Report: Eric Bischoff Officially Begins His SmackDown Live Executive Director Role

Back in late June WWE announced that it had hired Paul Heyman and Eric Bischoff to serve as the [...]

By Connor Casey

Back in late June WWE announced that it had hired Paul Heyman and Eric Bischoff to serve as the new executive directors for Monday Night Raw and SmackDown Live, respectively. Many questions popped up after the announcement, particularly when the two would start their roles and how long it would take for their creative decisions to start taking effect. Heyman had already been working with a handful of wrestlers backstage with their storylines and was reportedly "side-by-side" with Vince McMahon in gorilla position weeks ago, but little was known about when Eric Bischoff would start his role with the Blue Brand.

Sports Illustrated's Justin Barrasso, who broke the original story about Heyman and Bischoff before the official press release was put out, reported that Wednesday marked Bischoff's first official day on the job.

WWE described Bischoff and Heyman's roles as, "Heyman and Bischoff will oversee the creative development of WWE's flagship programming and ensure integration across all platforms and lines of business," the press release read. "The creation of these roles further establishes WWE's ability to continuously reinvent its global brand while providing two distinct creative processes for its flagship shows."

Bischoff responded to the news in the following week's edition of the 83 Weeks podcast.

"The magnitude of this opportunity and the challenge and the commitment that goes along with it is not lost on me. There's been a couple of times over the last few days where I've been driving around in my truck or taking my dog for a hike and going, 'Wow!'

"It's not maybe, this is the biggest opportunity I've ever had in this industry. Granted when Bill Shaw made me president of WCW, obviously that was a very, very big moment. But I was learning on the job there. I had nothing to lose there. I was taking a company in WCW that had never turned a dollar of profit, that was such a distant number two to WWF at that time that we weren't even really number two, a company that was fraught with a bad history and all kinds of internal issues. So I had nothing to lose. In this situation, this is an entirely different ballgame here."

Since the announcement Bischoff and his family have moved from Cody, Wyoming to Stamford, Connecticut. The former WCW executive producer is also scheduled to appear on next week's Monday Night Raw as part of the "Raw Reunion."

0comments
Start the Conversation

of