83 Weeks with Eric Bischoff - Strictly Business with Eric Bischoff #32: AEW Collision & NXT Ratings, Mid-Year Business Predictions

Episode Date: June 23, 2023

In this edition of "Strictly Business," Eric Bischoff and Jon Alba examine the strong AEW Collision and NXT ratings from this past week, plus look back at their beginning of 2023 predictions and see how they've aged! Special thanks to this week's sponsors! Manscaped- Get 20% Off and Free Shipping with the code WRESTLEBIZ at Manscaped.com. Factor- Head to FACTORMEALS.com/WRESTLEBIZ50 and use code WRESTLEBIZ50 to get 50% off your first box FOLLOW ALL OF OUR SOCIAL MEDIA at https://83weekslinks.com/ Stop throwing your money on rent! Get into a house with NO MONEY DOWN and roughly the same monthly payment at SaveWithConrad.com On AdFreeShows.com, you get early, ad-free access to more than a dozen of your favorite wrestling podcasts, starting at just $9! And now, you can enjoy the first week...completely FREE! Sign up for a free trial - and get a taste of what Ad Free Shows is all about. Start your free trial today at AdFreeShows.com If your business targets 25-54 year old men, there's no better place to advertise than right here with us on Strictly Business. You've heard us do ads for some of the same companies for years...why? Because it works! And with our super targeted audience, there's very little waste. Go to AdvertiseWithEric.com now and find out more about advertising with Strictly Business. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Get rid of your credit card debt, get a lower monthly payment, and skip your next two house payments at save withconrad.com. NMLS number 65084, equal housing lender. You don't need perfect credit or money out of your pocket to save thousands with save withconrad.com. Find out how much money you can save right now at save with Conrad.com. How's it going, everyone? It's time for another edition of Strictly Business with Eric Bischoff, presented to you by the Ad-Free Shows Network and podcast. I, of course, am John Alba, and join this week from Huntsville, Alabama. Mr. Eric Bischoff, how are your travels, my friend?

travels great weather is wonderful down here not too humid yet so a beautiful day today mrs b is along for the ride with me we're going to party with our ad-free show family we actually started that last night and just had a blast so it's going to be a fun weekend of course i'm going to get my head shaved on sunday for a good cause we raised approximately $15,000 for st jude in donations so looking forward to all of it it's going to be a blast it's a lot of people who want to see you bald eric it's a lot of people i don't think it was so much that as it was a good cause and we have an ad free shows a family member that uh his name is lucas and he's got an amazing story it's not my story to tell so hopefully at uh at the event on sunday

uh he'll share with us the reason why he donated ten thousand dollars to st jude and uh it's a great story but i've just you know it started out as conrad just kind of poked fun at me and tease me a little bit, and it turned into a silly-ass bet. And that silly-ass bet turned into $15,000 to an amazing cause. So I'm really, really excited about it. I think that's amazing. Congratulations to you and the team. And thank you for that massive donation, as you just alluded to. I'm cherishing these final few minutes with your hair. How long are you expecting for it to grow back? You know, I don't know. I haven't shaved it in a long time, and I don't really pay attention. I get my hair cut about once a month.

maybe once every five or six weeks, I get a haircut. And so I imagine it's probably going to take, you know, till probably fall, probably October before it's reasonably back to where it was. But who knows? Who knows? Might go into shock. Might never grow back. You know, they're like Stone Cold Steve Austin, which is fine too, you know?

You could. You could do the Vince McMahon do rag also. I don't know if that's going to be the look you're going to vibe with per se. Now, did he actually wear? dureg or was that Photoshop? No, he actually wore duress. He was he was wrestling and became ECW champion wearing a du rag. In a du rag. Yes. Wow. No, I think I'll pass on a du rag. Although

Teddy Long, who I'm still staying in close touch with, good friend, he actually when we lived in Atlanta, my family and I lived in Atlanta, Teddy would give Garrett some of his show worn do rags. And Garrett had like a big, like a close hamper full of Teddy Long do rags. So I bet you if I look hard enough, I can find some of those. I can have like a leopard skin du rag.

That would be awesome. That would be quite the view. And if you want to see Eric get shaved, man, you got to be over there at Top Guy Weekend, add free shows hooking everyone up. What are you most looking forward to with Top Guy Weekend here? I know a lot of our Top Guys will probably be listening to this episode as they're there in Alabama with you. You know, as on my way over, you know, I'm in Conrad's office recording here because

it wasn't really sufficient Wi-Fi in my hotel. But on my way over here, as I was leaving a hotel, I ran into David Crockett. And David, along with myself, Dick Cheatham, we used to call him Dirty Dick Cheatham. Can you imagine being in finance and your name is Dick Cheatham and your nickname is Dirty Dick Cheatham? and your nickname is Dirty Dick Cheatham. So yeah, Dirty Dick Cheatham is going to be on the panel with myself and David Crockett. And I'm not sure who else is going to be on that panel with us. But it's going to be fun.

It'll be a lot of question and answer. And people will be able to hear a perspective about WCW and what went down from someone who, Dick Cheatham didn't work for WCW. He worked for Turner Broadcasting in the finance side of things. So much like Guy Evans' book did, the Nitro book, you know, in the interviews that Guy Evans did with a lot of people who were very instrumental and had their fingerprints all over ultimately what happened with WCW, but we never hear from those people, right? You know, the dirt sheets, the Dave Meltzers, the scumbags of the world,

never do the work to find out in interview the people who were instrumental. Nobody had until Guy Evans did. And Dick Cheatham and David Crocker are going to be there and we're going to get into, you know, all of, all of the goings on WCW, the good stuff, the bad stuff, and things that people didn't really know about or haven't heard about from people who were there. So that's what I'm looking for to. And just seeing, you know, I haven't seen Dick Cheatheman, God, I don't know, 20 some odd years or more. Well, so it'll be fun to see him. And David Cruckett's looking good. I was afraid that he might not be here, but he was able to kick out. And he had a little bit of a cold bug or whatever it

was flubuck but he kicked out he's here so it's going to be fun love top guy weekend love our top guys and top gals ad free shows dot com is where you want to be subscribed as long along with rather 83 weeks dot com that's how you're going to get strictly business that's how you're going to get 83 weeks and eric you even dropped a bonus episode of 83 weeks uh where you talked all about the a w collision stuff that you know typically you hear here on strictly business but you went segment by segment breaking down collision we've had a dynamite since then we've got the forbidden door pay-per-view coming up this weekend is there anything else you'd like to add as a cherry on top off your discussion there that you had about collision or anything that's unfolded

since no it was interesting because i think everybody assumed i was going to bury collision and i went into it with a pretty open mind um i was more than pleasantly surprised borderline shocked at how tight the show was formatted, how well it was formatted, the placement of certain segments I thought was really, really good. There was just a lot to like about that show. And I made the comment, and I know this sounds like I'm being negative, and I don't mean to be. It just is what it is. That when I got done watching that show, I thought there's no way Tony Con wrote this show. It is impossible for someone that we've seen,

We've seen the Tony Kahn product now in terms of creative for about four years. This was completely different in terms of the way the show was formatted and produced. And it was excellent. So I don't, and I said this, you know, on the breakdown episode, you know, I don't, I don't know who is involved, you know, clearly I don't. But whoever was working with Tony, surely Tony was involved. but he was clearly influenced by whoever he was collaborating with. And my advice to Tony Kahn is, don't let any of those people out of your sight. Don't ever sit down and format a show or write a show without those same people in the room.

Because that formula, that combination of people that were there to help Tony, really, really helped him a lot. And I would keep doing what you did, Tony, on collision, whatever that. that formula was, whatever the collaboration was. Keep doing that. Now, I didn't get a chance to watch Dynamite last night. I know you're very supportive and optimistic and don't want to say a bad thing about anybody, which is fine. You make up for me in that regard. That's how we balance each other out. But what was your take on dynamite last night? And how do you think it compared to collision in terms of words? Heaven forbid I ever say anything bad about AEW, right? Because all of the commenters, oh, Alba and Conrad are these marks for AW.

They just like everything that is thrown at them. Now, listen, I thought it was a decent show. The dynamite number was fairly strong. And the quarter by quarter breakdown was fairly strong as well. They went up pretty much the entire first hour, which I think is a good thing. There was a little bit of a drop off between it. I thought it was a strong show leading into a pay-per-view. But there was an interesting thing I noticed in the numbers, too, Eric.

I was looking at the breakdown in viewership for this particular episode of Dynamite was that when the New Japan-heavy-centric stuff happened, and keep in mind, we're leading into a New Japan versus AW pay-per-view, the numbers dropped off pretty significantly. Because nobody cares. And so I was, I was going to ask you about that. We saw a lot less New Japan involvement this year as opposed to what we saw last year. Do you see there being merit in doing a pay-per-view like this as someone who in the past has collaborated with New Japan Pro Wrestling?

As a part of an event, yes. But it's real simple. The American audience doesn't know, nor do they care about. New Japan talent. It's nothing negative about New Japan talent. They're talented people. They're very, very exciting to watch in Japan. But the American audience just doesn't have a taste for it. It is what it is. And while Tony and company, you know, and a lot of fans may really, really love this New Japan exposure, the general audience just doesn't care. And, and the numbers reflect that. So it's not a mystery. It's pretty cut and dry to me.

Well, last year's paperview, quality of matchwise was one of the best shows of the year. And they did a strong buy rate off of it. I'm curious how this year's does. They're really trying to market it off of the dream matches. And I know that you've said in the past, you've gone on record and saying that just leaning into dream matches ultimately isn't going to lead to long-term success here. But it absolutely will. Let me be clear in it. It absolutely will. It absolutely will lead to long-term, long-term success with an incredibly small portion of the audience. So if the audience is this big, potentially, the portion that's going to be really interested in New Japan and AW versus New Japan is about that big. And that audience there,

that tiny little fraction of the overall potential market, they're going to be thrilled. they're going to be jerking off in a corner because the matches were five star oh my god did you see that but they represent that audience represents such a small part of the potential market that it is what it is so you're going to make a very small percentage of the audience extremely happy because of the match quality is not why most people watch wrestling but is it a bad thing to throw those people a bone with a show like this you're you're not booking to them year round you're not giving them new Pan versus AEW matches year round. This is a special one off occasion.

I agree. And in that sense, I think there's not a thing wrong with it. It's a smart idea. It's just not going to do big numbers because it doesn't have a big audience. Well, big numbers. Collision did $816,000, did a 0.33 in the demographic. I know you didn't get a chance to talk about that and your bonus show because they hadn't come out yet, but what's your reaction to that number? And what did you like from the collision show that you think could be leaned into to help sustain that number.

It's not as much of what I saw that I liked as it is about what I didn't see that I hate. I didn't see a lot of stupid interviews with people that shouldn't be doing interviews because they don't have any talent when it comes to doing interviews. And when you overexposed people who aren't ready yet, you're really hurting them. You're hurting their character. You're hurting their potential. And I see a lot of interviews in typically on dynamite. No, no.

Admittedly, I don't watch a lot of dynamite because I can't. stand it. It just, there's nothing about it that captures my imagination. And I don't watch wrestling just to watch wrestling. If there's not a character or story, primarily a story, because you have to have a good character to have a great story. But if there's not a great story going on, I will not go out of my way to watch it. That being said, when I do watch it, when I have watched it, I see a lot of backstage interviews and some in ring interviews that are just bad. And it just takes me out of it. I didn't see that on collision. The interviews I saw in Collision were pretty solid.

And I like that. I like the pacing of the show. The pacing was solid. The, for example, the one in ring with the guns and the scissoring and the Tony Chivani jumped in and it felt very impromptu, very spontaneous. And it was highly entertaining, highly entertaining. And it, that, the placement of that, particular segment, that stood out to me because somebody was thinking, you know, you got to give

the audience a chance to breathe, a chance to relax. You can't go from intense action, intense action, serious, serious, serious into your main event. I like the way they use that segment just to break up the emotion a little bit. So you're taking people on a ride, like a roller coaster ride instead of just starting out, you know, going down, you know, the exciting part of a roller coasters when you make that descent down straight down but yeah you got to come up out of that catch your breath so you can enjoy the next ride and i think the placement of that particular segment was was excellent that again it was either by accident or or just share luck or somebody was really thinking and i i'm hoping that somebody was really thinking last week we had the conversation

about production and how you were hoping that collision would show something different from the AEW team from a production standpoint and we had the conversation, well, do you want to make it more WWE-ified? Are you trying to just do something different? Where did you look at it from that standpoint? strictly speaking, not from layout. I mean, the visual presentation. No, I thought the presentation was outstanding. Mike Mansour, he did a fantastic job lighting and shooting. And one of the things I really liked about is there was a couple flubs in there, right? The announced team, to Malachi Black as Buddy Murphy? Was that the one? Was that the, was that? Buddy Matthews.

Yeah, but there was a buddy Murphy reference in there, right? First of all, no big deal. Anybody that hasn't made that mistake has never really been, you know, in broadcasting or certainly has never broadcast anything live,

you know, but the fact that there was that little flub, it endeared me a little bit more because now I feel this is live, right? because if it was taped, you would never would have heard that. There were a couple other little things that I saw that made me go, huh, I love live TV. But yet it still looked impressive. The way the crowd was lit, you know, and I've used this before. I didn't make this up.

Someone told me that Elvis Presley once said the best part of any of his shows were in the audience. That's where the energy is. That's where the emotion is. And I don't think anything could be more true when it comes to. professional wrestling. The action in the ring, absolutely. That's what everybody's there for. However, when you've got, I don't know how many people were in the audience, 9, 10,000 people, 7,000, whatever it was, it doesn't matter. It looked good. It scaled really well, visually, and the way it was lit, I thought was fantastic. But yet the crowd very much made that episode.

They were so invested that that energy and that emotion that I saw watching at home, translated you know it communicated to me and i that's what you want to do so i thought it looked great it was shot well it wasn't so perfect that it did it felt like i was watching you know a disney movie um it had enough you know words and pimples that it made me feel like i was watching something live but it still had a great energy big big time feel if you want to hear eric's long form thoughts on collision you can go check out the bonus episodes available on the 83 weeks feed and on the 83 weeks YouTube. Also, Eric, I'm not even sure

if you were aware of this, but NXT did a hell of a number this week for its standards. And the show was headlined by Seth Rollins versus Braun Breaker, NXT pulling 773,000 viewers. And the Seth Rollins segment

in particular got up around 900,000, which for NXT are, that's really, really strong business. Finn Baller was on the show as well. They're doing a program with Carmelo Hayes and Baron Corbyn, so we're seeing more integration of main roster talent with a show that has been presented as developmental. I'd love to know your thoughts on that strategy. Can you go to the well too much with that sort of thing? I'd love to

hear your take on that. Well, my take is about time. I love seeing that. It's great for the brand. it's great for that developmental talent to be on a show and be a part of something that's growing and bigger. It'll give everybody confidence. It'll give some talent a chance to learn at a higher level because they're working with more experienced talent in the case of Brom Breaker using there with Seth Rollins. So I think I can't think of a negative thing to say about it. It's all positive. In terms of can you go to the well too often, sure you can. Sure you can. When it's no longer a big deal in a special event, then you've gone to the well too many times. But I think they're a long way from that. I'd love to see, you know, a, if not monthly, you know, at least every

other month, a story playing out on NXT from the main roster. It just makes sense to me. And I think the numbers will certainly justify it. You know, it makes me wonder, not it makes me wonder, but I have to consider, is this, was this a move that's being made in anticipation of rights deals, you know, a television rights deal? Are we, are we growing that audience now, stunting that audience and growing that audience in order to enhance negotiations or conversations? Likely, right? Kind of makes sense. I would. I'm not sure I know anybody who wouldn't do that. But we'll see. We'll see if this is a long-term commitment or just a little bit of a short-term strategy. That was certainly my read on it. I felt like this was a way to get

a little more buzz going into the summer, especially as we know, as we've been covering an nauseam here, those TV rights are up. And we know that Nikon views NXT as a property that they could utilize, whether it's on a streaming platform or another cable network, if it's continuing to be on USA should WWE re-up with Comcast and NBC Universal. This summer is going to be a big, big season for us to discover that. But I also know, Eric, that the summer for a guy like you and I, it's the time for Eden well. And sometimes when you're on the road,

you just don't get the opportunity to queue up the grill or get the smoker fired up. But thankfully, strictly business is powered by our friends over at Factor. America's number one ready to eat meal kit. It can help you fuel up fast with flavorful and nutritious, ready to eat meals delivered straight to your door. You'll save time. You're going to eat well and you're going to stay on track reaching your goals this summer.

Eric, what's your absolute favorite thing about these factor meals? Because I could list off like five different things. I was shocked at the quality. And I came into it. I came into Factor, when they reached out to us and wanted to, you know, to sponsor our show, they were kind enough to send some samples of the product so we could try it and do an honest testimonial. And I, full disclosure here, I've had other types of product like this sent to me to sample and I've always been disappointed. So when I heard about Factor, I was excited to try it,

but I also was a little cynical because of my previous. experience, but one of the things I noticed right away when I filled out the form before a factor sent me my package of things to sample, I was asked about my, my preferences. Now, I happen to, I've been on a keto diet now for probably well over a year and a half, and I just, for me, it works better. It's, I feel better. I've dropped probably 25, 30 pounds over the last five or six months. I just feel better.

And I filled, you know, I put down my preferences, you know, keto. And long story, I'm going to make it really short, though. Lori and I ended up going to the Black Hills of South Dakota with a friend, right? And we were gone for four or five days. We finally got back home, dropped her off at the airport. Lori and I finally got home about 730 or 8 o'clock in the evening. It was too late to make anything to eat. But lo and behold, my factor box had just arrived about two hours earlier, right?

It was still cold on the inside. We opened up our box and I said, well, you know, we're not going to make anything to eat. We're not going to go out to eat this late at night. So let's just try one of these things. And I don't remember which one I had, to be honest with you. It was, I believe it was chicken. It was delicious, like so good that I ate another one. And I cannot say enough great things about the quality.

And to have, you know, it's sitting right there in your freezer. So if you run out of time or if you, you got to pinch hit, you got to, you know, make something fast, it's right there for you. But more importantly, the quality of the food, the nutritional aspect of it, the overall quality of the food is fantastic. And that's exactly it. You know, you said you had it there in the freezer because you have the option to store in a freezer if you want, but they are shipped fresh. They are not shipped frozen. They're ready to go in just two minutes. You pop them in the microwave.

You're going to be out there enjoying the nice weather this summer. You're going to be able to eat quick. It's everything you want. They offer delicious flavor-packed options on the menu each week to fit a variety of lifestyles. Like Eric said, you got keto. They've got calorie smart. They've got vegan and veggie. They got protein plus.

And they're prepared by chefs and approved by dietitians with each meal having all the ingredients you need to feel satisfied all day long while meeting your goals. And if you're looking to mix it up, you can add a protein to select vegan and veggie meals each and every week. And Eric, I don't know if you had a chance to indulge in them as well, but they came with the smoothies. those plant-based fruit smoothies, I thought those were so freaking fantastic and refreshing, especially in the summer. I downed like three of them in one day because I was like, these are so good,

and it was so hot outside. I felt great after drinking one of these factors smoothies. Have you had a chance to try any of those yet? Yes, yes. We absolutely have, and they are delicious. But again, I want to emphasize, because they are shipped fresh, I said, you know, keep it in your freezer.

They're designed to eat over a period of time. So we do keep them in the refrigerator. We're all out now because I work my way through everything and we're looking forward to our next shipment. But I do want to say also that, you know, because you emphasize the nutritional quality of it and the fact that it's approved by a dietitian, you know, fast food is the thing that kills most people. You know, fast food is deadly.

It's horrible for you. It's garbage. It's poison. It's toxic. It just is what it is. And we all eat it because when you need fast food, you don't have a lot of options. Here you've got an option. Whether you're in your office and you've got a refrigerator in your office or access to one or whether you're working from home, whatever the case may be,

this is a healthy version of very fast food because it just takes minutes to get it warmed up and ready to eat. And so much healthier for you. So much healthier. We're going to help you out here at Strictly Business. Head to FactorMeals.com slash wrestlebiz 50 and use code wrestlebiz 50 to get 50% off your first box. That's code wrestlebiz. 50 W-R-E-S-T-L-E-I-Z-5-0 at FactorMeals.com slash wrestlebiz-50 to get 50% off your first box. And we thank Factor for sponsoring Strictly Business. Hey, guys, it's the hardcore legend Mick Foley here, and I need to call a quick timeout, a brief timeout, because I wanted to tell your listeners what I have been telling Foley is pod listeners

for a while now about all the cool things. happening over on ad-freeshows.com. David Crockett and Conrad go day by day through June of 1985 and Jim Crockett promotions on the latest episode of The Book, the month that the grandson of a plumber arrived. June 30th, Cody Rhodes is going to be born. I mean, his dad is wrestling with Tully Blanchard in Los Angeles, and Dusty's got to hurry home and rush out of there and get home to Charlotte to see his wife Michelle give birth to the American Nightmare. It's a special day in Jim Crockett Promot's history.

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have waiting for you with four levels to choose from four see for yourself by ad three shows is the best value in wrestling today sign up now right now at ad three shows dot com yeah okay eric so as we tape this it is june 23rd which means we're pretty much halfway through twenty twenty three which i can't believe is the case in the first place but if you turn the clock back and you head into our archives eighty three weeks dot com you remember that eric and i did a twenty twenty three predictions episode and i figured since we're halfway through the year eric it'd be kind of fun to take a look back at some of those predictions and see how of them have aged and some have been great and some have not been and i think at the end of this

we're going to make one bold prediction for the rest of 2023 to spruce things up a little bit so let's let's get through some of the things that both you and i threw out there i predicted that we would see a working relationship between wwe and new japan pro wrestling at some point this year now we're seeing of course this week the forbidden door pay-per-view between A.W and New Japan Pro Wrestling. We haven't really seen anything from New Japan. This came at the time when Nakamura was allowed to go over to Japan

and we saw the involvement there with him in the Great Muda. Could you see at any point, maybe not this year, but WW and New Japan picking up some business together despite New Japan having a working relationship with AW? No. And why is that?

Because they don't need it. What benefit would that provide to WWE for the very same reasons that we were just talking about and why the numbers reflected a lack of interest amongst the hardest of hardcore wrestling fans that makes up pretty much the AEW Dynamite audience if they're not interested why would WWE be interested in bringing in New Japan talent and integrating them into their show knowing that the audience just doesn't care now look if if the New Japan

talent or any organization outside of WWE were to be integrated storyline wise if there is story behind it and it's not just a dream match if there's story behind it and that talent is integrated over a longer period of time and the audience gets a chance to know that talent from New Japan or anywhere else if they get a chance to develop a relationship whether they love them or hate them or just like them whatever the case may be then, yeah, I could see it. But I don't see that happening because there's no real upside to WWE in that case. So it's not driving ratings.

They're not going to be able to license and merchandise off of it, at least not the way they currently can. Why was you want a license and merchandise product? You have to split with another third party when you can license and merchandise your own stuff and not have to split. So I just, I don't see any business upside. I'll give you one that I think could potentially lead to some sort of relationship. It probably wouldn't happen this year, but maybe next year or the year after that. We know that WWE has said that they're going to go back to attempting NXT expansion. NXT Europe was announced like a year ago, and they say they're targeting it for the end of this year.

NXT Japan was a plan at some point. I could very well see Paul Levick specifically wanting to break into the Japanese market within NXT, Japan, and forming some sort of a collaboration effort with New Japan to help get developmental talent in a place where they're getting reps consistently, whether it's on WW programming with NXT Japan or a new Japan program, and you're getting some cross-collaboration there at a much lower level. Could you see a scenario like that at some point? Nope. And why not? Why would New Japan do that? If WWE has got their sites fixed on Japan and they want to create their own promotion, their own NXT Japan, why would New Japan

want to help them with that? In essence, WWE would be invading, for lack of a better term, breaking into a closed market. So why would New Japan help them do that? I wouldn't. I think it would be based on how it's presented. If it's presented as a product that's trying to compete with New Japan, certainly not. If it's not presented in that way and it's presented as much more of a minor league kind of thing,

I think it would benefit both sides to get talent reps on either side of that equation. And New Japan talent getting some of those WW-style reps, I think, would help add to well-roundedness. And I think it would benefit WWE developmental talent as well. But just a hypothetical situation, of course. Yeah, I just don't see it. You asked me if I could see it happening and I just don't see the upside. I predicted that Cody would face Roman reigns at WrestleMania because all the chatter at the time was The Rock. Instead of Cody, it did end up being Cody, but I watched the episode back.

And you and I were both very convinced, Eric, that it would make no sense for Roman Raines to beat Cody and that we expected Cody to get his coronation at WrestleMania. And unfortunately, that was not the case, as we know. But my gut says that that's still on the table at some point here. Oh, I think we'll see it. I think we'll see it. Roman Raines transitioning to Hollywood this year was something that I expected to see. I think with the writer strike, Eric, honestly, I think that,

kind of takes this off the table. I was actually going to ask you about the writer's strike because we heard that the movie that Bad Bunny was going to be in for Sony and Marvel, he was going to be, I want to make sure that I've got it right entirely, he was going to be El Muerto, which is a wrestling-based character in Sony and Marvel. It's a Spider-Man spin-off. He was going to be the main character in that. And the rumor had been that Mercedes Monet, the former Sasha Banks, was going to be part of this as well.

But the writer's strike has put that on hold for now indefinitely. I think we're seeing that have a ripple effect. And I know you mentioned a few weeks ago when we talked about the right of strike. You weren't too concerned. But do you foresee that being something that becomes of concern for the industry over the next few months here? It just, it all depends on timing. Right now it's a blip. it's a speed bump it's it has to be dealt with there are issues there are everything's on hold

um if it ends relatively soon and then it will end up being just that a speed bump and won't have a lot of long-term ramifications if it goes on for six months or more that's a whole different thing. Then you're going to see a lot of upheaval in the entertainment industry. You can see a lot more reality television all of a sudden. Guy Fiori and diners, drive-ins, and dives are going to be busy as hell. Hey, it could be a positive for wrestling, too, an opportunity to seize more eyes against less stiff competition. Getting to your predictions, your first one, CM Punk leaves AW with a buyout. Now, obviously, he's back on TV but Eric I don't think it's totally impossible still we've got a lot of

year left to go how do you feel gonna say that's a volatile situation it seems like uh you know it ends up in my feed you know some development ends up in my feed two or three times a day so we'll see you know it's it's there's a very uh juvenile kind of emotion that's running around backst running through the backstage area just the comments that I see it's like it's like high school you know the issues that everybody has with each other and you know having to keep guys off the show and it's just it's such it's so juvenile that it's hard for me to pay too much attention to it but who knows you know it may it could work itself out hopefully it does you know see and punk came out and in publicly acknowledge that he

apologized to tony for his behavior at the scrum which you don't not that's not that that CM Punk gives two shit, what I think, but, nor should he. But, you know, it kind of, you know, somebody apologizes, it recognizes that what they did was wrong and apologizes for it. And then, you know, for me, I kind of wiped a slate clean at that point. I think he would have been better served. Punk would have been better served for himself and certainly for the company to have made that clear, you know, months ago.

But nonetheless, he did. And I thought, you know, he did the best he could with the ESPN interview. I thought the ESPN interview was solid and was a good piece of business. And the interview that I saw on collision that he did, I thought was perfect in terms of tone. So if whoever's got their issues with CM Punk backstage is able to kind of grow up, which is part of the equation, then this could all just blow over. and a year from now or six months from now nobody will be thinking or talking about it but if that kind of juvenile emotional bitch fest continues to to brew backstage because there's nobody there

managing that part of the business and they're just allowing it to fester it could blow back up again and who knows i know you made the bet with conrad and a lot of that was for fun and the show was there ever a part of you throughout this process i know it's not something you spent a lot of energy on but was there ever a part of you throughout this process that thought realistically that punk would end up back on a w tv oh i i honestly i didn't think about it enough to have an opinion one way or the other it was just a mess and i nothing surprises me when it comes to AEW, I think it's a, I think it's a volatile environment, partly because it's a young company, partly because there's a lot of people in that company in management that I have

no idea what they're doing. They'll work through it. You know, you learn on the job. You learn as you go. But the state that it's in right now and the kind of child, childish, juvenile behavior that we read and hear about so often. hopefully that works itself out people kind of wise up mature a little bit and move on with their lives but who knows i don't know i didn't give it enough thought really i didn't and truthly didn't care

and still though to be honest whether punk stays or leaves i just i'd love to see him stay and i'd love to see things settle down and i'd love to see solid continued progress because i think collision to me showed that there is the they do know how to do it we know now they know how to produce a show We saw it. Now, there wasn't any story, which is fine. And I didn't, you know, I didn't throw a flag on that because it was a premiere episode. The stories should be born from that premier episode and evolve going forward. Now, if this Saturday, we see a show that is essentially a standalone show where there's no story, there's nothing connecting it to what happened last week, you're going to be right back into that 3 and 400,000 viewer category before. you know it. But if there is story, because that's the one thing that I didn't see Saturday that I'm hoping we're going to see going forward, we'll see. We'll see. I've got an open mind and I'm optimistic. Let's put it that way. There was a rumor that the show Saturday was supposed to end with a big angle that would have set up Kenta and CM Punk for a match at

forbidden door, but Kenta reportedly, essentially refused to work with CM Punk. So that match got canned, and now we've got CM Punk versus Kajima at the pay-per-view. So I guess they went with the send the fans home happy approach to that. And, you know, sometimes that works effectively for one night and you see where you go from there. Your number five, Eric, was that Fox or NBC would get all of WWE's TV rights. Now, there is still time for that to happen, of course. but as we have discussed both of them are out of the exclusive negotiating window

do you still feel good about that prediction that one of those entities will get all of wwees tv rights yes which one i mean it's close i could i listen i see i see all the reasons why I would be wrong, but I still think it's possible. I tend to think, especially after our conversation last week, that there's just so much more opportunity for WWE to license its programming out to different vendors because of, again, if you want to just go back and listen to our episode last week you can, but with Disney, with the possibilities that stem from them having access to that intellectual property, with Amazon.

Prime with the streaming access and reach that you would get with Amazon, but also the merit that comes with staying on an NBC Universal or a Fox. I really think they're going to split their TV rights among them. It just, it seems to me that they're not quite ready, especially after how we saw the sale go down. They're not quite ready to go all in on one entity. And I don't know, Eric. I just don't think that would be a great idea for them at this time, where there are so many vendors out there in the field no i see both sides of it like i said i i do uh and it's it's a close call for me but i i still think especially with fox well both fox and mbc universal it makes sense we'll see is there one in particular that you could see more than the other at

this point mc universal just because of their scope yeah uh do you think because i I've seen this at the local news level. I have a lot of friends who work for Fox O&Os, owned and operated stations, and they've had a lot of layoffs ever since the Dominion lawsuit went down, and all the payoffs had to happen from that. Do you think that that could potentially affect Fox's willingness to go all in on TV rights for anyone, let alone WWE? No, I don't.

I mean, obviously it's a hit, but look at what's going on at Disney. I mean, they've been taking financial hit after financial hit. after financial hit, but they're going to have to reinvest in the future. Yeah, you may be getting your ass kick now financially, but that's even more incentive to correct the ship and shore up your revenue opportunities for next year and get your stock price back up. So why it looks as, it looks like a negative right now with regard to Fox and the hits that they've been taking, it was a $768 million settlement that they had to pay almost a billion

dollars losing Tucker Carlson has cost them about 30% of their audience in prime time that's a big hit but what do you do when you're getting hit you you cover and then you go on offense and I think the offense would makes the WWE license television license acquisition interesting you predicted that WWE would be sold to endeavor and I that that sale would go down WrestleMania week. We both were on the money on that one. We've talked about that more than anything else on this podcast.

So if you would like to go back and listen to weeks and weeks of Eric and I talking about the sale, feel more than free too. You predicted that Warner Brothers Discovery would officially renew AW television. Now, there have been reports that have indicated that they've been near a deal.

There have been reports that have indicated, well, this was directly from Tony Kahn's mouth, that the addition of collision was an extension of the existing deal, so not something that goes beyond that 2024 window. We just learned this past week, Eric, that Warner Brothers Discovery was essentially gutting TCM, Turner Classic movies, and Scorsese and Spielberg went and met with David Zazlov to try to change the thinking on that. Do you still feel like we're looking at a long-term investment in A.W. from Warner Brothers Discoveries N? 100%. 100%. And I think the relationship

between Warner Discovery and AEW either has or will go beyond a licensing agreement. I think there will be an equity play in there if there isn't already. Interesting. Can you explain to people what you mean by that? I think Warner Discovery will end up owning a piece of AEW, much like I wanted Biocom to own a piece of TNA. What are the benefits and backdraws of that? well benefits to AEW would be long term a long term home you're not out there shopping your show every two or three years hoping that the market is going to be right for you and hoping that the

appetite for wrestling is going to be there because it can change things can change um that's the benefit to toning the benefit to Turner I'm not sure I see that as well because I don't think AEW is in the near future a money-making proposition, but there's a lot of, for the same reasons that Viacom ended up buying Bellator, which is if you're going to grow a franchise, and excuse me, if you're going to have a third-party franchise business that is using your network to build their value, why would you not want a stake in it? Of course, you're going to bet on yourself. You're going bet on your network. And if, if just like Bellator, Viacom, the reason Viacom bought Belator is because they got their ass handed to them by the UFC. Viacom built the UFC. If it hadn't been for

the reality show that UFC produced and distributed on Spike Television, I don't think UFC would be where the UFC is today. And then UFC decided, nah, when their deal was up, they're going to take their product and they're going to go shop it. And they did. So Viacom spent years building that brand, successfully building that brand in partnership with UFC, only for UFC to take it down the road and bring it to a competitor. Biacom looked at that and said, nope, we're not going to do that again. Let's buy Bellator and they own it for the same reason. If you're going to build a franchise, own a piece of that franchise you're building.

So that that would be the, I would guess, the strategy if, if indeed Warner Discovery either already owns a percentage of, of AEW or May in the future as a part of a negotiation, that's probably why they would do it. Did you check in and hear anything about that Turner Classic movie situation there? No, no, no, yeah. It was, it was interesting to see so many players in Hollywood get involved with that. I did like CM Punk giving a shout out to David Zaslov in this promo. I thought that was a crafty little, way. I was like, I don't know if that's going to get you a baby-faced cheer with the way the landscape is right now in public perception. But 99% of the people that heard that don't even know who it is. That's what I was thinking too. It's one of those things that, you know, if you know, you know, and you get a kick out of it. And if you don't know what he's

talking about, it didn't matter because it just got one right over your head anyway. Yeah. That was my way of thinking as well. You said that you felt with 80% confidence that the rumblings of Vince McMahon trying to get back into ownership position with WWE was much to do about nothing and that it was unlikely we would see Vince McMahon back in power in WWE and as we know You just make me just look like a complete asshole here today or what? You were right about a lot of these things.

You were right about a lot of these things. Yeah, well, you know, first of all, I can't believe that I bet against Vince wanting to be back because it goes against everything that we've all learned about Vince McMahon. But nonetheless, I'll take my, I'll take my lumps when I, when I have them coming. Well, and it was so fascinating. Rikosha gave an interview this week where he just straight up said that Vince is still in charge of the creative hierarchy, even though Triple H has his content management team, that Vince McMahon is still the one who is in charge and very much in the weeds,

despite the public statements that we've heard from Paul of Beck and from Nick Con, that you wouldn't see that. And that Vince himself said in that endeavor interview that, that he would not be in the weeds instead here Vince McMahon very much is but he's working remotely now have you heard that that doesn't surprise me he did that even when I was there there were occasions when he would work remotely and I for one hated those because it was more difficult dealing with him remotely than it was face to face so yeah it is what it is I guess you know you can take wrestling out of you can take Vince out of wrestling but you can't take wrestling

on events right so yeah he'll probably be around until the cockroaches take over i'll say i i do think that his influence has not been overbearing in the way i think a lot of people expected it to be when they heard he was coming back i do think he has taken some degree of a step back even if he is giving the final okay on things i do think we're seeing more triple h paula veck ideas out there on television the TV while still having some vincent band tropes i do think it has maintained that degree of freshness and we've still seen a lot of stories get a chance to play out in a positive way no we're seeing a lot of growth i mean year over year growth um raw and smackdown are both doing better i believe could be wrong but i'm pretty sure the last thing i looked at that tracked

their performance year over year both shows are up year-over-year performance and that's that's no small feat yeah yeah i thought the bloodline segment this past week with the official turn of j uso setting up bloodline civil war was just fantastic and they have a chance to tell a really special story there so i'm remaining optimistic about that and your last one eric was that nxte will beat a w dynamite in the ratings at some point this year you know seven hundred seventy three thousand as we just saw this past week erry Eric, for NXT, if they were to continue with that formula, I think it could be plausible that we see something like that.

What do you think? I'm going to double down on that one. I'm more confident than ever that it's, I'm a little surprised it hasn't happened already. But if indeed, WWE decides to add some of their top talent to their developmental talent, then I think you're going to see that happen sooner than later. it could happen as early as the next week or two well i want to say if indeed wwe makes a commitment to doing it long term i was going to say these were not 770 000 773 000 is not a number

that nxte was typically doing nxd was doing in the fives and the six not almost 800,000 so that that is a bit of an outlay outlier to this point but it could very much change and we could see something different if they start including set ralins more and by the way what a the tip of the cap that is to Seth Rollins and his drawing power, that him wrestling Braun Breaker was able to give them that number. I'm really glad to see WWE leaning into Seth Rollins as a top guy in the company after kind of having him in the periphery of that for the last few years. Do you have anything that you'd like to add on Seth Rollins?

Somebody that I haven't really picked your brain on too much. No, I never really got to know, Seth, while I was there back in 2019, ever so briefly. He was one talent that I just never really talked to, got to work with or anything like that. So I really, you know, I enjoy watching his work. I think he's very versatile. I love the fact that he's fearless in terms of his character and what he does and how he presents himself. He's absolutely fearless as a character and great as a performer, as an athlete. He's entertaining as hell.

But I don't have any inside knowledge of or feelings about him because I just never really got to know him. I was just curious what your thoughts were on him as a performer. But I think there could be some merit to your guests there about NXT beating AEW. Now, we are going to each make a prediction for the end of 2023, the second half. But before we do, Eric, I've got a prediction. And it's that your head's getting shaved in just a matter of hours. Okay. Oh, good one, John.

I know that's not quite a bold prediction, but it is a prediction nonetheless that we're going to be seeing a ball. Eric Bischoff in the very near future. But I also think that men around the country are going to be taking care of their shaving needs this summer. And that, of course, is with our friends over at Manscape. There's a nickname for this summer, Eric, and I'm not sure if you've heard of it, but it's smooth sack summer.

Jesus. When you're playing in the summer sun, make sure you're scaped from pubs to bum in 2023. That's right. This is the summer to keep your balls cool while still looking hot with Manscape. The leaders and below the waist grooming are making sure we all have a ball this summer by giving our pants partners everything they need to stay fresh. Dive head first into smooth sack summer by going to Manscape.com for 20% off plus free shipping with our code wrestle biz. Manscaped, they've got some of the best products around. They also have some of the best copyrighters, if you ask me, out there in the industry.

But the thing that's going to help you stay cool this summer is the Manscape Performance Package 4.0. It's got everything you need to prepare that summer bod for. They built the ultimate grooming bundle for your summer grooming. Their lawnmower 4.0 trimmer features a cutting edge ceramic blade to reduce grooming accidents thanks to their advanced skin safe technology. Eric, I know when you're getting your head shaved, you're going to want to make sure that there's no Knicks and anyone giving you a blade job. and Manscape is helping you rest easy with that with their skin-safe technology, are they not? I hope so for crying out loud. You know, I mean, this is, we're going to shave this stuff off.

So I'm hoping that I don't have to get stitches when it's over. And I'm sure if we're using Monscape, I won't have to worry about that. Of course not. The lawnmower 4.0 has a 7,000 RPM motor, a new multi-function on off switch that can engage a travel lock. And it gives you the ability to turn the 4,000. LED spotlight on and off when needed for precise shaving. Did I mention that this trimmer is waterproof as well? Beach Lake shower.

This razor will devour even the strongest of pubs. How's Manscaped helping you prepare for the summer, Eric? Well, I'd show you, but we can get pulled off of YouTube. They have other things, too, like the weed whacker, which is helping your ear and And nose hairs, of course, Eric, that, that I think the proof is in the pudding. Yeah, you know, I realized a while back, I'd go in to get my hair cut, right? And I started noticing that my barber was spending more time trimming the hair in my ears and he was cutting my hair.

And I realized then that I needed to take advantage of everything that Manscape has to offer. So now I can trim my ear hair and my nose hair and all that other disgusting hair that is growing in places you don't. don't really want it to grow, and Manscapes got me covered. That they do, and we got you covered here on Strictly Business. Get 20% off plus free shipping with code wrestle biz, W-R-E-S-T-L-E-B-I-Z at Manscape.com. That's 20% off plus free shipping with the code, wrestle biz, and Manscape.com. It's smoothsack summer, boys. Get on board or get left behind with our friends over at Manskaped.

Just tremendous stuff there from our partners. Okay, Eric, bold prediction time. We got half a year left. I want one bold prediction from you for the rest of 2023. What do you got? Ooh, this is tough. This is tough. I don't know, man.

I don't really have a bold prediction beyond the ones that we've already kind of established. I still, again, I think I think NXT is going to outperform Dynamite at a certain point, probably sooner than later this summer. I think I think if collision

continues to produce the quality that we saw last Saturday night, I think it's going to have a detrimental effect on dynamite unless dynamite improves substantially in terms of the way it's

formatted and the quality control and the interviews and the presentation. If Dynamite continues on the path that we've seen it on and collision continues on the path that we saw last Saturday night, I think it's going to have an adverse effect on dynamite. That's my

prediction. Okay. I'm going to give you a bold one. Ready? Here we go. Sure. Come the end of the year, beginning of 2024. One of, if not more, hangman page the young bucks mjf or cm punk will no longer be in a w oh i could see that i could see that in a heartbeat especially given the juvenile goings on that we're hearing about constantly in the issues

with bucks and page and punk and yeah so let's out of those, what was it, five that you had four? Seampunk, MJF, Hangman Page, and the Young Box. Okay. So essentially four options there. Which you see being the most likely to leave? The pairing of the Young Buck's and Hangman Page. Good riddance.

Well, I think, I think, I think, I think, I think, I think, I think WWE. would be salivating at the opportunity to bring in hangman page in the young bucks, especially hangman page. I think hangman. Why? I don't get that. Really?

So you don't see it in hangman page, huh? Not salivate. I mean, do I see him there? Sure. Oh. A talented guy, but do I see there's been some big move? I, I think hangman page checks off all the boxes that a guy like Paul Levec would want in a top guy in a company.

And he's so in tune with. where the industry is right now and where it's headed. I think an opportunity to bring in Hangman Page and inject him right into that top tier of WWE talent, I think he would be salivating at the opportunity to do that. And then the young bucks, you know, they have never done the WWE jump. At one point,

WWE offered them the farm to come in. It was reported that they were given even a six month out and some creative control should they come in, but instead they opted for A.W and starting that up. Did he believe that? I think they've confirmed pretty much all of that in interviews since then that they were very well taken care of in the initial contract negotiations. There was creative in place for them to debut at the Royal Rumble,

and they opted to start A.A.W. instead. But what an interesting turn of events it would be if Cody, hangman page, and the Young Bucks, three entities for people who were instrumental in starting AW were gone from the company within its first five years of existence that's pretty dramatic

wouldn't that be interesting it'll be something to talk about so I have what we do here so I hope it happens just so we have something cool to talk about it's a bold prediction Eric I guess we'll see but I could also see on the other side of the equation everything imploding with CM Punk and him being gone I could totally see that side of the equation as well.

I think MJF sticking around. I think he's sticking around. I think Tony's been good to him. And MJF is smart. He's very, very, very smart. So I agree with you on that point. He calls you Uncle Eric. You know that?

Oh, that's sweet. Sweet. Well, it would be very sweet if everyone out there would subscribe to Strictly Business 83 Weeks.com. We also want to get you involved with our team. You go to advertise witheric.com. Get your message, get your product, get your business out in front of thousands of listeners and viewers every single week here.

Advertise witheric.com. Eric, I want to give everyone one last look here at that beautiful, beautiful set of hair. Oh, man. I'm going to miss it. Oh, I'm going to go away. But you don't know, I could look like, I could look good, bald. You never know. I may just keep it.

I may just keep it. I may keep my head shaped. I don't know. As a fellow Ken Doll, I've appreciated all your contributions to the hair industry. You've certainly financed it with plenty of hair product over the years. And I hope for your sake that everything goes well. Enjoy Top Guy weekend. I hope it's a blast for you over there.

Anything else you want to add? Nope. I'm good to go, man. It's lunchtime. It is lunchtime. Enjoy your time in Huntsville. This has been strictly. business. We'll see you next week.