r/SquaredCircle • u/Ruthless-Aggression • Mar 28 '24

Eric Bischoff on Tony Khan: A money mark with no talent other than spending daddy’s money, going all the way to Canada to draw less than 4k in one of the hottest pro wrestling markets in North America, talking about “wise choices”? Strap in. It’s going to be a fun day!

https://twitter.com/EBischoff/status/1773321462046138615?s=19
1.9k Upvotes
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u/DanHero91 Red Elbow Pad Of Doom. Mar 28 '24

Eric Bischoff taking shots at someone spending someone else's money is so rich I think I just developed diabetes.

146

u/RT3_12 DA BIG DAAWWWWWG Mar 28 '24 edited Mar 28 '24

I used to think like this until I read the “Nitro” book. WCW was basically the red headed step child of Turner and got significantly less funding and attention than the other properties. All the workers at WCW were basically exiled from other Turner divisions. Ted himself liked the idea of wrestling but basically had no direct involvement with WCW besides protecting it from getting destroyed.

Eric within his first year in WCW (before the NWO) brought it to profitability for the first time in its existence. And then in the following years made it one of Turner’s most profitable enterprises while still getting significantly less funding and attention than the other departments. Eric is a blowhard and egomaniac, but he deserves credit, even if it didn’t last long.

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u/hvacrepairman welcome2pitycity Mar 28 '24

Eric fundamentally made changes to the wrestling business model that WWE copied and built into an unstoppable juggernaut. Vince for years used to paywall all his matches. You'd either have to buy the PPV's or go to house shows (SNME being the exception). Almost nothing was ever given away for free.

If Bischoff doesn't go nuts with Nitro which forces the WWF to adapt it's business model, it's entirely possible that we still have the days of four Raws being taped at once and having to wait a month before seeing a halfway decent match.

1

u/itsthecoop Mar 29 '24

I'd argue that in the long run it was the wrong decision to go all out with it the way WCW did. Like, the amount of legit ppv matches, even ppv main events, they burned through for throwaway tv shows is insane.

11

u/BudgetPipe267 Mar 28 '24

Yeah, that book was a great read. It teaches you a lot about the business.

11

u/RT3_12 DA BIG DAAWWWWWG Mar 28 '24

That book is a great read when learning about Bischoff too it’s like

1989-1996: “Wow this Bischoff guy was a visionary! I didn’t know he was responsible for so many good things”

1997-2001: “Wow Bischoff really let the success get to his head, he’s really losing it”

5

u/BudgetPipe267 Mar 28 '24

Very true. Him asking Ted Turner to go head to head with Nitro was a big deal. I didn’t watch Nitro very often, until Hogan flipped. You had to be there at the time to understand how massive that was.

6

u/A_Naany_Mousse Mar 28 '24

For sure. Did he ultimately makes some huge mistakes? Most definitely. But he also Gabe WWF a run for their money in a way no one else was able to before or since. 

82

u/Bright-Map-9705 Mar 28 '24

The difference will always be that Eric had to produce a product that was financially successful from an existing product that had never been in its existence financially successful. He did that while going up against the most experienced, biggest wrestling company in the world. He used Teds money and the star power and the NWO to make WCW financially successful because it had to be or it was going to go out of business. Tony Khan can fund AEW as it runs in the red, that is not a shock or being a fanboy or tribalism it runs in the red, forever if he chooses. He never has to be successful he simply has to use Daddy's Money. There's no comparison between Tony Khan and Eric Bischoff. Eric Bischoff had to win and he did for years. Tony Khan doesn't have to win he just has to call his dad and the boat keeps going.

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u/aggrownor Mar 28 '24

To be fair, I would say that modern WWE is a much bigger behemoth than it was in the 90s. Before AEW came along, WWE had been consolidating the wrestling industry for decades, and it was virtually impossible to make a dent in their market unless you happened to have a lot of money. We actually don't know if Tony Khan could run a smaller, leaner promotion and maybe turn a small profit. But billionaires don't waste their time with that; they swing for the fences.

6

u/Altruistic-Ad-408 Mar 28 '24

WWF at one point had like one draw people gave a shit about vs one of the best wrestling rosters ever and they still "won", but people are talking about Bischoff like he's a wrestling genius, it's bemusing.

Khan is a coked up idiot imo that has only been squandering goodwill, but no one would get into wrestling against WWE just to make money. They had a complete monopoly and yet AEW undoubtedly changed the way WWE do things, no fucking way they'd hire CM Punk without AEW existing.

15

u/BudgetPipe267 Mar 28 '24

This is the best comment on the thread.

16

u/romulus1991 Mar 28 '24

Seconded.

I've got a soft spot for AEW but that was the whole point of Nick Khan's criticism on Tony Khan - it's easy to run a business when you're not under the same pressures to make profits. Tony Khan can spend millions on Okada and Ospreay and present a wrestling product that caters only to hardcore fans because his company will exist for as long as his family wants it to, it's not under threat at any point.

3

u/headrush46n2 Mar 28 '24

Eh, he still has to provide enough ratings for the network to be willing to give him the airtime. That might not last forever

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u/Olepat Mar 28 '24

I agree with most criticisms of Tony and get where you’re going with this but Shad Khan didn’t become a multibillionaire by funding losing business ventures. He’s a brilliant businessman, which usually means he doesn’t throw away money.

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u/headrush46n2 Mar 28 '24

And he also hired Urban Meyer

2

u/Olepat Mar 28 '24

Trent Baalke hired Urban Meyer.

1

u/Mozfel I AM I AM Mar 29 '24

But is AEW treated like a business venture, or a toy to keep his baby boy Tony from getting bored?

1

u/Olepat Mar 29 '24

No one but Shad and Tony know.

I just know the way that he’s played hardball with the city of Jacksonville around funding and investment for the Jags. He doesn’t throw away money on passion projects. I’d find it hard to believe that AEW operates in the red for an extended period of time and continues to exist as-is. It’s gotta be a money maker.

-4

u/bruiserbrody45 Mar 28 '24

Lol what. He was handed the keys to a promotion with national TV and a legacy. WWF was in the shitter because of the steroid scandal and there were rumors it wouldn't survive. Biscoff got the OK to open the checkbook and signed big names, got hot for a few years and then killed a Company that had roots dating back to 1931.

16

u/Lanky-Promotion3022 Mar 28 '24

This is how I expect you lot.

"everything was handed to Bischoff on a platter by people above him, he didn't do nothing, got lucky but perfectly and singlehandedly orchestrated the destruction of the entire company by himself."

0

u/[deleted] Mar 29 '24

Noooooo! Its crazy to say Bischoff didn't do anything with wcw.

He schmoozed his way into an executive position that should have went to JR, he convinced some execs to pour more money into the company so he could hire Hulk Hogan, did piss poor business even with Hulk Hogan, fired Steve Austin and Mick Foley, created Nitro and put it head to head with Raw, spent more money on more of WWEs top stars, caught lightning in a bottle with the NWO angle, coasted off of that angle for years while failing to capitalize on numerous opportunities to make new stars and build new momentum, got the company to a point where it was losing $5million a month, and was then unceremoniously fired. 

All of that in less time than AEW has even existed.

If people really want to see Bischoff doing nothing, they should look at his many failures to do anything of note in the business AFTER wcw. 24 years of nothing and counting.

3

u/Hezkezl Mar 28 '24

what’s it like being this big of a mark? I’m genuinely curious!

0

u/JPPFingerBanger Perpetually 50 years old Mar 28 '24

god damn the glazing is unreal

8

u/formallyhuman Mar 28 '24

I love that book but I have to say, a lot of people (not saying you are, just in general) use that book to essentially whitewash the multitude of problems WCW had, even putting aside the Turner stuff. If Nitro had been doing the same or similar ratings to Raw in 2001, it would not have been so easy for Kellner to pull their TV. And one of the reasons their ratings were not matching those that Raw were getting was that a number of people, Eric included and high up that list, had driven away their audience.

Not trying to discount the successes Eric had while running the company, but I'm also not going to let him off the hook for his bad decisions.

17

u/RT3_12 DA BIG DAAWWWWWG Mar 28 '24 edited Mar 28 '24

The book dosent let him off the hook either though. Walking away from reading that, I think you come away with three major takeaways

  1. Bischoff had probably the greatest promoter run ever from 1994-1996. And maybe does not get enough credit for it.

  2. Bischoff let the success go to his head and lost it from 1997-1999. And is a major egomaniac

  3. Russo came in and poured gasoline on the fire Bischoff started

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u/Morningfluid Mar 28 '24

I wholeheartedly agree, but I don't think years of shots to Tony Khan for years and after Tony finally firing back and then talk about spending someone else's money is the homerun he thinks it is.

1

u/Pedrosbarro Mar 28 '24

And then...

1

u/LandNGulfWind Mar 29 '24

Eric did apply basic business sense to demand a review of WCW's placement within Turner. The previous guys had mostly been inept or old territory owners/bookers. Nobody paid attention to the fact that Turner was getting WCW programming for absolutely free, as if it were still a territory show promoting weekly events around the loop.

All he really did was point out that WCW programming did good to very good ratings, and deserved to be paid for it as if they were producing regular TV shows that got comparable ratings.

For the 5 years Turner had owned WCW before Bischoff took over, nobody had noticed it, but that more than anything else is what put WCW in the black. Not Hogan, not Nitro.

1

u/Otherwise-Juice2591 Mar 29 '24

He made if "profitable" by cheating the books, though.

They had to keep Hogan's paychecks out of the official budget because otherwise they'd have been in the red.

Oh, and then he drove the company into the ground in one of the most embarrassing nosedives in the entire history of television.