I mean, I watched Stephanie as a talent. I worked with her pretty closely for a while as a talent. When I came back, and I watched her from the sidelines.

I watched the things that she did on the sidelines. It was so thoroughly impressed with her as she kind of grew up the corporate ladder, right? And then in her role while I was there, while I didn't do any day-to-day business with Stephanie, the one strong impression I got was her leadership. You know, she had a great team. And you can, I can tell a leader how well a leader leads a team. The way they react when they're meeting with other groups.

You know, Stephanie's group was always upbeat. They looked at you in the eyes. You know, they were confident in the things that they were saying. They were buttoned up. And you just felt like they were bursting at the seams. and Stephanie was very deferential to some of the key people on her team in the meetings that I was in not because she needed to be big but great leaders are because you've surrounded yourself with great people you're all on the same page you challenge them you know they know

they know their business and then you let them you know take the floor in those critical meetings I saw a lot of that and to me you know I'd always walk away and oh wow she's really she's really amazing when she was when she came back as co-CEo I don't think think you could create a better person. You couldn't create a robot that would be any better at that role in that company than Stephanie McMahon. You couldn't go outside of the company and hire it because she has such a strong knowledge of the industry from the ground up from the time she was little.

She started out as a 12-year-old model with Hulk Hogan headbands and selling T-shirts, right? as a kid and then she became an intern and she grew up through that business as well as being, you know, getting a ringside seat under the Vince McMahon Learning Tree. And you can say whatever you want about Vince, you can have whatever personal opinions you have.

But that's a learning tree right there, folks. So who would be better? Which makes it even more interesting to me why she would resign. And you got to give her flowers too. One of the best on-camera talents W.W.E. has ever had in Stephanie McMahon. I think that goes without saying. And she was fun to work with, too. She was awesome and fun.

We got a super chat from Jim. He wants to know, is it possible that some of the employees or talents will leave regardless of what the situation is that's coming? Anything's possible, man. Anything is possible. I mean, I would, you know, I just read an interview that Jim Ross did. I think it was something that he spoke about on his podcast, Grillen, J.R. go listen but he gave you know Jim gave some some what I think is great advice to tell him

because nobody knows how this is going to turn out it could be the best thing that ever happened to to talent two years from now they could be looking back at this going wow I can't believe

I was actually afraid of this this is awesome that could happen folks it's not necessarily or even I think it's not doom and glue but if you get caught up in it if you're a talent

and you were caught up in this, especially if you're online and you're following the news like all of us are, I could see you, you know, going into an emotional death spiral. You know, just kick back. Here's an opportunity. This is really an opportunity for talent right now. Because who's going to stand out the most now on that roster, in those locker rooms on Monday and Friday nights?

Who's going to stand out the most? probably the people with the best attitude because everybody's expecting everybody to have a bad attitude and be nervous and walking on eggshells and moping and groping and huddling up in the arena and talking about all the parade of evils and is descending upon us from the wrestling heavens, right? But if you're that other person

and you're excited to be there and you're excited to get into your creative and you're excited to lay out your match and you can't wait to get out there and do whatever you're asked to do and you do it with enthusiasm and energy while everybody else is sitting around the back of the arena waiting for the other shoe to drop, you're going to stand out. And if that other shoe never drops or it does drop and it's a better shoe and a bigger shoe,

you'll still stand out. Yeah. So just it's all how you want to look at it, man. Is it possible? Let me answer the question. Is it possible? Of course it's possible. Everything's possible.

Do I think it's going to be like a major concern and have a, have a noticeable impact on the roster no i think some of that could also be dependent on who would be a potential buyer but we'll get into that in just a few moments here again guys just like jim you want to have your comment read on air all you got to do is leave a super chat we will read it on air also you can leave a chat if you'd like to without doing a super chat you just got to be subscribed to 83 weeks here on youtube and we very much appreciate your support Eric and I have had just a total blast doing strictly business, especially as often as we've been doing strictly business in the past few weeks here.

We did get another super chat from Joel that we're going to pull up here and this can kind of launch us into our conversation, Eric. So as we know, after the Stephanie McMahon stuff went down, a whole bunch of chatter started, I started hearing things, a whole bunch of people started hearing things, you started hearing things. And there were then reports that WWE was either in full agreement on or had sold to Saudi Arabia. And Joel asked, Eric, I value your opinion more than anybody. How likely is it, do you think Saudi Arabia buys WWE now? Eric, I spent all night, literally overnight. I've been going for 48 hours straight now trying to get comment on this, trying to confirm this. No one all night

long would confirm this they wouldn't deny it because i think genuinely people weren't aware but firmly this morning i was able to speak to someone pretty high up in the wwe pecking order who said at this time any report that a sale is done or agreed upon is completely false and others have also reported similarly so eric joel wants to know how likely is it do you think saudi arabia buys w w yeah i want to go i'm going to answer jill's question but i want to go back to those stories and where they came from as soon as I do. So let's not forget. How likely is it?

You know, look, anything's possible. If you step back, you know, kind of take a macro, big picture view of things. You know, Vince with me and Saudi Arabia, I've been doing business together for about five years now, right? Six years, whatever spent? 2018 was the first Saudi show. Okay. So about five years, going on five years. A lot of money.

has passed back and forth during that period of time, and all parties seem to be, for the most part, except for one little glitch, enjoying the relationship because it's continuing. If they weren't enjoying it, it wasn't working out, it wouldn't. So it's a good relationship. Who knows how good of a relationship it is between Vince and the Saudi government? We don't know. So it's possible.

That's why it's possible. We know that the Saudis are investing in media properties, right? we know what the what is it the liv is that what's called live golf so there's a we know that they've invested a ton of money in that there's a term called sports washing which is what happens when entities that maybe are controversial or a government like Saudi Arabia they utilize sports as a way to mediate and do business in a more positive light. And that is generally what people refer to what is happening in Saudi Arabia with the live golf tour and some of the other ventures they've done. And this, if that were to be the case,

this would be an example of that. Yeah. Well, it would be an extension of the Saudi government using WWE currently under its agreement to do that very same thing. But so is it possible? Of course is possible. But here's why I think it's more remote, certainly than we thought. not last night because if if w w here's another before i go there live golf and the saudi government can't find a tv deal nope because tv companies tv networks don't necessarily want to be in business with saudi's it's a challenge it's a it's a controversy and they don't want to do it so yeah the saudi's have dumped a ton of money into live golf but so far despite having to having really a cream of the crop roster of professional golfers,

they can't get a TV deal. What's that tell you? So that's why I think is it possible that Saudis could maybe not buy the whole thing, maybe invest a portion of whatever it's going to take to buy it as a non-active, non-major stakeholder? Yeah, definitely. I see them being a player. But I think because of the challenge of television rights, so far at least, I think it's a pretty remote possibility because if you look at the WWE, it's currently a $6.6 million market cap company.

A portion of that is because of the rights fees that it's getting. Well, if you take those rights fees out of the equation for WWE, what does that 6.6 valuation look like? It changes dramatically. That's why I don't think it happens. I could be wrong. You don't know. So let's dig into the reporting then, because that was an element of this that I know you wanted to discuss and I can speak ad nauseum about, but I'd love to hear your initial reactions to that. Well, I mean, you know, first of all, when I woke up this morning, for the very reasons that I just laid out, I was relieved. And I did, you know, I went right to your comments because I could tell that you were up, you know, all I doing it.

And again, I was relieved to hear that news for the same reasons that I just. categorized but I want to know who who first leaked this story that the deal was done I saw some guy named Malenhausen or some shit you know I don't know him by the way I'm not being critical

I just he's got a complex name so I can't remember it but if it wasn't him who was it so Cassidy Haynes from Body Slam was the first to report it and Steve Malhausen and I apologize if I'm mispronouncing it after then reported it as well. He has since deleted his tweet. Steve works for DeZone and Sporting News. He since deleted his tweet, Cassidy's Remains Up.

Why would they do that? Why would they do what? Report the news? Why would they report something that isn't true? So my thought process, and again, this is just my thought process here, is I don't think either of them, especially Cassidy, who was first to report it, has also, by the way, and this needs to be said, reported very accurate information in the

past. There's the tweet from Cassidy. Yeah, I don't care what he's done in the past. Why would report a story that isn't true? So what I'm saying is I believe he believes that his sources have fed him correct information. I don't believe he is purposely misleading anybody by reporting this. I think he believes in his source. Does he believe in him because he wants to because he wants to be the first one out of the gate and get the clicks? I don't know. I don't know the answer to that. where I gleaned because look between Conrad and I and I don't know who your contact was and I would never ask and you would never tell me anyway but between Conrad and I we can have a conversation and we all have sources of our own.

Why would this guy have a source that he believes? I mean unless you're in the freaking board room, unless you're asked to vote, you don't know. And neither does anybody you're talking to unless they're on the board. And it is, if they're talking to a board member, if they're talking to a board member, you know, I'll, I'll, I'll apologize live in the middle of time square. But unless they're talking to somebody on that board, that freaking knows, you're just repeating what somebody else may have heard. It is entirely possible.

Who are we to say who is sources? We don't know who is sources. It's entirely possible that he could be talking to a board member or it might not be as well. I feel like I'm pretty connected with WWE and I couldn't get anybody to confirm this news. No, no, because nobody, first of all, nobody that has any real credibility, forget about friendships. I'm talking about somebody that's high enough. enough in the food chain to actually have some insight or something to offer, they're not going to talk.

Are you kidding me? They may, you may read into something, not you, I'm not talking about you. I'm talking about people in general that have sources that they think are, you know, credible sources that may be work in WWE. But unless you're talking to somebody on the board, you're just spreading rumors. yeah and i do want to underscore this too there is a difference between reporting something like this versus reporting on oh so-and-so is going to debut on raw or this person is going to feud with brock lesner this is one of the biggest stories in the history of wrestling if not the biggest

it very well may be the biggest and you got to make sure that you've got this right and Cassidy has gone on the record and said, hey, I stand by my sources. So if he feels that that's accurate, then, hey, we'll see. We'll find out, right? But everyone, just think about from a logistical, from a reality perspective, do you know how long it would take to put that deal?

Correct. To paper and to a point. where it would actually come up for a vote. And that's where wording is very important. And I was trying to explain this on social media too. There is a difference. And you know this firsthand from your intentions of purchasing WCW with your investment group. There is a difference between agreeing to a deal and sign seal delivered this deal is finalized.

There's a big difference. And a lot can happen in that little difference between those two aspects of a deal being done. And then I think anyone, Eric, who glosses over that is doing themselves a disservice as well. No, because they're ignorant, meaning lack of information or knowledge. If you don't have the information and you don't have the knowledge firsthand, you're just guessing. You know, and I think people, I don't know, man, it's just so negative out there, you know. And, you know, we're on social media now. I'm part of it.

but I think that just natural tendency to lean in the dungeon of doom. Oh, I hate that I even said that. That's just where the conversation automatically wants to go to. And I'm not suggesting that there's not some Machiavellian slash McNamellian aspect to this. But man, there might not be either. Yeah. Yeah. And I want to make this clear.

I don't think anyone reported this with the intention of misleading anybody. I don't think there was malice in doing that. But if this is incorrect reporting, which we're going to find out very shortly if it is or isn't, if we haven't found out already, then it just, it requires a really, really, really important step back, take all the information in, and just make sure that we're being responsible in our reporting and not jumping to conclusions. It's easy to jump to conclusions because, Eric, there's a lot of speculation after Stephanie stepped down, like this super chat here from Brett. He says, do you think Stephanie's stepping down as CEO is connected to a sale to Saudi Arabia or at least positioning the company more favorably since they may not find a female CEO appealing?

And I think, Eric, that's why a lot of people were ready to buy right into these Saudi Arabia rumors just on those two inferences alone. No. I don't think it had anything to do. with a sale to the Saudis. I believe it was a personal decision. And it has nothing to do with Saudis, right? Whether she, however she felt about the potential of that transaction. There's something else to it.

There's something emotional about her decision. And I'm going to take what she said at face value because it makes sense to me based on her previous decision to resign. come back because her father was forced out. Now that her father's back, she's no longer needed to be in that position to watch over her father or watch her father's back because he's back and he can watch his own back. So I'm going to take it at face value and say no, it had nothing to do with whoever is going to buy it. And I'm going to choose to believe that it had everything to do with Stephanie's original statement. She wanted to get back to her family. And she felt

she didn't need to be there to protect her father's interest any longer. And again, guys, if you want to leave a super chat, you can. We appreciate your patronage and we will ensure that we read your comment on air. If you just want to leave a comment, go ahead. You've just got to be subscribed to 83 weeks on YouTube. There are other super chats that we're going to get to, but I want to make sure we get into every aspect of the Saudi conversation. Again, guys, currently as things stands at this moment of time,

I've been told there's no deal in place. there's no agreement in place with Saudi Arabia. Others have corroborated such. I'm just trying to think, Eric, is there anything else on the Saudi aspect of this conversation that you'd like to put out there before we move into other elements of a potential sale? Nope, I think we covered it.

Okay. All right, let's get to some more of these super chats, and this one from Mark Cyrus, who's a loyal ad-free shows.com subscriber. Mark says, with the sale looming at this point, who do you feel would be the best option to buy WWE and make sure that the prestige the brand carries is left intact? My first, you know, my first bet would be Comcast.

They've got a long relationship with WWE through USA and in WWE. They've got, what, 20 years of experience and a powerful streaming platform, which I know is important to Comcast, or I believe would be important to Comcast. That just seems to be a more seamless, not that this is going to be seamless, but a more seamless and logical acquisition than the rest of them. But each has its own unique caveat. If it's Comcast, does Comcast want current management in place, including Vince? That's where the baggage comes in, right?

That's where those, that dark cloud of controversy that's following Vince around. that's where it becomes a little bit of a factor, I think. But if Vince has no interest in staying on board and would act only as a consultant, so to speak, I think that makes absolutely the most sense. But it all depends. Here's what it comes down to, and this is what nobody knows. I don't care who you are.

I don't care where you work, what you do for a living, how many millions of dollars you make in the markets, or if you're the king of mergers and acquisitions, you don't even know. What's Vince's motivation? Is it to be the guy who put together a monster deal and that will cement his legacy? Or does he want to get back and steer the ship? And by the way, it's not necessarily either or. It's not a binary choice because there is a scenario, and this is where I'm betting my money.

If I'm betting, I'm betting on Endeavor. Yeah, you've been, you've been pretty gung-ho about Endeavor being the one. Because that's a, that's a scenario where shareholders are, I mean, right now, shareholders should be high-fiving right now. If you're, if you're a WW employee with stock options, you should be happier than anybody. Steve, can we see where the stock's at right now as? Not 89 bucks. Right now, we are at 89.50, which is down a little bit.

And that's one of the things, too, Eric, that is important that when this news was reported, which, again, as things stand, currently, it was not factual information that a sale was done or agreed upon, the stock shot up. And then over the course of the day, went down a little bit before rising again, just before close. So there were tango... It's back up to 90 bucks, which is phenomenal. But I surmise that the stock dropped because of the chatter about Saudi. Well, it actually went up to start because of the chatter about Saudi. And then as you see over the course of the day, we've got the hourly breakdowns there. It starts to drop when the news comes out that there are denials on it.

So this was yesterday? We're looking at the past 24 hours here. We're looking at 10 a.m. today. Oh, I see. Okay. I see. Okay. I thought, okay. So the stock went up overnight. Well, not overnight, but, you know, based off the chatter from overnight. And then upon around 9.30, 10 a.m. when some of the denial started coming in is when the stock actually drops. Well, that's, that's the opposite then, right? So then that would suggest that people were excited. The market was excited about a Saudi, a Saudi move. And maybe that's

because everybody's anticipating that, you know, the stock is going to continue to go up until the sale is done. You know, I remember again, once I figured out what a stock option was, you know, I remember sitting back and watching the, you know, Turner stock, you know, I'd watch it all day long because every time it went up, I made more money. But perhaps it was kind of an artificial bump based on the transaction and it kind of came back down to normal. I don't think you can read too much into it. I really don't. And ultimately, that's large. And these are not big swings.

We're talking about a buck or two at a hundred dollar stock. You're talking about one or two percent. That's what I was about to say. It is ultimately marginal. Look at that one month graph. there, Eric. Look at that. That is just crazy. January 5th, which is, of course, around the news when Vince was reported to be coming back in. And then the next day, which is when Vince was filing the motion to return. And then that brings us to last night and today. It's just crazy, crazy to see the

stock swinging like this. Let's get to some more super chats here. We've got one from from Warhawk Rambo. It says, hello, Eric, I'm concerned about this. I've been a pro wrestling fan most of my life. I just have ethical concerns about supporting a Saudi-owned WWE. And that is one of the elements that comes with all of this, not just from a fan perspective, but performers, too, and people, employees working,

there might be some ethical problems that come up for some people. And this is the part that just irritates me to death. Irritates me to death. because we as a culture are so hypocritical and to a degree uneducated about how the world is really working and what we are supporting. So I would ask Warhawk Rambo, and I say this with respect. I know I sound like I'm coming at you and I don't mean to because I'm really talking to a larger audience because a lot of people feel the way Warhawk Rambo feels.

He's not alone. But does Warhawk Rambo like the NBA? Are you a fan of Nike? You wear the swoosh? Do you have an Apple phone? Do you use Apple products? We can go down the list and talk about how these companies and China, China, Yeah, Saudis are, their culture is so much different than our culture.

It's hard to understand. But do you think the Chinese are any more equitable or care any more about human rights? Are you fucking kidding me? So, well, the general public, and again, Warhawk, I'm not picking on you, brother. But so many people are so, oh, man, Saudis are involved in them out. they're wearing their nikes watching an nb a game on their apple phone how hypocritical is that and if you're going to lay down a marker when it comes to things like human rights and by the way if you do i think you're a good human being but don't be a hypocrite about it don't be so judgmental that it's okay

if chinese murder people that you know speak out against the government or disappear them or they have children working in slave labor camps that are making Nike shoes every day or Apple products, don't tell me about your, I have a distaste for the Saudis, when you're supporting companies that are benefiting from slave labor in China, but you're proud to wear, and you'll pay premium dollars for those shoes in that iPhone. Come on, man, we got to get real as a culture. You've got to be honest about this stuff. Do I agree that there's ethical,

issues in Saudi Arabia. Sure I do. But that exists around the world. And we do business with a lot of bad people. Nobody else cares about that. Well, and even just on the surface level, too, Eric, anyone who's actively supporting WWE right now, WWE is in business with Saudi Arabia. WWE makes $40, $42 million a show working with Saudi Arabia. Superstars paychecks, money is coming from those super shows that they are currently running. Oh, by the way, China, the Chinese government donated $54 million to the Biden family to build a Ben Biden Center where there's all kinds of secret, top secret documents that, oh, by the way, just happened to be there. and Uncle Joe forgot about it, which that part is believable.

But if you want to be critical about ethics of any country, let's not be hypocritical and not realize that we're embracing all things, China. And China is just as bad, if not worse, than Saudi Arabia. In many respects, they're far more dangerous. Yeah, and listen, human rights is going to be a big aspect of this conversation. you know, LGBTQ communities are executed for stuff there. And it's a whole wide conversation, but you're no doubt correct in saying that this exists around the world.

There are different hypocrisies that we deal with. And one thing that has been a big part of the live golf stuff, Eric, and I don't think this is something that enough people are having this conversation about as far as a potential Saudi deal with, with WWE, is that talent contracts, the pay that talent would, hypothetically take home in a Saudi-owned WWE, money would be off the charts. I mean, Phil Mickelson's making like $48 million to play 15 tournaments for Live Golf. And that's where this money is coming from. And there will be people who,

even if they have ethical concerns, they'll see that money. And they'll say, well, at the end of the day, I got to look after my wallet. I got to look after my pocket. And that's life-changing money for a lot of people. Is it not? Potentially, I mean, you know, it's hard to say. We're projecting what could happen in a Saudi deal, but we don't know. But that's, again, where I say, man, if I'm a talent, if I'm working at WWRE right now, I'm smiling. Because no matter how this shakes out, I'm going to be okay. And there's a potential that I'm going to be really okay. You know, it's just, man, yeah, yes, guys that are making, you know, gals that are making 75 grand or 100 grand a year down on NXT may have a whole.

whole different future. Yeah, that's true. Giorgio Arcade says we just need strictly business merch made. Yeah, we do. Let's get on that. I'm all about some strictly business merch. God of Frogs says, I wonder if Netflix would be interested. That's really funny.

I just got off the phone with Kevin Nash right before jumping on here. And we had a long conversation. We covered a lot of ground. But one of the things that Kevin brought up is Netflix. You know, Netflix dipped its toe in the water with Formula Racing, live action, sports. and you and I have touched on this before. If if Netflix was going to make a strategic commitment to really support live action programming,

are you fucking kidding me? Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. I think Netflix would be more inclined to get in on the live TV rights before buying WWE. But who's to say? It is certainly an option out there, as is a company.

like Amazon. And this chat comes from dotx. Disney needs to add more live TV to their portfolios. They spin off ESPN into its own entity. They've got the ESPN plus platform on their service right now. And that's certainly something that we could see as well here. We touched on Disney too. So let me ask you, is, is it a fact that Disney wants to spin off ESPN? Well, it does. I mean, ESPN plus is a streaming service that Disney owns. Yeah, but that's not a spinoff. A spin-off is you're going to get rid of it. Oh, if that's the context you read it in, then no, I don't think that's something happening at all. Okay. So Disney owns ESPN because as Kevin Nash pointed out, you know, there's people that are associated with the industry that are, you know, laughing at the Disney option because, you know, what are we get to the?

do, put, you know, wrestlers in the park with Mickey Mouse ears. Yeah, okay, that's funny to say. It gets a chuckle. But, yeah, if Disney owns ESPN and they've got a streaming platform, can an argument be bait? Now, I would, you know, I'd have a hard time if somebody was pitching it to me and I was on a board at ESPN or Disney. But can you make an argument strategically that WWE and Disney makes sense because of ESPN? Yes, you could probably convince me at the end of the day.

there would be a business rationale behind that. Let's keep talking, Disney. David McKenzie says love strictly biz. Eric and John, thank you very much. Recently, as a four Disney shareholders, we're pushing Bob Iger to spin off ESPN. Here we go. Do you see a Turner style own the content strategy on sports if ESPN's funnel?

I really, I would be very surprised if Disney just totally does away with ESPN, quite frankly. I really would be surprised by that. But do you see a Turner style own the content strategy on sports if ESPN is spun off? Yeah, and maybe we're maybe. David is using the word spin-off the way you and I just got through talking about it. You know, let's call it an extension. If ESPN Plus is an extension of the Disney business model, could owning the content make a difference?

Oh, yeah. And by the way, an existing, you know, streaming platform that's already quite successful, absolutely it could. I mean, there'd be a business argument for it. They would have nothing to do with putting wrestlers in Disney theme parks. Yeah. that's it's uh yeah i mean can you imagine that i mean that would just be so insane um movie junkie john with a super chat says hey erc what hidden story does the board have on vince that hasn't come out yet in your opinion i can't imagine what's worse than rape allegations

i i spend about six or seven seconds a day thinking about things like that i i don't know and i none of us know we don't even know if there is anything Yeah. As we talked about the other day about some of the hidden threats, I guess, or implications in the board's, you know, first response to Vince McMahon's inquiry about coming back. You know, that could be like, hey, don't go there. It could be a bluff. We know something you don't know.

Yeah, it could easily be a bluff. That's the game that's really being played, right? That's the stuff that's really going on that none of us know what's true, what's not true. we got another one from Joel. Thank you, Joel. He says, my main concern is about Saudi owning WWE and what that means for morale and the talent. And that is a fair concern.

Sean Ross Sapp, our pal here on Strictly Business, did report that he spoke to a lot of WWE talent where the morale around the rumors of a sale to Saudi Arabia was extremely impactful. And he outright said that there were several talent who told them they would be done with the company should something like that happen. Yeah, but again, going back to the point that you just made about LiveGolf and some of the dollars that are floating around.

They may feel that way now. You may have a handful. You may have more than a handful of talent because they're reading the doom and gloom. They're looking at worst case scenarios. They probably imagine having to move to Saudi and live there six months out of the year. I kid you not. There are probably some people that are thinking, oh, my gosh, you're going to put a developmental territory in Saudi and I'm going to have to move my family to Saudi. I mean, people lose their minds of this stuff.

Fear of the unknown inspires more fear. But out of that same group of people that Sean Ross Sapp has spoken to, how many of them would change your mind if their life got infinitely better and they realized there was no boogeyman? Potentially so. I don't know. Morale is going to be no matter what. what happens morale is going to be a roller coaster until this deal is done.

Yeah, I don't disagree. That deal is with whoever, until that time comes, because this, this kind of thing is going to permeate social media, all talent's going to be on their phones, just like I would if I was there and I was a talent. I'd be trying to keep track of what's going on because I want to know how it's going impact my life and my family it's a valid reason why you're going to follow this stuff but 90% of the stuff you're following reading and seeing is all nonsense and doom and gloom we're reading your super chats guys send them in right now we got another one from brett he says if you're an on-screen

w-dew talent which potential buyer is your favorite my favorite would be comcast more so than with me even with the crossover opportunities yeah yep yep i think strategically Comcast makes more sense. You look at Comcast, I don't know what percentage of the cable systems they own and control in the U.S., but I think it's the majority of them.

I think that that gives you stability and strength and leverage all of the things that strategically you would want out of a transaction. You know, it's a little, think of it this way. You know, and I've gone through this in different businesses. When you go out and,

If you wake up one day and say, okay, I've got a great business plan, but I need to raise a million dollars, whatever the amount. Do you want, you're not just going after a million, if you're smart, you're not just going after a million dollar investment because there may be a lot of people that are willing to invest a million dollars in your business. Maybe you have a great track record. Maybe you have charm and charisma. Maybe you're the best salesman of the world. Who knows what you have? But there's a lot of people that are willing to invest in your company. but what else do they have to bring to the table other than money?

I refer to it as smart money and dumb money. Dumb money is when you bring in a lot of investment or you sell yourself to a company that doesn't have any strategic value. They may have the money, but the strategic value just isn't there, meaning does one plus one equal three or does one plus one eventually equal less than one? Because there's no strategic value, but there's, the desire to control, right? A couple years ago, I went into business with a group of guys,

really, really smart guys. We brought in some money, an investor, by the way, from China, who came in and did almost a complete funding for our startup. We were excited as hell. Great. You got the money. Yay. Until that particular individual wanted to come to the United States once a month

and sit down. and try to understand the business that he was totally unfamiliar with. Didn't matter. He wanted his say. He wanted control. He wanted to understand. He wanted to learn. But when you bring an investment like that or when you partner with somebody like that

or when you sell to somebody like that, you run the risk of an unhealthy relationship because it doesn't, there's no added value beyond the money. and Comcast provides such a unique strategic opportunity as well as the money and the stability that goes along with that strategic value, that that's what my first choice would be if I was there. It's not what I think is going to happen necessarily. I think it's a good chance it will, but depending on Vince's motivations, we're going to keep going back to that.

If Vince's motivation is to get back in saddle and take things, back to the way they've been for the last 40 years or whatever it's been. That's a different, that's a different strategy. Stockholders are still going to see a big payday. Nobody will be disappointed, but that company will end up private again. I think just from a talent perspective, since that was the question asked, having Disney with the arsenal of IP that Disney owns and potential opportunities for crossover there, Marvel being one of them, Star Wars being another,

I'd be licking my lips as a talent if that were to become something that I could be in my back pocket. Just my take on that. Yeah, now you've got two opportunities, John. You've got Saudi, which portends or presents possibly a huge financial upside for talent. And you've got Disney based on your perspective that can also provide a huge upside for talent. So right now we're two for two on the upside. Let's keep going here. We've got so many super chats.

Thank you guys so much for sending them. in. We appreciate that. Johnny Hexes, did you hear about a, did you hear about, there's a typo, did you hear that a shareholder filed a lawsuit? And this happened from a shareholder in Delaware. This went down earlier today, Eric, for those who are unaware, a shareholder sued Vince McMahon in Delaware's chancery court, accusing him of wielding his 81% voting control to oust three board members, replace them with loyalists and push through bylaw changes that would impose his will on the board. And in return, they are looking for invalidation of the bylaw changes costs and fees good luck with that look anybody can sue anybody for anything right one of the things you need to do is show damages so how are how have you as a shareholder been damaged since Vince McMahon came back and changed the laws I know I don't have to be a judge I'm not an attorney but you have it you've got no you've got one of your damages now you're trying to project what damage is made be in the future? I'm sorry. Vince wielding is 81% of voting control. It's not wielding. It's

utilizing it. He earned it. He built the company and he structured it as such under SEC rules and guidelines that left him with that control. He didn't manufacture it out of thin air. It's not a storyline. It's a reality. And he has every right to do it. Again, take what you feel about Vince McMahon and put it. in the garbage because that's where it belongs. It has no value and just look at the reality of the situation. Vincent, it didn't do anything wrong. Didn't do anything illegal.

Warhawk Rambo adds, thanks for answering. Also, just answer, I don't buy Nike products or Apple. I'm more of an NFL guy, but yeah, I avoid Nike products like the plague, he says. Oh, not the NFL supports Nike and vice versa. So there you go. You can't get away from those Chinese tentacle. continuing with the super chats here, Jim has another one for us.

Thank you, Jim, for the multiple super chats here. Eric, thank you for answering my earlier question. This is a huge shocker news since W-Cov was sold to WW in March 2001. If they were given the opportunity, do you think New Japan or ADW would be able to buy WWE? I got a feeling I know your answer to this one, Eric, but go ahead. Well, not New Japan. I mean, I don't know anything about New Japan, but New Japan is not necessarily a financial powerhouse, okay? You know, the cons, you know, net worth of $11 billion, a lot of other assets.

I would imagine if Tony decides that he wants to do it. And he has the support of his family because it's family money. Could it happen? Yes. I think it'll happen. Can't imagine it, but it's possible. And Vince McMahon would have to agree to sell to them as well, which is a lot of And there's that.

Yeah. But, you know, if the price is high enough, here's the, here's the, here's the, here's the, here's the, here's the flip side of that. If, if, if the offer is high enough and it's in the shareholder's interest, you've got to do it. Then now if you, if you deny it for personal reasons, if you block it for personal reasons. Now you got a fiduciary responsibility issue and that could be, that could be tricky. But I think we're, that is such a, that's a good movie of the week, but I don't think it. It's part of our reality. No, me neither.

West Britannicus says, happy Wednesday, Mr. Bischoff. Thank you all for all your time, energy, and introspective. Am I right to guess you salivate at the idea of what you could have done with streaming in 1997, 1998? No, I don't think about things like that, man. Any more than, you know, if I woke up tomorrow morning and read somebody won the power mega millions,

billion dollar lotto, would I sit around and spend any time thinking, man, if I just could have been in that 7-Eleven outside of New Orleans and Louisiana at 2 o'clock at the morning, that could have been me. I just did. I don't think that way. I just don't. Good for you.

We got so many people. We got almost 1,000 people watching us live right now. We're so grateful for you guys. We're starting to wrap up a little bit here. So if you have any super chats, this is your last chance to get them in. We're going to call for them one more time. If you want to comment, you can comment as well without giving a super chat, but you have to be subscribed to the 83 weeks.

YouTube channel. If you're enjoying this episode of Strictly Business, by the way, Eric and I guarantee at least one episode every single week on Thursdays, but recently you've been getting tons of bonuses. Here's the bit of pattern, John. Every time you and I lay down on Strictly Business, within two hours, something monstrous happens,

you know, so who knows? We may be doing another one tonight. We very welcome. We had a great episode that we taped yesterday with Raj Geary from Wrestling Inc. It's available now on ad-free shows.com. It'll go up tomorrow for everybody. Go check that out if you haven't. It's a great episode. Raj was an awesome guest for us who gave us some really interesting perspective,

I thought, on the business of the wrestling website industry. Joel has one more for us. Thank you again, Joel, for the multiple super chats. Last question, Eric and you two, John, if you had to put money on it right now, who ends up buying WWE? That is, of course, I got to say this is an outlier, Eric, if there's even a sale at all. Right. Who was the betting site that was taking odds? Bavada. Bravada. Bavada. are they opened up odds again let me take a look because they did stop bavada betting odds wwee let's see uh we are currently looking at oh darn they're really going to make me log in steve help us out here give us give us some help

from bavada um uh they did have betting odds so in the meantime while we pull those up eric do you have a favorite in mind here yeah and actually i ask because if bavadas if they've opened it up again, I'm going to put my money on Endeavor. Okay. I think it's a long shot, but I always like betting long shots. Like, I wouldn't bet Disney because I don't, or Comcast, because it makes too much sense and there's no excitement in that for me, I mean, in terms of a bet, but I would bet on Endeavor Group holdings and an outright purchase to take the company private.

That's where I'm going to put my money. And I'm going to go to the site, and if they're taking bets, I'm going to put real money on Endeavor. Okay. As from what I can see, looking at this currently, they did close last night after all the Saudi stuff was going down because there's conflicts of interest there and everything. But the leader in the clubhouse was still Comcast at minus 140. Disney was plus 350.

Fox was plus 1,200. Warner Brothers Discovery was plus 1,500. Netflix was plus 1,200. Amazon was plus 950. Saudi was plus 750, it looks like, and the least likely at the time of closing was plus 3,000 for Tony Kahn. Now, here's an interesting angle on this. I know we've probably got to go, Jack, because you probably have 37 other podcasts to do.

But I had an interesting conversation with a very high profile individual in the film industry. He's currently on one of the biggest movies that of the year, as far as, is being produced right now. And we were talking, because he's got a interest of this and curiosity, not a financial interest, but curiosity. And we talked about this this morning, and I didn't know this, but do you know that Comcast was very interested in Warner Brothers before Discovery came in? No, I did not know that. There is a rumor, according to my friend.

I'm not in Hollywood anymore, so I don't know. But according to my friend, there is a rumor. that Comcast is still interested in making a play for Warner Brothers Discovery. Can you imagine? Think about that. Folks, you are hearing it here first on strictly business. Eric, if that happens. You need, you people need to retweet, post this, clip this.

Steve, you have my permission to clip the living hell out of this. Because we're breaking an angle here that nobody has discussed yet. and my friend is incredibly credible when it comes to what's going on in Hollywood. I just saw my life flash before my eyes because of the amount of content we would have to lay down after something like that happening. Holy crap.

That is surreal. Wow. Well, lots of elements at play there. We got another one from Michael. He says, I do business with a friend of the Bishas named Tyler out of Cave Creek, Arizona. He went to Garrett's wedding and Cody. Why did Eric move from Arizona, Wyoming?

Here's, hey, Michael, here's the honest answer. You know, I had two homes in Arizona. One of them was a monster. The other one was a nice investment property in a golf course community. And when our kids left, you know, when the kids moved out, Montana went to L.A. And she's still there. And Garrett went to Florida. It's like, wait a minute, man.

That's my wife and I in this monster in Cave Creek, and we have two homes here. We have a home in Cody, Wyoming. I'm keeping a $4,500 a month apartment in Santa Monica. It's like, I think it's time to cut some fat. So, and it came down to a decision, because we loved Arizona, and where we lived in Cave Creek was very cool. But it came down to where do we want to spend our life, you know, what's the destination? And the reason we built this house here in 1998 is because we love this area so much. And if we didn't want to have two anymore and be snowbirds, which one are we going to keep?

So we stayed here in Wyoming. There you go. We got the last super chat. This is going to be the last one we're going to read on air. Thank you to everyone who donated super chat money to us here today. We really appreciate your support. Jeffrey says since the WW has killed traditional pay-per-view, but ESPN Plus charges $80. If Disney buys WWE, would you see WWE going back to a regular pay-pview format $49?

So, Eric, are you familiar with the ESPN Plus pay-per-view format, how that works? Nope. So ESPN Plus, there's a subscription fee to have the service and the library and all that. I forget what the monetary amount is. I think it's like $12.99 a month. Then in addition to that, the pay-per-views for like UFC, for example, can cost $80 or so. So you could be paying $80 for a UFC pay-per-view plus just to have access to that. You have to have the $1299 subscription to ESPN Plus.

There's a lot of money at play there. So could you see WWE going back to a regular pay-per-view format of $49 plus if Disney were to purchase something like that? You know, I don't know. That's a complex, interesting, valid question. And it would all come down to a revenue model. You'd have to project the revenue. And what's the upside? What's the upside?

The downside is, you know, WWE has already established that you get their premium live events as a part of that streaming. package. To make that change, you would have to figure out some way to project, you know, what the reaction to that would be. It's hard to take things away from people that have been used to getting it. So I don't know, man. I could see them wanting to to maximize value, but I think you would have to also consider, you know, how business has been conducted up to this point. Maybe, and, you know, maybe it's not either or. Maybe it's both. Maybe you get all the pay-per-views as a part of the streaming platform for no additional upside, but you're going to pay retail for WrestleMania or WrestleMania Royal Rumble, whatever.

There were a couple of quick super chats that I do want to get to. The landlord harassment channels is breaking WW just sold to Christy Olson. Well, that would make after 83 weeks quite a show, wouldn't it? Oh, it'd be fun. Couldn't wait. She makes me laugh. She's smart. She's aggressive and she's smart.

I like her. Theme parks and things with Johnny says, pay-per-view still exists and you can still buy pay-per-view of 49-99 on cable. Yeah, that's true. It does. It still exists. You could. So do rotary phones somewhere.

Yeah. David also asked, second question, Eric, where did this, where does this leave A.W. Warner Brothers discovery is Warner totally ruled out of this and does this sale benefit or potentially harm AW? That is an element. Actually, Matt Hardy and I just taped an entire podcast that's going to drop tonight, the extreme life of Matt Hardy, about the effect of what a WWE sale or stuff like this would have on AEW. So do you see any correlation there?

No, I think, you know, the fandom starts revealing itself. And, you know, I love it when people that don't know anything about the business of the wrestling business, whether they be wrestlers or fans or people like you and I talking about it, you know, start projecting what could be. I don't, here's the answer. I don't know. Here's the scenario, though, I thought may benefit AEW. If you go back to a Saudi acquisition, I think there's a potential that that could benefit AEW simply because of the challenges that TV rights are going to create and the difficulty it's going to be in getting the kind of, you know, blue chip programming time and revenue that WW is currently getting. If it sales to Saudi and they're having a hard time getting a good TV deal

because of it, doesn't it kind of automatically enhance AEW's perspective or opportunity? And then you've got the, which I think is the hypocritical backlash from people about Saudi, as we discussed early, does that negative fallout actually benefit and create some additional goodwill for AEW? I think it could. So I think that's a scenario that might somehow indirectly or directly benefit AEW, that being Saudi and WWE. However, if it goes the other way, it's a Comcast or Disney or God forbid Comcast buys Warner Discovery and they already own WWE.

I mean, I think that's a pretty obvious scenario. People can figure out how well that would be for AEW. But again, we don't know. I think anything other than a Saudi acquisition probably doesn't benefit AEW. May not harm them, but I don't think it benefits them because it will inherently, again, if it's a Comcast, what does it do? All the things we talked about. It gives WWE an even more entrenched strategic strength than they already have.

And how could that be good for anybody trying to compete with them? Yeah. Again, guys, we're not going to take any more super chats at this time. these are the last ones that got in. Wicked Wally says, Eric, my late Nana was world's oldest living NWO fan. The NITRO shirt I bought her at the sold-out Boston show. Thanks for the men.

And I bet you your Nana thought I was hot. Because I was over with old ladies. I was in my 40, mid-40s, late 40s. Grandmas love me, man. Those dimples, man. That's what it was all about there. That's it. And E. Wilkie Night 10, he says,

Hey, Eric, any thoughts on WW being told? Brother, you got to rewind. You got to watch this whole program. That's what we've been talking about this whole time. So make sure you do that because Eric and I have been talking for more than an hour and 10 minutes now on this bonus edition of Strictly Business. For those of you are not familiar with Strictly Business, this is a podcast that is about the business of the wrestling business. And Eric and I drop it at least once a week every single Thursday. We get guests from inside, outside the industry.

it's one of the most unique podcast in all of professional wrestling and I really encourage you to check out our archives it drops early access on had free shows.com Eric, is there anything else you'd like to add here either about this or about strictly business in general? No, man. Like I said, I just enjoy the hell out of doing this show

and I love all the support we're getting and spread the word, folks. If you love this show, if you're on YouTube and you like this, please share it with your friends, subscribe, give us some five-star ratings to whatever you can do to help. help us because we want to keep doing it but man it's we need some help too we need the support so don't be shy and uh yeah john you know kudos to you for you know not jumping on the uh the bandwagon

that everybody else in your world did and standing out amongst the herd so to speak you along with a couple others but you you kind of spearheading it so thanks for that i got to go and i'll probably see you soon well maybe later tonight who's to say thank you everyone for tuning into this very special presentation of Strictly Business with Eric Bischoff. We'll see you next time.