What is Eric Bischoff's legacy?

[H-Virus]

For a guy who had such an enormous impact on the pro wrestling world back in the 90s, it feels like people don't really talk much about Eric Bischoff, at least not to the degree we talk about McMahon, Russo or Dixie, at any rate.

So when you think of Bischoff, what's the most prominent thing that comes to mind; what you think he'll be remembered for? Is he-


-The guy who kick-started the Monday Night War and helped create the last great boom period in wrestling?

-The guy who made WCW the biggest wrestling company in the world and almost put the WWF out of business?

-The guy who revolutionized the industry with the NWO?

-The guy who destroyed everything he had built through a combination of arrogance, bad decision-making and not listening to the fans?

-The guy who squandered dozens of incredibly talented people in order to placate guys like Hogan and Nash?

-The guy who only ever had one really great creative idea (which he stole), but ran it into the ground until nobody cared anymore?

-The guy who helped ruin not one, but two different promotions?


Or something else completely?

[Deleted]

Some time in the future, long after Bischoff is gone, he will be remembered as the guy who revolutionized the US wrestling industry with the nWo and the guy who really took it to Vince. But, at the same time, he will be remembered as a guy who made a lot of bad decisions because he seemed to think that all of his plans would work as well as the nWo.

[MC Blowfish]

Having his hands in tanking two different companies. Yes Impact is still going, but only because it'll survive a nuclear blast. But it almost died when he was there.

[David-Arquette was in WCW 2000]

He had great ideas for marketing, publicity, and for cost cutting. Then he borrowed an idea, but built on it very well, then allowed his ego to get the better of him.

[tafkaga]

I see Bischoff as a guy who had great success because he was an excellent big picture guy, with a vision for how to innovate and update a floundering wrestling product. Nitro brought wrestling out of the 1980's and became the new standard for how wrestling was presented on television. Unfortunately, this did not translate into his being a good hands-on manager or creative visionary, but in spite of that he still managed to strike gold enough times (nWo, cruiserweights) to compensate for his weaknesses in those capacities, at least for a time.

[XIII]

The guy that made the nWo and Goldberg, helped to bring Lucha/international talent to the US big time and let them do their thing. The guy that almost put the McMahon empire out of business and as the guy that had a solid part of putting WCW out. It wasn’t solely his fault but he helped it along tremendously.

Bischoff was a good promoter/booker that ran out of ideas and let ego(his own and that of others) cripple any chance at long term success. Hugely important to wrestling history though.

[Aceorton]

I think he'll be remembered as a bold, gutsy competitor who was willing to tear up all the old blueprints of how business was done in order to get an edge, but once he had that edge, he wasn't capable of the long-term planning needed to sustain it.

[THE FVNKER]

I think he gets unjustly shit on by the greater part of the community (sometimes it is 100% warranted), but I think he falls in line with just about the rest of the more well known promoters and minds excluding Vince, ie Heyman, Cornette..

A guy who had a revolutionary concept, that worked, but after that the ideas just kind of dried up.

[Jaws the Shark]

Jan 25, 2023 12:44:57 GMT -5 THE FVNKER said:

I think he gets unjustly shit on by the greater part of the community (sometimes it is 100% warranted), but I think he falls in line with just about the rest of the more well known promoters and minds excluding Vince, ie Heyman, Cornette..

A guy who had a revolutionary concept, that worked, but after that the ideas just kind of dried up.

I'd actually say that in a lot of ways, his legacy is pretty similar to McMahon's. When they got it right they really got it right, and when they got it wrong they really got it wrong; they were presented with great opportunities that they seized on with great success, but also blew quite a lot spectacularly too.

[El Pollo Guerrera]

Jan 25, 2023 9:54:33 GMT -5 H-Virus said:

For a guy who had such an enormous impact on the pro wrestling world back in the 90s, it feels like people don't really talk much about Eric Bischoff, at least not to the degree we talk about McMahon, Russo or Dixie, at any rate.

So when you think of Bischoff, what's the most prominent thing that comes to mind; what you think he'll be remembered for? Is he-


-The guy who kick-started the Monday Night War and helped create the last great boom period in wrestling?

-The guy who made WCW the biggest wrestling company in the world and almost put the WWF out of business?

-The guy who revolutionized the industry with the NWO?

-The guy who destroyed everything he had built through a combination of arrogance, bad decision-making and not listening to the fans?

-The guy who squandered dozens of incredibly talented people in order to placate guys like Hogan and Nash?

-The guy who only ever had one really great creative idea (which he stole), but ran it into the ground until nobody cared anymore?

-The guy who helped ruin not one, but two different promotions?


Or something else completely?

Yes.
Yes.
No.
No.
Yes.
No.
No.

[The Dark Order Inferno]

Jan 25, 2023 12:06:57 GMT -5 booty2shoes said:

Got handed things by Ted Turner in the right place, and at the right time.

Then, when it fell apart, never proved to be worth much to wrestling after that.

But yeah, Turner deciding to give him the Nitro time slot and finance going after Vince McMahon was what enabled Bischoff to do anything. Honestly, there are a ton of equally smart or smarter individuals behind the scenes who would have been just as successful had Turner given them the same tools in that same time frame.

I like to crap on Eric but that's not true. Ted gave him the time and the budget because he pushed for it in a way his predecessors did not. Ted didn't have big plans for Nitro and Eric just happened to be the guy in charge, he convinced Ted it was what was needed to right the ship. JR was one of the guys in line for the job Eric took at the head of WCW, can you honestly say that you believe Jim Ross would have gone to Ted Turner and asked for the budget to do the things Eric did? Do you really see Jim 'Wanted to push Dr. Death in 1998' Ross as a guy who'd modernise every aspect of WCW's production and presentation beyond what the WWF were doing at that point or bring in luchadores, hardcore wrestlers and so on to give Nitro it's something for everyone appeal that it had under the first few years under Eric?

Eric had the balls to push for what he needed from people who didn't want to give him it, and to turn Vince McMahon's own tactics against him (let's not forget most things WCW did in the Monday Night Wars are things the WWF did to the AWA while Eric was there) and that required more than just lucky timing. If he wasn't there, they never would have gotten off Saturday night and likely would have been quietly canned after the Warner merger.

[sfvega]

Jan 25, 2023 11:09:50 GMT -5 Aceorton said:

I think he'll be remembered as a bold, gutsy competitor who was willing to tear up all the old blueprints of how business was done in order to get an edge, but once he had that edge, he wasn't capable of the long-term planning needed to sustain it.

This. Just because you don't win, doesn't mean you don't have a lasting impact. Look at the ABA and the NBA. Look at Sega and Nintendo. Starting well behind an industry giant in footing and merely giving them a good run for their money isn't a giant loss. It's actually really impressive.

I think in terms of historical impact, Bischoff might currently be a tad underrated because everyone loves to shit on him and also because he has such a hard time taking any responsibility whatsoever for his (many) mistakes. But when you look at what he accomplished, it's not something easily attained. Many ran WCW; none of them with near his level of success.

[tirtefaa]

Jan 25, 2023 12:06:57 GMT -5 booty2shoes said:

Honestly, there are a ton of equally smart or smarter individuals behind the scenes who would have been just as successful had Turner given them the same tools in that same time frame.

I disagree with this so much. This sounds like something Mike Graham would say.

There had been plenty of people who had run the ship of WCW, and none of them were successful. They all had their vision and their assumptions about what worked, and they all failed because most of them were still stuck in the 70's and 80's as far as booking goes. I don't see anyone making the moves that Bischoff did.

Bischoff is legitimately one of a kind. Not only is he the only person to keep up with WWF, but he's the only person to beat them week after week in the ratings. How many other companies have had the creativity, the marketing or the cash flow? You don't need to be Ted Turner rich to make that work either, yet not a single other company has done so.

I'm no Bischoff apologist, and that said...he still didn't counter program when WWF switched gears. WCW evolved, then WWF evolved...then WCW went right back to what it was already doing. And his TNA run speaks for itself in how bad it was. But I will give him credit as an onscreen character as GM for WWE... probably the only person who consistently fit the role and was credible at it.

[Red Mage Riot]

Jan 25, 2023 13:44:55 GMT -5 tirtefaa said:

Jan 25, 2023 12:06:57 GMT -5 booty2shoes said:

Honestly, there are a ton of equally smart or smarter individuals behind the scenes who would have been just as successful had Turner given them the same tools in that same time frame.

I disagree with this so much. This sounds like something Mike Graham would say.

There had been plenty of people who had run the ship of WCW, and none of them were successful. They all had their vision and their assumptions about what worked, and they all failed because most of them were still stuck in the 70's and 80's as far as booking goes. I don't see anyone making the moves that Bischoff did.

Bischoff is legitimately one of a kind. Not only is he the only person to keep up with WWF, but he's the only person to beat them. How many other companies have had the creativity, the marketing or the cash flow? You don't need to be Ted Turner rich to make that work either, yet not a single other company has done so.

I'm no Bischoff apologist, and that said...he still didn't counter program when WWF switched gears. WCW evolved, then WWF evolved...then WCW went right back to what it was already doing. And his TNA run speaks for itself in how bad it was. But I will give him credit as an onscreen character as GM for WWE... probably the only person who consistently fit the role and was credible at it.

He didn't beat them. You just have to turn on a tv on Monday nights to see that.

[tirtefaa]

Jan 25, 2023 13:46:42 GMT -5 Red Mage Riot said:

He didn't beat them. You just have to turn on a tv on Monday nights to see that.

Let me rephrase that.

He beat them week after week in the ratings.

[celtics543]

I give Bischoff a lot of credit and I tend to think if he and Vince switched places (and pocket books) then Bischoff and the WWF still win the war. WCW got cancelled because AOL/Time Warner killed them. The creative was poor in the end but WWE creative has been poor for a long time, they just don't have a huge conglomerate that owns them and is willing to kill them off.

Bischoff did a lot of stuff first. He went with live Nitro every week. He had shades of gray characters that were based on real life. He presented cruiserweights as legitimate. He gave out guaranteed contracts and started the process of making pro wrestling a legitimate field with an HR department.

Did he have issues? Of course he did. His own ego got in the way but so did Vince's. The difference is that Vince owned his private company and could shop around to tv networks. The network owned WCW and didn't want anything to do with it once Turner was out.

[Fade]

The pretty boy who almost could but flew too close to the proverbial sun, bruhthur.

[sportatorium]

An innovator who allowed himself to be influenced by the stars who were supposed to be his employees. A powerful person who didn't acknowledge or have a plan for things starting to work against him and his company. Now, a guy who is the master of revisionist historical narratives.

[Rave]

Claire Lynch.

[Clash, Never a Meter Maid]

Hostage Taking Bird.