With Eric Bischoff soon to be appearing at the For The Love Of Wrestling convention on April 27th & April 28th in the UK, United Kingdom-based SPORTbible recently interviewed him for their website. With most media focus currently being on WWE's upcoming WrestleMania, this interview went in a different direction, looking at Bischoff's time in the AWA and WCW, two wrestling companies that were also noteworthy during their times of existence.
In this interview, Eric Bischoff states that he originally "never even had the most obscure random thought about getting into the wrestling business", but then describes how much of a positive experience it was to work for the AWA, the company where he originally learned the business side of the industry. Bischoff talks about what he cherishes the most when looking back at his time working in the AWA, and also explains why he left.
The interview then moves to the subject of WCW, as Eric Bischoff reveals the two things that amazed him when comparing WCW company structure-wise to what he had seen during his time in the AWA, and how, "it felt very stable compared to what I had come from, which was a family owned business."
But with all of the positives that WCW had going for it, there were still negatives, as the company's management at the time was what Eric Bischoff describes as being "pretty dysfunctional", and he explains how he was given the responsibility of turning WCW around in terms of the television product, and then eventually the entire company itself.
Ted Turner's goal was for WCW to be competitive with WWE, which would be no small feat- WWE was the #1 company, with a loyal fanbase behind it. Founded in 1952, it took WWE over 30 years to become a major success (and without true competition). And yet, Turner wanted Eric Bischoff to come up with a way for WCW to pose as a serious competitor to the giant of the pro-wrestling industry. In this interview, Bischoff describes how he felt about being given this opportunity, as well as how it felt to succeed in doing it.
Everyone knows that the NWO is one of wrestling's greatest factions/storylines of all-time, and as its heel leader, Hulk Hogan was a big part of it. But what not everyone knows is that during the planning stages, there was a period of time that Hogan was not going to be in the NWO at all, which Eric Bischoff explains in this interview, as well as how that changed.
Had Hulk Hogan not been a part of the NWO, Sting was going to be part of it instead, Eric Bischoff explains. But in the end, Hogan did become a part of the NWO, and as a result, Sting's role in the storyline changed as he instead feuded with the NWO. Along with Sting's role changing, his character eventually evolved, as Bischoff goes intto detail about in the interview.
In pro-wrestling, it is common for storylines to not continue for an entire year, sometimes only continuing for a number of weeks. The NWO vs. Sting storyline however, was very different, as it continued for more than a year. In this interview, Eric Bischoff tells how that process came about.
Lastly, Eric Bischoff also discusses Goldberg in this interview, and tells how he went from being someone who WCW kind of rushed through the Power Plant to becoming lightening in a bottle with an undefeated streak of 173 wins (and was the longest winning streak in pro-wrestling until it was passed by Asuka with an undefeated streak that ended at 914 days in 2018).
You can see the interview here.
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