Former WCW boss Eric Bischoff has become one of many pro wrestling personalities to regularly share their insights on the industry today. However, back in 2019, he made his shock return to WWE to oversee SmackDown as Executive Director.
Paul Heyman took charge of RAW and the idea was that the quality of both shows would improve on their watch. Ultimately, it was still Vince McMahon who had the final say and nothing really changed. As for Bischoff, his stint only lasted a few months before Bruce Prichard replaced him.
Talking to Wise Choices, Bischoff revealed how the job was pitched to him by McMahon.
"The role, as it was described to me, was to oversee the creative team and make it more effective and efficient," he explained. "I got really excited about that opportunity is because, by 2019, I had come much closer to having an actual formula that I was about ready to try and implement in a more formal way. Meaning get everyone on board, 'Okay, here's the story arc...here's the three act structure.'"
"'Let's build the story arc leading to this PPV, this big live event, whatever it may be. To the end of the story. Let's work towards building that story using the framework of this formula that I had been literally developing since 1995,'" Bischoff continued. "And given the role that I was given...ultimately [it] would allow me to try to get at least part of my team on board to develop this concept more fully."
He'd go on to say that he took the job for the money and only planned to stick around for a couple of years (with the hope by then being that he'd done enough to change the company's approach to storytelling for the better).
However, on reflection, Bischoff now realises that wasn't possible.
"Unfortunately, I was never able to adapt to the WWE system and culture," he admits. "[I] never really had a chance to work on that, because the fire hose nature of the way things were being done in WWE at the time, with regard to creative and the way Vince liked doing things, there was really no opportunity to focus on that."
Heyman ran into similar issues and it's become clear since that these job titles were only decorative and a means of trying to fool fans into thinking the quality of WWE's TV shows would improve.
Unsurprisingly, that didn't happen until McMahon was ousted from the company and Triple H took full control of WWE's creative endeavours.