Eric Bischoff recently appeared on UnSKripted with Chris Featherstone of Sportskeeda Wrestling. Bischoff answered several questions from fans and gave his thoughts on what’s happening in professional wrestling. Here are some highlights:
On Roman Reigns’ return:
Bischoff: “I think bringing him back as a surprise, I mean, thank God for surprises, right? We love surprises in professional wrestling, and that’s one of the things audiences on all four corners of the globe will agree on. They love surprises, so hats off to WWE for being able to come up with it, not only to come up with the idea but to be able to execute it in a way that no one saw coming.”
“Roman as a heel… look, I wish it would have happened a couple years ago. The timing was right a couple years ago. I think they tried to swim upstream for so long now that the audience may just be fatigued, they’re not quite as interested in the Roman Reigns character as they were two years ago and I pray that I’m wrong about that. Really hope I’m wrong about that. And that’s just my gut instinct because you know, the audience has wanted it; they’ve been begging for it, they’ve been asking for it, they’ve been petitioning for it, and to have been ignored basically for two or three years or more, they may have gotten to the point where they’ve just become numb to it, to a degree, to a small degree. Or a not so small degree, time will tell. I hope I’m wrong.”
On whether Orange Cassidy could get over with the mainstream audience:
Bischoff: “Of course. Here’s how that happens, though. On his own as Orange Cassidy, the character, to be able to get over with the mainstream audience is a one in a million shot. But surrounded by the right people, with a great story and some discipline creatively, meaning keeping him at a certain point for a certain period of time, absolutely I do.”
“He’s a great character, I love that character. I think with a character like Orange Cassidy’s, if he’s around long enough, at the level that he’s at right now long enough, and he gets to interact with some other people that are maybe a little more recognized, like he did with Chris Jericho, but a little bit more of that, yeah.”
On how AEW incorporates legends into their product:
Bischoff: “As far as AEW goes, I think what they found is a really cool balance of what’s current, in terms of the appetite of the current wrestling fan, between the 18-34/39-year-old demo, you know, what’s current to them and for them but balanced just appropriately with some of the old-school stuff. Arn [Anderson,] Tully [Blanchard], Rock ‘n’ Roll Express, myself a couple of weeks ago. You know ,you sprinkle a little bit of that in along the way as a garnish or seasoning, you know, you don’t want the seasoning to take over the flavor of whatever it is you’re cooking,. You want the seasoning to enhance it. And I think the way AEW is using guys like [Jim] Ross and [Tony] Schiavone and Tully and Arn and Jake [Roberts] is the appropriate amount of seasoning because it enhances the overall product, it doesn’t take away from it.”
The full video is available here:
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