83 Weeks with Eric Bischoff - Strictly Business with Eric Bischoff #69: AEW Rebrands

Episode Date: March 7, 2024

In this edition of Strictly Business, Eric Bischoff breaks down the AEW Dynamite rebranding effort, diving into the weeds on production changes and positioning of new stars like Will Ospreay and Okada. Plus, a look back on Sting's last match, and news about WWE's initial Netflix discussions! Special thanks to this week's sponsors! BlueChew- Try BlueChew FREE when you use our promo code WRESTLEBIZ at checkout--just pay $5 shipping. 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

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That's right, it's saved withconrad.com. NMLS number 32416, equal housing lender. SavewithConrad.com. How's it going, everyone? It's time for another edition of Strictly Business here on the ad-free shows and podcast Heat Networks. I'm John Alba, and I'm joined as I am every single week by the man of the hour, the main character of Strictly Business with Eric Bischoff, Mr. Eric Bischoff, dude, you have an unbelievable, impeccable ability to grow hair at the rate of which I have never seen anyone.

It is truly impressive, like genuine. Yeah, it's almost back, right? I mean, you would never even know. Actually, I'm scheduled to get a haircut next week. Oh, look at you. Oh, man. Just a little, you know, just a little fade, you know, something a little contemporary looking. That is impressive.

That's impressive. Kudos to you for that, my friend. How you doing, Easy? It's been a pretty busy week in the wrestling realm. Sting's retirement. We'll talk a little bit about that. We'll talk about the dynamite rebrand, some TKO news. What's going on in the House of Bischoff?

House of Bischoff is kind of status quo. You know, got a couple little projects I work on to keep my mind occupied and a couple of big projects I'm working on to keep my banker satisfied. and stay out of my wife's hair. But other than that, man, just kind of plug it along, enjoying my life. Even super busy online this week. You and Conrad did a ton of programming

surrounding the AW Revolution event. So everyone can go over to the 83 weeks YouTube channel and check that out. You don't want to miss that. Yeah, and I want to just throw on a plug there because we're going to be doing a lot more over at 83week.com. And if you go to 83 weeks.com, It'll take you right to our YouTube channel where you can subscribe, sign up for notifications,

hit that little bell. And I think in the next 12 months you're going to be seeing a ton of new content, perhaps even daily content, coming to you via 83weeks.com. So you want to get in on that. Don't want to miss it. We're working on some of that content right now, but it sounds like it's going to be fun. Well, that's great to hear. It's always a great way to stay in touch with any of the ad free. shows programs, constant YouTube content is always uploaded. Of course, at freestows.com is going to be

where you're going to get first access and add free access to these great podcasts like Strictly Business and 83 weeks and all the others as well. Busy week, as I said, Eric, I want to jump into it here and specifically talking about revolution. I don't want to get two in the weeds of it, but we did get some business news on the back end of it. Before I get into that, though, now that we've had a few days to kind of resonate with things how are you feeling about stings retirement and seeing how everything went down well you know it's kind of like i said john before the event weeks or months before the event when it was announced it was going to take place and we had discussions about who his opponent should be and what kind of match it should be and you know all the all the variables

that could possibly go into it and i you know made it pretty clear that from my perspective as long as Steve Borden, the man who plays the character Sting, is happy and leaves that venue with a big smile on his face and feels satisfied that he ended his career the way he wanted to. I'm happy as hell for him, you know, living vicariously through him, really. He got to bring his sons into the picture, not only is a part of an angle, but also at the very end, you know, coming in dressed in the various evolutions of Sting. the character. I just, you know, I thought it was cool. There were parts of it, you know, the match is just not my favorite kind of match. Anybody that has ever worked with me or listen to me knows. I'm just not a big fan of hardcore gimmick matches. This was no exception. I thought the Darby thing was flat out stupid. I don't think it added anything at all to

the match. I think it's scratching whatever weird fucking it's that Darby Allen has, good for him. but the risk involved, just the idea of it. It didn't do anything at all for the match. It didn't do anything at all for Sting. It did whatever Darby thinks it's going to do for his career. But other than that, I thought it was fine just because of the way it ended. And the crowd left happy. That was the most important part.

When you're producing an event, you know, you're producing it for the audience that paid their money, whether to come into the arena or to watch it on pay-per-view, you're producing it for the audience. You're not producing it for yourself. And the crowd left happy, man. And that's at the end of it all, it doesn't matter what my opinion is or yours or derbies or stings or Tony Kons or Conrad Thompson's.

It really only matters what the fans think. And I think the fans left happy. So from that perspective, it was a home run. I did enjoy watching Will Osprey. I was very impressed with that. I understand the hype. I've seen, seen him before,

but never really watched him closely. I get it. I get the hype. It was a, it was a thing of beauty to watch his, his abilities in the ring. We're going to talk about more about that as we cover dynamite here, as I've watched this morning.

But, you know, that was impressive. I thought everything else was just kind of, eh, well, not bad. But nothing spectacular. I was disappointed in the Eddie Kingston match with Daniel Bryan.

I just, eh, you got supposedly the best wrestler in the world in Daniel Brian or Brian Danison or whatever he's called right now. You got the best wrestler in the world, and I think he's one of the best. He's an amazing performer. And then you got that slop fest. I don't get it. But, hey, people liked it. Good for them.

Yeah, that's all very interesting to me to hear, especially i want to hit on the the derby spot for a second you know not even talking about the actual spot itself going through a pane of glass um you said you felt that it didn't add to the match that it didn't add anything to it for that uh to sting in that regale right part of me it was just a high it was just a crazy fucking mcfulley off the top of the cage high spot that's all it was there was nothing it just was there as a oh my god that's that's what it was for great well so i took the and let me from a story perspective within the context of the match the matches we've seen with sting and derby over the past 28 29 matches that they've had

whatever it was the one story beat that was always consistent in these matches is that darby would do something crazy in these matches to ensure that sting's legacy would prevail and that sting would get his moment and sting would be able to win these matches he was willing to go to those great lengths for Sting so in this match when he does this wild i mean absolutely wild stunt and it was a stunt is what it was um and he and he comes up short he was willing to risk it all for sting then the entire remaining part of the match which was probably about i don't know maybe the remaining half of the match is about sting trying to overcome the odds and building to those near falls to where Sting then becomes 1991 Sting again,

fires up, beats the chest, and has this great comeback. Oh. You call it a story. I call it a fucking lullaby. But isn't that like a lot of sting matches? Like he has,

you can justify it if you want to and you can be as positive as you want to be. I'm looking at it objectively as a producer. not as a marked out Kool-A-Dinking fucking AEW hardcore wrestling fan who thinks everything they do is fantastic because there's

a number of those fans out there. I was talking about it from her producer. I thought the match was it was okay for what it was. The, you know, the young bucks don't really have any heat. They've got Pavlov's dog heat, which means the audience knows

that they're playing the roles of a heel. now so the audience is going to be complicit and do what they're supposed to do, but that's not real heat. That was one thing, and I just, you could justify and try to, you know, mind some kind of story logic out of that shit if you need to. I don't. I'm just looking at the drama in the match, the story in the match, and yes, maybe that seat has been granted and that's Darby's giving. I'm telling you, I found it distasteful and stupid, and I think in the long run it's going a backfire. But, you know, you've got those people that just love watching people throw each other in front of fucking trains and off of buildings and shit like that. Hey, keep watching, you know,

until you won't be able to anymore, watch somebody else do the same thing. I think it's stupid. I just do. I will say, Darby Allen, you know, he's a little guy. He's only about a buck 40. So it's not like he's a 250 pound guy throwing himself off the top of the cage or anything like Mick used to do. But, you know, I hope it when he's 45 or 50 years old, he's still able to walk and look back at his career and be glad that he did the stupid shit he did and maybe make a lot of money in the process. But I, I don't see that. I will say. History, history, history does not suggest that that's going to be the outcome. I, I just, I loved the fact that Sting got treated with so much respect on his way.

As did I. And, and I, that was, you know, that, that was a, it was a good feeling. It was a good feeling. Like I said, you know, Sting to be. able to have his kids there is an important thing you know i had the privilege being able to work with my son and and it's a very satisfying full circle kind of feeling um so yeah overall you know happy with it just cool seeing as a producer not as a geeky dirt sheet wrestling fan but as a producer i'm giving my perspective take it or fucking leave it don't care people if you're listening to this you don't like what I have to say, fuck off. It's my show. It is your show. Well, we did find out the venues now that Revolution grossed more than $1 million in ticket sales. The average ticket

price was about $55. The Coliseum's deputy director, Scott Johnson, provided numbers for hospitality and merchandising sales from that night, as well as vendor information. They had $306,000, $2.42 in concession receipts. and they reported about $349,000 in merchandise revenue, which came out to about $21 or so per person. They compared it to a high-end. That's a nice number. And the margins of merchandise are nice and high,

so that's a fat number. Yeah, they compared it to about a high-end concert in that sense. AW did more than 16,000 fans for this show. It was one of the better attended shows over the course the past couple years, in fact. And like you said, Eric, the people went home. home happy at the end of the day, which I think for a show like that, that's kind of what it's designed to be.

But the atmosphere was great for most of that show watching it. And I was just happy that Sting got that respect. And you know what I love too, Eric? He did not look like an old guy playing greatest hits. He looked like Sting being awesome. And that's what those fans wanted to see. That's what they paid their tickets to see. And they got that.

So, yeah, shout to him. And he was very clearly appreciative of all of the work that put into him getting that retirement. I know you can't do it for every legend, Eric, but do you feel generally in wrestling that legends are treated well today versus maybe in the past? Oh, I guess it's relative, you know, it depends on who and how much of a legend you are. Some people are only legends in their own mind. It's relative. I think in some cases, you know, there are certain legends like The Undertaker, for example, that I think will continue to be positioned as deservedly so in a very high profile, very positive way. And there are others that fall into that category. There's a lot of them that just prefer to stay off, stay out of the limelight. You know, you don't see or here, much is still called Steve Austin. You know, he does a few things. things that are, you know, you'll do a TV commercial here or maybe a guest appearance on a TV

show there, although that's been a while. But Steve is not one, apparently, that, you know, feels the need to get a lot of face time and be positioned in some of these events. So I think it's all, it's relative. It just depends on who you're talking about. How do you feel about Paul Heyman and Bolnikano being the first two WWU Hall of Fame inductees? Paul, Paul Heyman, especially, you know, I don't know Bullen Cano and I'm somewhat familiar with her work, but not real familiar with her work, to be honest about it. Paul Heyman, who I've known since roughly 1987 when he and I were working together. I think in 1988 is when he came in and worked for the AWA. He worked for the guy by the name of Rob Russon, who was like the slipperiest used car salesman in the

world. But he was selling live events and you had to be, I guess, at that time, especially selling AWA live events. There's not necessarily a hot ticket. But yeah, Paul was working. working with Rob Russon. And I never really had to know Paul real well because I was doing my thing. He was doing his. But that's when I first met Paul and of course worked with him and when I first got to WCW back in 91 and then had a on again, off again type of relationship with him once I got to control of WCW and Paul launched ECW. And it's funny because for a long time, you know, publicly we had heat with each other. Right. He was constantly taking shots at me and I was taking shots at him and, you know, it just,

we went back and forth like that a couple times, threatening to sue me and me, you know, it's just, it was silly shit, really, but it was good. It was fun. It was good for business. And then I got to work with Paul really more closely as adults, you know, because we were really kids in the business when we first started working together in AWA. But once I got to WWE in whatever year it was, 2001 or two, um really got to spend more time together and we became pretty good friends during that period of time

we kind of publicly we kind of kept the heat alive the perception of it occasionally fire off at each other in social media or whatever it was or in interviews at that time but we did that because we thought well you never know we might end up you know we might end up in a ring at some point as it's true you know so we kept the heat alive hoping that someday we'd be able to cash you on it but it never really happened got close a couple times during the brand wars in WWE, but it never really came together. But I respect the hell out of Paul. First of all, you have to respect any human being, male, female, in-ring performer, promoter, manager, cameraman, it doesn't matter. If you've been in the business as long as

Paul Heyman has been in the business, at the level Paul Heyman's been in the business, and you don't have respect for him, there's something wrong with you and you need to look at your life and maybe see a doctor or shrink because there's something desperately wrong. Paul's an amazing guy, amazing talents, his fingerprints are all over so much of some of the most memorable things that we'll talk about and think about and cover over the last 20 or 30 years. So hats off to Paul. The stuff with you guys as both general managers and having the draft and fighting for picks it was some of my favorite stuff of that area you guys had great chemistry together what do you think his greatest contribution to the business is at the end of the day i think

it's going to be less obvious but maybe more important than anything paul has ever done as far as being a promoter for ECW and breaking some acts, you know, guys like Taz and Tommy Dreamer and, you know, there's some talent out there that you probably wouldn't know of today had it not been for Paul and ECW. I think some of the talent, including Taz, would be the first one to tell you that. Paul was giving people an opportunity, giving people a chance that wouldn't have had that chance anywhere else. And some of them, Bully Ray, for example, have really, really made it. Devon, we could go on and on and on and talk about the people that have, become successful in the industry because of the start that they got at ECW.

But I think, again, as a producer, looking at things a little differently, I think Paul's ability to nurture talent, not just young talent, but even seasoned talent, to help them find a new way to communicate their narrative, cut their promos. giving them the confidence and perhaps a different lens through which they can look at their own characters probably has been the most significant impact overall because I think he's helped, Paul has helped a lot of people who had the talent and the potential realize that potential because of Paul's ability to direct and see characters. And that's something that's vitally important today.

And we're going to talk about dynamite in just a few minutes. sure. But it's one of the thing I noticed when I watched last night's episode of Dynamite is there's just, and I've said this forever, there's a ton of potential there. But so much of it is unpolished and undiscovered at this point. And that's one of the things a guy's like, a guy like Paul Heyman brings to the table is he can see beyond the obvious. He can see something inside of a talent that sometimes the talent themselves, in fact, more often than not, the talent themselves don't even see because you don't look at yourself the same way others look at you.

People don't say, trust me, go into a fucking Walmart anywhere in the country. Go in about July when it's hot and humid out and you'll see exactly what I mean. People do not see what other people see because if they did, they wouldn't wear that shit and it wouldn't be a website just for Walmart pictures. But when it comes to a performer, I think, it takes, I mean, it's just like a movie, right? It takes a great director to get the most out of an actor and actress that has the innate qualities and talent. It just hasn't quite figured out how to tap into it. And that's one of the things that I think Paul should be remembered for primarily.

know ECW is the front facing loud, you know, shiny object that everybody will associate with Paul. And obviously his relationship with Roman Reigns and Brock Lesnar and some of the other big names. But Paul's ability to see talent, nurture talent, and bring the best out of talent is what makes Paul different than just about anybody else I know. Yeah. And I think in the current structure of WWE, that's very much encouraged for his involvement. But at the same time Eric like speaking from a very objective business standpoint there are times and we've heard stories about this in the past with Paul and Vince specifically but gunning too much for one talent or trying to get too much in the corner of one talent at times that could almost rub people

the wrong way and give a bad impression of a talent so having to navigate that in combat the ebbs and flows I watched it I watched it with Paul the brief period of time that I was in And Paul was the executive director of Raw, and I was the executive director of SmackDown, going back to 2019. Got to work with Paul just a little bit and quite a bit, actually. And Paul felt very strong. When Paul feels strongly about you, he's going, he is, he is truly going to advocate for you. It's not just a gimmick. It's like the most important thing in his world.

If he's convinced, he knows how to make something work. he's relentless and it can it can be it can be a challenge because he's so passionate but without that passion he would never deliver he would never he would never have examples of success stories so you got to kind of take the good with the bad how would you have felt as someone in a leadership position say wcd if someone came to was like you got to be paying attention to this person this person can be a big star and it's relentless and just trying to get it on i love that i love people that are relentless i love people that are in my face. I enjoy people who are passionate and are convinced that they're right. And even if I don't agree

with them, they'll keep coming at me because I could be wrong. I want to see it. Just because I can't see it doesn't mean I'm right. And especially in a creative environment, you need, I would need to be surrounded by, I don't think I'd want more than one or two people like Paul, because that could be a little get over till but to have that one guy sure one woman that you know even if you don't agree with them they've got such a great track record that if they're going to be in your face and pushing something even if i don't like it i would probably listen and and go with it because the odds of someone like paul being right are more often good than bad no and i mean i've heard stories over the years on podcast where

Paul would be, say, pitching CM Punk, the Anaconda Vice, you've got to see, he's going to be the guy, and Vince would say, you know, why do you have such a hard on for this guy? And Eric, the reason is, is because Paul Heyman was probably taking Blue Chew at the time. And as we know... Good job, John. Good job. Love

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over the course of a week. Now, Blue Shoes came out after, uh, I was good at that awkward moment never occurred. That's good. That's good. But when have you found blue chew to come in handy for you? Usually on Saturday mornings, that's my go-to mornings for sure. It's like, you know, we, this is B and I are actually quite busy. She's got her projects that she's doing. I've got mine. I travel quite a bit.

But Saturday mornings are like, okay, no matter what's going on, Saturday mornings belong to us. You know, sometimes if I, especially if I've been traveling her, I've been, my head's been buried in a project of just not quite feeling it. So that little assist comes in handy and boom, I'm 25 again. that's the best part about blue chew you can use it at any time anywhere and it's going to work quick too bluechew wants to help you have better sex gents discover your options at bluechoo.com chew it and do it we got a special deal for our listeners try bluechew free when you use our promo code wrestle biz at checkout just by five dollars shipping that's bluechoo dot com promo code

wrestle biz to receive your first month absolutely free visit bluechew dot com for more details and important safety information and we thank blue chew for sponsoring this edition of strictly business. So I want to real quick, Eric, get back to the AW side of things before we talk a little TKO. You had a chance to watch Dynamite. This was the post show for Revolution. And it was a bit of a soft relaunch for Dynamite, too. They did a new set.

They brought back the tunnels that we had previously seen with the original AEW design. There were some new production shots, too, that we saw on this. There was an overhead at one point. I know Mike Mansiri, I believe, spoke to. Sports Illustrated this past week that mentioned there were going to be some changes coming. What were some of your impressions of the show and anything you'd like to hit on here? I really, I like the changes. I like the set.

I like the colors. One of my, this hasn't been a big issue for me and I haven't thought about it a great deal, but there's been a lot, as I've talked about, that I like about the kind of gritty presentation that AEW has. I like wrestling, especially live wrestling, to feel like it's live. anything can happen. And as I've said a million times before, sometimes in WWE, it's so well produced that one forgets that you're watching a live performance and you feel like you're watching Disney on ice made for wrestling. So I like the grittier kind of anything can happen slightly less than

perfect overall visual presentation of dynamite. The set design, the colors, the palette that they use, a lot brighter and more colorful than we're used to. But I think, I think AEW needed that. And part of it is, and again, this is going to sound like criticism and fuck it, I don't care. If you look at the roster, you watch, you know, and I just got down watching the show like an hour ago. I got up early and watched it this morning. No one would be going to do this podcast. for the most part you see guys coming out in jeans and black t-shirts and construction boots

and bermuda shorts and who's that fucking guy that came back that was gone for like two years and he made a surprise appearance when it looked like he bought him a cameron on his way to the building a pair of shorts and tennis shoes and a t-shirts like what the fuck you just crawl out you should just wake up in the back seat of your car or what kaille o're yeah it just looked like shit It looked like somebody that could barely afford a ticket and just crawled into the ring. And I get it if you have one or two characters. That's kind of their trademark and it's consistent with their character. I get it.

But when you've got just about everybody dress in a similar tone and fashion, it's like you're watching an independent wrestling show out behind a jiffy lube on a Saturday afternoon as a fundraiser for a local charity. I mean, that's the way it looks sometimes. And I think the colors in the design, the set design, make up for some of that. I just liked it. I liked the colors.

I liked it. I liked everything about it. I liked the dynamite banner, the LED banner that, you know, the hard camera is seeing. I think the visual of AEW needed that nice touch, just brought it up a level or two. I liked a lot of the camera work. Somebody's got to tell the referees to stay the fuck out of the shot

unless they're absolutely necessary because I did notice that the director, I'm assuming it was Mike Mansoury, was constantly trying to shoot around a referee who feels for whatever reason they need to be in the shot, even if there's nothing going on and selling the action. Like, what the fuck?

You're not there to sell the action? You know, it's just little shit like that. And it is little stuff. It's nitpicking. But again, I'm watching as a producer, not as a Kool-A-Drinking AEW fan. As a producer, I thought a lot of the shot choices were better, getting moved a lot. They've got a little ways to go. But that's more of a talent issue than a director issue.

As I said, you've got to get your referees, get out of the fucking shot. Unless you're making a count or breaking something up, you should be as far out of that shot as you possibly can, not mugging for the camera because you feel like you're a star. So a lot of that. And it's consistent, too. It wasn't just this week. Actually, I saw a list this week that I usually do when I try to watch. Sometimes it's just so hard and annoying to me that I'll just quit watching as a result of it.

It's just so amateurish. But, again, I love the colors. I love the set. I like a lot of the shots that we're getting, the pacing of the direction. It's not frenetic. We're not just going from shot to shot to shot to shot to try to. to create the illusion of action. We're actually following the action

and we're doing a good job. A lot of facials. I don't know if you've noticed this as as of late, but I don't watch a lot of AEW. I'll go for a couple weeks and not watch it. And I'll sit down and watch it for a week or two and then I'll, you know, pick up, you know, an hour or two here or there, maybe 20 minutes

every once in a while. But I did notice consistently, we're getting a lot more tight shots in emotion out of talent. And I think that's really a big move forward. That's a positive thing. Again, wrestling fans who don't watch wrestling as a producer would probably aren't going to notice it. And you shouldn't. I'm not suggesting you should. It should be subtle. But it should also help

create more emotion in the viewer too. And I think it will over time and with consistency. So I love all that. I mean, these are all positive things. I'm pointing out the things I find a little bit amateurish but i'm also pointed out some of the more positive aspects yeah it's one of those things you don't want to beat the viewer over the head with it with like those emotion shots but when you hit them in the right spots they can really add a nice story beat to the match you're watching and you notice a lot of that in talent too is talent is taking their time and and selling some of that and i'm guessing that's mansuri talking to talent and saying look guys i want to help get you over i want to do what i can do you know i can't like jump off a fucking ladder that the

referees holding for me, which is another stupid thing. But I can't jump off the ladder through a pane of glass to help get you over, but I can, because of the way I direct the show, bringing motion to what you're doing. If you work with me. Now, if you have the conversation with talent and talent doesn't understand it or necessarily feel it's necessary or comfortable doing it, or they just haven't developed a skill set yet, it's going to be hard. But if you've got talent that goes, okay, Mike, I'm sorry, our director, I'll work with you. Here's a great spot.

I'm going to do this spot in the match. We're going to have a false finish here. This would be a great spot to sell this emotion. If the director knows it's coming and the talent knows the director's looking for it, that's when the magic happens. Yep, yep. But if you don't have that communication between the director and a talent, or if you have the communication and for whatever reason,

the talent isn't able to deliver, yeah. you're watching a wrestling match yeah it's well directed and well executed by talent now you have the ability to create emotion and that's what makes this little world we call professional wrestling spin on its access certainly so there is definitely merit to having the sports centric more realistic don't find the camera at all the times like make it feel a little grittier real approach there's merit to that but i do think we have to remember at the end of day we're watching a television performance here and blocking out those specific moments that can provide those great beats that help propel characters and help propel action forward can really be very valuable.

It's something that WWE has done very well for a long time. And I don't feel like anyone really touched them on that front for years. And when you have instances like that, Eric, I'm in total agreement with you on that, even looking at the AW pay-per-view when they, in the sting match, they did the callback to the Rick flare match where the I'm sorry I love you the young bucks said we're not sorry we hate you and they made sure that the cameras were there capturing their face saying that and then on dynamite in this episode Kyle Fletcher and will Osprey who were friends going into this match they had that one moment where there was there was that acknowledgement from each character very cinematic in a sense

helping drive that story beat forward to the viewer and that's the way it should be and here's here's here's what it takes to get that though It takes pre-planning and it takes pre-production. Now, if you're in a situation where nobody knows, and we've heard this, you know, I'm not making this shit up, if there's a lot of dysfunction creatively and nobody knows what they're doing the day of the show and nobody knows what they're doing once the show starts and hearing a lot of that kind of feedback coming out of AEW, it's impossible for your director and the talent.

to have that communication. You know, guys trying to figure out their matches, you know, when the show starts. So you're not going to get that opportunity. But with pre-planning and pre-production and being ahead of the curve and knowing what your story beats are and what your matches are and you have enough time in the day for your director to sit down with each one of the talents in that each match, sit down. Once the match has been laid out, sit down with that talent or, their agent and say, okay, where's the opportunities here?

Where's the camera shots we want? Where are the shots that are going to sell this match or sell this talent? You sit down and figure that out and then go out and do it. But that takes pre-planning. And I think in the cases, you know, the couple of examples we're talking about, I think you had that. We'll see if that continues now on the weekly shows and on collision and some of the other shows.

I don't expect you're going to see it all change overnight. But if gradually over the next few months, things tighten up, better pre-production, better planning, getting ahead of the curve creatively so that you can take advantage of somebody who has the abilities of a Mike Mansoury. Mike is phenomenal director, but you've got, it's got to, there's got to be communication between the talent and the director in advance. Otherwise, you're just, you're going to cover the match, but you're not going to get that emotion. I think what you saw with Will and dynamite, who is his opponent? Kyle Fletcher. that was a fun match to watch um there again these guys have worked together a lot before they had their match probably laid out well in advance so they could sit down with mike mansuri and say okay

here's what we're going to do here's a couple spots where we can really sell let's make sure that we get that shot yeah so let's let's talk about some of these at talent additions with a w because i think there's very much a concert effort being made right now to add some names to try and heat the product up going into the summer from a business perspective and and push some more tickets too. We saw Will Osprey coming full-time. Okada made his debut on this episode of Dynamite. And then we know big business next week.

All implications are that Mercedes Monet is going to come in. So those are three pretty big names in the wrestling industry that are coming into AEW right now. What are your thoughts on kind of stacking that up here headed into the late spring summer season and trying to get some momentum going? You know, my first reaction was, wow, this is a tough time of year to try to get some attention because

WrestleMania kind of sucks the wrestling conversation to air out of the room. There's just so much focus on WrestleMania that it's hard to really break through the noise in a way. But when is a good time? Right. You're going to wait till, you know, you're going to wait until WrestleMania is over right in the PICA NBA playoffs. That's not really a good time of year.

You're going to wait until summertime. Well, everybody's out playing at the beach, you're playing softball drinking in the whatever that's not a great time there's not a lot of people watching television in the summer for the most part you're going to wait till the fall oh and then we got football so there's really no great time of year right um you you could probably argue for january or february or february as being the best time of year to want something new because russomania season hasn't really begin to peak yet um so i with that in mind i yeah I think it's a good thing.

I think there's more interest right now for certain on my part. And I think I probably represent a large part of the non-Cool-Aid drinking AEW fan base. There's some interest there. And I'm going to give it another shot. You know, and that's what you want, right? A.E.W., if you look at the last six months or a year, it's not been great just because of the political infighting and nonsense that's happened in the past. But that's all behind them now.

People have gotten it out of their system. It's been talked about to death. Everybody's moving on. So to have, you know, a guy like Will and Mercedes-Munay and Ocada coming in, you know, Akata, Will Osprey are not household names. It's not like you're bringing in, you know, Roman Reigns or John Sina or Steve Austin. you're bringing in, you know, people other than Mercedes who are relatively unknown outside of the hardcore AEW Kulei drinking audience.

The average wrestling fan doesn't know who Okada is nor care. Or for that, for the most part, the same is probably true to Will Osprey. He's relatively new to the mainstream American audience. Didn't get a lot of exposure wrestling in New Japan. I could get more people watching me cook a burger in my garage than they were able to get on television. So he's new, and I think it's a good thing. I think them all happening at once is a good thing. It's going to be tricky.

Talk about dynamite. Let's talk about Osprey. Getting ahead of it a little bit myself. But in watching Will Osprey both on Revolution and then again this morning, he is a very unique talent is special he's in a different category no question about it he's got a great look he is and i don't know where he did it who taught him or if it just comes naturally but he is a he is a gifted performer he knows how to control the audience he knows how to present himself so that he comes off as a big star on top of his amazing god-given abilities in the ring

he looks like a star he acts like a star he feels like a star oh and he is a star I would be if it were me I would use him as an attraction for a couple of reasons Number one, because he should be. He should be special because he is. So he should be treated as such. Also, you should build anticipation for the audience that just, they can't wait to see him wrestle again. You'll lose that if we see him every week.

He'll become one of everybody else after six months. So the advantage you have with someone like Will Osprey is you have an amazing, talent. I hate to use the term generational because it's so overused. No, I don't think you're wrong if you were to say something in that realm, though. I'm going to throw it in here. He's so unique that, number one, I'm sure Tony recognizes it, just like we all do, but you have to protect it. Once you recognize it, you have to protect it. So I would keep, number one, I would, I would, I would position Will Osprey as an attraction. You may see him on TV leading into a pay-per-view a couple times but I wouldn't put him in like you know

we saw with Kyle this past Wednesday night he was it probably about a 14 16 minute match went through two segments so whatever it was I wasn't timing it but I went through two commercial breaks so I would be careful about overexposing him I understand why they did it now because you're introducing him to the audience but if and I've seen this happened so many times before, especially with inexperienced creative people, which Tony is, is you can give the audience too much of a good thing, and it's no longer that important anymore. So I'd be very, very protective of Will Osprey if I was Tony number one. So then what's the difference between, say, him and a Cody, for example? Like, they're different performers in the

ring, obviously, but you're talking about Osprey's a guy who can clearly be a top player for this brand i totally agree with you on that he has a superstar presentation his entrance has the crowd going nuts they're participating in the entrance cody's very much the same way but we see cody on tv every single week because w we realize much more on story and the soap opera of it all and the drama of it all and less on the wrestling of it all that's one reason the other reason is because Cody has probably a dozen people that are his caliber or higher in terms of abilities in the ring

that he could work with at any given moment. Will Osprey's got about two, maybe three. That's the other big risk with a guy like Osprey. Osprey came to the ring and he looked, he looked exactly the opposite of the Jiffy-Lub indie rific wrestlers that we typically see. And I'm talking about the presentation. I'm not talking about them as people.

But when you get guys that half of them, you know, Eddie Kingston, perfect example, he comes to the ring looking like the guy that changed the oil in my truck. It's just not impressive. And I get it if that's his character. But when you've got six or eight or ten other people that look just like him, like they have the same wardrobe assistant, it ain't good.

Osprey comes in looking like a superstar. From the minute he came through, that curtain and then over delivers in the ring how many people are you going to be able to match osprey up that are like kyle was that can bring out the best in osprey that can keep up with him name them very few of that roster in a ewe could possibly keep up with with now there's a company you know now you got a cot in there obviously and kyle and there's probably a handful of others, but that's a small handful. Anybody else at Osprey works with, he's going to have to come down to their level

because they're not capable of coming up to his. It's kind of like a reverse rub, if you will. And if you're going to use Will Osprey on a consistent basis, you're going to have them wrestle every single week, maybe on Dynamite, and maybe over here on Rampage, let's drop him in on collision because, oh, we need a rating. He'll end up working with guys on the roster who cannot possibly keep up with him and he'll have to slow his shit down what does that do for him makes him less special that's what i mean about protecting him i think there are a lot of talented

in-ring wrestlers on the a w roster that i mean he could have a ton of matches with he just came from the indies for crying out loud where he was having matches with everyone but i think to your point um there are very few people on the a w roster right now who feel as important as Will Osprey already feels. And part of that is a willingness to go all the way with someone when they get hot and being willing to ride them out into that momentum and get them as hot as possible. I mean, we just saw it with Daniel Garcia where the crowd was aching for him to win. They're aching for him to win that title and then it doesn't happen.

And it's like the third time that's happened for him. So there has to be a point where these talent are given the opportunity to take that next step and be presented in a similar realm where they seem like big time superstars. hopefully a guy like Osprey can help that you know on your your Kingston point i get what you're saying but i also listen to these crowd reactions and eddie kingston consistently has some of the biggest crowd reactions on every show he's on as a baby face nonetheless so maybe it's not a one and this may just speaking in hypotheticals here maybe it's not a one size fits all when it comes to a performer like that because if he's selling merchandise if the crowd

is cheering for him isn't that ultimately what matters at the end of the day no what matters is that he's he's any not just Eddie I'm picking on you know I don't want it to sound like I'm picking Andy Kingston there's a lot about Eddie Kingston that I like as a character I think one of the reasons that people cheer him when they do is because he's relatable in a way in a way he's relatable very he he therefore the grace of God go I is kind of like the thing that I think about when you look at a character like Eddie Kingston because he represents everybody out there sitting in the arena. Everybody out there is looking at Eddie Kingston and goes, God, he's made it.

And if he can do it, maybe, maybe someday I could. Not that they ever will. It's almost subconscious. You're living vicariously through someone that you can relate to. It's hard for people to relate to a guy like Will Osprey because I don't care who you are Unless God blessed you with a certain amount of natural talent, you can't learn that shit. You can learn it, but you won't be able to do it. You know, it's certain, you know, certain guitar players, you know, there's a lot of people

that can play, hell, you could play a guitar. I'm not Angus Young. I'm not Angus Young, right? Exactly. You know, Steve, Ray Vaughn, you never will be because that's a God-given talent. You could work as hard as you want and you could practice eight hours a day and you'll probably never get there. That's just life.

And that's why we put people like Osprey up on a pedestal or Bruce Springsteen or Eddie Vedder or Jimmy Hendricks or whoever you want to pick. You know, Jimmy Page, my favorite. You put them on a pedestal because they're capable doing something that almost nobody else can. And that's a God-given talent. But with a guy like Kingston, he doesn't have that God-given talent, but he has relatability. Be a little careful with that, too. But I understand the attraction to a guy like to Eddie Kingston.

I do. And I understand why people are cheering them. But here's where the rubber meets the road. Is he drawing money? Or are you the 3,000 people that are in that arena in Duluth, Georgia. Yeah, you get them to cheer. But why aren't there 13,000 people in that venue? Why aren't there 30,000 people there?

There should be if your talent is truly over. If they're not truly over, you're going to wrestle in front of 2,500 people or 3,000 people for a national live television taping. The talent has to get over. They have to be perceived to be big stars in order to attract a big audience. Sting, 16,000 plus people came to green. worldwide because Sting is a star because he's been a star for 30 plus years not because he's the greatest wrestler in the world especially at this age of his career and Sting never was the greatest wrestler in the world no sting was never the four-star five-star Dave Meltzer circle jerk guy he was

never that guy he was just a great character who had great stories and that's part of a charm motion and came to the ring looking like a star yeah that's what it's going to take everybody else is a supporting cast member anything else on the dynamite front that you want to bring up no i mean like i said i like i enjoyed the show i'll watch it again i thought i thought cliffhanger ending too eric cliffhanger end i did like the ending i did like the ending thank you for bringing that up i did i made a mental note of it but then i forgot it because i'm going off on my fucking tangents like an idiot the ending was obviously awesome that it was that was a cliffhanger is a different kind of cliffhanger but it left me wondering

hmm what's going to happen next week fucking episodic television yay let's see if they can keep it up because that was good that was really good and it made me interested and I'll watch again yeah even last week's show they did the whole a story thing we've talked about where at the very beginning of the show we were introduced to the boxes they were looking for sting we revisited that a couple times throughout the course of the episode and then it was in the main event segment paid off so that's another thing i want to bring up john thanks for reminding me the backstage the backstage interviews sucked they're fucking horrible stop doing them until you figure out a way to do them that matter and that elevate talent and your show

because those backstage segments, there was one of them, I think, I can't remember which one. It was pretty decent. The rest of them were horrible, horrible. And I'm watching, and I finally get to Osprey and Kyle, what's Kyle's last name? Kyle Fletcher. Now I'm looking forward to this. And the announcers did a pretty good job, by the way, of telling the story, giving me enough narrative as a new viewer, particularly with these two guys as a new viewer the announcers taz in particular

did a great job of filling me in on some backstory i didn't know that these guys lived together i didn't know that they came up together i didn't know they had a personal relationship i didn't know that they were friends i knew they were part of the hontie hells's family but that doesn't make a fucking bit of difference to me because that's just work right that's just creative but the relationship between these two I thought was important, why didn't we eliminate some of that Drek we saw backstage and let let that story be told leading up to that make a bigger deal out of that match than I did. The match just popped up out of the ground. There was no reason. And I understand that. There doesn't always have to be a reason why. Sometimes you just book matches

just because you're exposing talent, right? And I'm sure that was the case here. But if you've got, which arguably is your biggest star now, Will Osprey, making his television debut, right? This is the first time we've seen him on Dynamite? Not the first time, but it's his first time as a full-time talent. Okay, so kind of first time on a roster, it's official. He's wrestling, what we know, what they knew, was going to be a great man.

match, why did we not spend some time hearing from each of them about what's going through their minds as they have to face each other? Now I really care, as opposed to just watching a great wrestling exhibition and seeing how well each of them are able to perform some very complicated, visually stunning, dynamic moves. Yes, granted, but why not tell me something about these people? why aren't we hearing from them because there were three or four bath state segments that honestly god would not have mattered if we didn't see them actually would have been better if we didn't because it takes away from the talent when you put talent in a situation where they're not

able to shine and they just get through the segment it takes away from the talent Renee is very good but somebody needs to be directing those backstage segments and at a them because some of them are just worthless why spend the time when you could have that should have been the a story right it was the a story on dynamite austrian uh yeah i'd say the bucks thing was probably right there too they they had multiple i would i would agree with that so we'll call it an a minus story sure sure or b plus i i would suggest it's really the a story because you're introducing this new talent, but it's close, and it's arguable, so I'm not going to debate it. But why not spend some time? That's what makes an A story or a B story is the amount of

time that you devote to it within the body of a show to advance the story and give it depth, whether it be the Buck story or Will and Kyle. We should have been hearing from them backstage, It's not some of the useless, pointless, actually poorly executed stuff that we saw. Yeah, I wouldn't say it was a cold match because the story they did start telling was this is like all the Don Callis thing. Don Callis is kind of pitting his guys against each other

because he's trying to get a feel for us. And I stop you without offending you. Can I stop you right there? That's a story. It's fucking uncompelling. And you can argue whether it's compelling or not compelling. I'm just saying I wouldn't say it was cold, but I get your point.

I totally agree with you, by the way, on the character stuff and giving a little more bags. I think that would have been great for this 100%. You could have done it in 20 or 30 second bumper clips. Sure. You could have sat down with Will talking to talking to it. You don't need to see the interviewer on camera. My God, it's better if you don't. Senator holding the phone microphone, not knowing how to react at the end.

Some of the closes, I know I'm nitpicking here, but this is the stuff that I used to pay the closest attention to because that's how I came up in the business. But when you're standing there as the announcer and you're interviewing these people and they deliver their last line, which just about everything I saw was fucking weak anyway, as far as the way it was scripted for them, the way they delivered it. It's hard to react to when you're standing there holding a mic and you're trying to add significance to this. You're trying to make something that's not important, feel important. And your talent says some weak shit and turns out and walks off the stage, you're just standing there holding them. Mike looking like a dumb shit. Dude. It's horrible.

That was such a WWE Kevin Dunn thing for so long. And thankfully, since Triple H took over, they've been starting to toss back to the announcers and stuff like that. At least, man, like. You feel alive. And the stuff that I saw on dynamite was like horrible. You could have had 20 second bumpers throughout the night of Osprey talking into the camera, what they call an on the fly interview.

Ospre talking, Fletcher talking, and just get little bites from them in incoming bumpers, you know, out of commercials or into commercials, just to build some anticipation instead of that backstage bullshit that was so fucking horribly produced. Did you, did you enjoy the Young Bucks doing a little homage to Tony Kahn's huge announcements? Is that what that was? I didn't connect those dots, but I thought, well, that's, it's kind of cute. they did the segment backstage where they like changed their talking cadence so they were talking like this and saying they had a huge announcement and yes that was very much i didn't connect the dots

to tony but i did find that entertaining it made me think about the bucks because i they they don't i know you're not big bucks guys but i think they're very entertaining but i could be i could be because i was thinking about what would i do with those guys what would i if we're just sitting around having dinner what would I suggest to them is something just to try or think about trying they're not going nobody's going to believe their badass heels they look like they're 12 I am 68 almost 69 years old and I know I could kick their ass there's just nothing about them that suggests danger to me but they're fun to watch they are fun to watch well but if if I were them I would could consider finding that kind of like playing off those the goofy thing that they were doing making

fun of Tony in his big announcements kind of an over-the-top smarmy cocky that is their character that's always been their character then why are they coming out looking like bad I don't I don't get it I don't see it I'm not feeling it it may be their intention I'm telling you as a viewer I'm not feeling it and I'm not seeing the consistency in it now I I will say that perhaps it's because I don't watch them enough. And maybe if I watch them more, I'll see that consistency. But there's something about their characters that needs to find a novel, another level of smarmyness in order for me to really want to see them get their ass kicked.

Otherwise, what I feel about them right now is there two extremely talented young men, probably solid citizens, good human beings, good family people who are pretending that they're heels. just like we see so many wrestlers who are pretending their baby faces. They're not really feeling it, so it doesn't really connect. I don't care what it says on paper. I don't care what they say in a conversation, how you explain it. If it's not connecting and resonating, it doesn't exist.

And there's a way for them to find that character. I just don't think they found it yet, but it's there. Let's get a couple TKO notes before we get to the end of this thing here real quick, Eric, Mark Shapiro, who we've been following closely on Strictly Business. We know they had their earnings call last week, but he had another call on the Morgan Stanley conference call specifically. He, a few things. There was one point that I thought was really interesting, where he mentioned that prior to the TKO acquisition with WWE, that he didn't feel like the WWE side did a great job with branding, so sponsorships, interpromotional brand,

landing within the arena. And he didn't feel they did as well as UFC did. So that's going to be something we're going to be seeing more of on the WWE side. What do you think about that comment? I think Mark Shapiro would probably be the smartest person in the world to make that comment. He's in that world. He's in that business at a very, very, very, very high level. So I would take that point.

and I would consider it to be a very valid one. Yeah, I was always surprised there wasn't more branding on WWE shows within the ring or more billboard ads. And I almost guarantee that's going to be something we're going to be seeing change significant. Well, we talked about this, you know, prior to the actual acquisition, right, when it was, oh, it's a Devere, what's it couldn't be like? What's going to happen? What are the synergies? Where's the opportunities? And one of the things that we talked about early on was.

sponsorship because that's endeavor William Morris that is their world yeah that's and they are the biggest in that world they are the 800 pound gorilla in that universe and that's where the opportunities lie and that wasn't wwee's strong suit that's a lot of their sponsorship and things that they did at least that i'm aware of was all generated internally by people who didn't live in that world. They happened to do those deals and they were tangentially involved in that world, but not on a day-to-day basis with multiple properties. That's the advantage that Endeavor brings to the table. So I think, I agree with you. You're going to be seeing a lot more of it. Yeah. He also mentioned you can expect to see some WME celebrities at WrestleMania and some more

partnerships there. So that's not surprising at all. He noted that Vince McMahon is completely detached from the company at this point, that you will not be. seeing Vince McMahon at any point return to the company. So if there were any fans out there trying to buy some conspiracy theories, I would not expect that to be the case. And there was one more thing that's really interesting from what he said. He said that pretty much no one in Endeavor was expecting the Netflix-WE deal and that the conversations actually started with NXT.

And he credited Nick Kahn and Andrew Schleimer for negotiating that deal. But the notion, Eric, that they went from NXT, the developmental brand to getting Monday night raw for the amount of money that they got. That's a pretty wild revelation as far as I would have to have been a fly in that room, right? Just to watch that whole thing evolve, the conversation. That would have been a very, very exciting process to be involved in, for sure. Leveraging NXT to your flagship show. my goodness that that's and plus all the other stuff that's coming with it in terms of international rights as well it's just going to be wild uh so that's kind of the latest on the

tk o front and as we alluded to last week eric it certainly looks like on w w content i mean they're going to be doing this two-night wrestlemania with cody roman rock rollins they can have that tag match night one and uh seemingly roman versus cody night two so That's pretty spectacular that those four guys are going to be involved in telling that story. And that kind of changes your storytelling opportunities too, doesn't it? To be able to carry those stories over from one night to the next? Well, it does. And it's going to be really interesting to see what they do between now and them because, you know,

Rock comes in. There's all the controversy about what's going to happen with Cody and everybody's speculating and press conferences. And I mean, Russellmania interest was at a fever pitch, right? it's kind of died down a little bit and it'll be in you know we still got what about four or five weeks ago yeah we got a month you got four weeks to go you got eight televisions basically to go it'll be interesting to see what they do maybe not this week but they're going to have to ramp it back up again try to i would say at least two to three weeks out from russomania so It'll be interesting to see what they do with that story between now and that.

Obviously, at WrestleMania, you know, you've got the two nights, you've got two matches, you can weave a story together or connect that story however you want to. It's a million different opportunities, I'm sure. But I'm really interested to see what they're going to do to kind of get that level of interest back up to where it was just two or three weeks ago, if they can't, because that was a unique situation. Well, the last thing that I want to hit on, Eric, and this is unique. It's not necessarily wrestling, even though it's kind of periphery, given who's involved. Jake Paul versus Mike Tyson July 20th

Live on Netflix from Jerry World AT&T Stadium promoted by most valuable promotions Mike Tyson versus Jake Paul I mean holy crap you talk about a spectacle we're getting 57 year old Mike Tyson versus undefeated Jake Paul on Netflix at

the biggest stadium in the country. When I saw this, my jaw dropped. I couldn't believe what I was looking at when I saw the promotional poster, but what say you, man? I'm buying it. You know, this whole celebrity, I call it celebrity boxing. Obviously, Mike Tyson is legitimate as it gets,

and I'm not suggesting that Jake Paul isn't. But Jake Paul came in. He's a YouTuber turned boxer. It's not, you know, the typical, tried out made the Olympic team want to go to medal, olympics turn pro you know it's not the traditional trajectory um there's been you know we've seen some celebrity boxing exhibitions before and there's always a certain amount of speculation as to how real it is or how legitimate it is i think this one is going to tell us well we're going to find

out how real this shit is pretty soon and i can't wait i can't wait to see it it's going to be great Well, the event leading up to is going to be. I don't know what the fight's going to look like. It's going to be very interesting. Let's put that one. Well, it'll be a good barometer, too, because we know Netflix hasn't really done much live streaming of events. So it'll be a good barometer for even WWE. See how they handle that traffic doing the pay-per-view on Netflix.

It's going to be fascinating to see their presentation of that. And, man, Jerry World, AT&B Stadium. Holy shit. Where's Jerry World? 18, the Dallas Cowboys Stadium. Oh, okay, Jerry Jones. Yeah. Yeah, they call it Jerry World.

I might have to get a ticket to that. That's basically... That sounds like a fun one, actually. It's basically an amusement park, so they call it Jerry World. Man, going to be wild. Going to be wild. And I'm sure Logan Paul, there will be some integration with him there, I'd have to imagine. So we'll see how all that unfolds.

Anything else across your mind here, Eric, as we wrap things up on Strictly Business? Oh, man, I'm good. What a fun show. Thank you, everybody for listening. Join me on YouTube wherever else you find us. Add free shows. We're everywhere. We are.

And we're also at Advertise witherick.com. We want you to join our ship here on Strictly Business. It's one of the largest podcast feeds in the world for professional wrestling. Advertise with Eric.com is going to be your place to get on board with us. Fun episode of Strictly Business in the Books. He's Eric Bischoff. I'm John Alba. We will see you next time.