WWF/WWE/ECW/WCW

WWE has named Paul Heyman and Eric Bischoff as Executive Directors, Sports Illustrated has learned.

Heyman is set to become Executive Director of Monday Night Raw, while Bischoff will fill the same role for SmackDown Live. Both will report directly to WWE Chairman and CEO Vince McMahon.

WWE confirmed the news with Sports Illustrated, with an official announcement expected later today.

What does an executive director of a wrestling program actually do?

Sounds like each of them will have control over each show. We shall see how much slack Vince gives them.

From 411wrestling:

– Ahead of today’s huge announcement that former WCW President and Executive Producer Eric Bischoff will be the new Executive Director of Smackdown Live for WWE, Inside The Ropes recently featured Eric Bischoff in a live show. Bischoff discussed what the WWE Brand Extension needs to succeed and what WWE has to do to differentiate the brands. Below are some highlights and a video of the segment where Bischoff discusses the Brand Extension for WWE.
As noted in WWE’s earlier announcement, Bischoff’s new role with WWE will give him the power to “oversee the creative development of WWE’s flagship programming [Smackdown Live in Bischoff’s case] and ensure integration across all platforms and lines of business.” Perhaps, Bischoff’s recent comments might serve as a hint or provide some insight as to what he might have planned as a new creative head of Smackdown Live going forward, including the show’s move to FOX.
Eric Bischoff on WCW being the first attempt at a major promotional brand extension: “First off all, this is the third attempt at a major promotion brand extension. The first one was mine. It was kind of short-lived, and it really wasn’t a pretty sight. Thunder… the whole idea was to create a show for the nWo, which is why we grew nWo as much as we did as quickly as we did because we knew we couldn’t keep all of the talent on one show without diluting the product itself. So, the idea was to build up nWo so that nWo would have Nitro — or that WCW would have Nitro — I don’t know which one it was anymore. Then, the nWo would be on Thursday. That was the whole reason. That’s why we did the whole nWo-exclusive pay-per-view called Souled Out [*shivers humorously*]. But — so that was my attempt.”

That doesn't seem to bode well for the Smackdown brand.

However I have no doubt that Heyman will do well at whatever pro wrestling ideas he's responsible for because I think the man is a wrestling genius when it comes to creative ideas and how to promote them.

The Cardinals are on the West Coast so the damn game doesn't start until 9:10 local time so I'm watching New Japan Wrestling on AXS TV for the first time in about a year.  The matches they're showing tonight are from 2017 but it sure is great to hear JR calling matches again.

tohostudios wrote:

The Cardinals are on the West Coast so the damn game doesn't start until 9:10 local time so I'm watching New Japan Wrestling on AXS TV for the first time in about a year.  The matches they're showing tonight are from 2017 but it sure is great to hear JR calling matches again.

Glad he will also be calling matches for AEW when it debuts in October. WWE's commentry has been greatly lacking ever since he was taken off the air. Corey Graves is the "best" commentator they have right now and even he grates on the nerves from time to time (especially since he's on both shows).

Cards are still on a West Coast swing (although they're off tonight) so I'll be watching both RAW and Smackdown this week.  I haven't seen Smackdown in over a month so I'll probably be completely lost.

And now I'm stuck with this crap because of the All Star Break.

Good grief, WWE writing is worse than ever.  And I still think this 24/7 Championship is the dumbest thing I've seen in wrestling since David Arquette won the WCW Heavyweight Championship.

With AEW, WWE and Impact I completely forgot about the NWA being back

Funny parody of Billy Joel's We Didn't Start The Fire. See how many wrestlers/gimmicks you can remember mentioned in this video. There are only a few I don't remember. It is the full version of a song used to introduce Cultaholic's video series What Happened To... :



Also, an example of said video series:

Once again Brock is Universal Champion. This was foreseen. The only reason Rollins got the title was because Roman was out fighting cancer. Now Roman is back and now it's time to get him ready for the title run he was originally supposed to have.

DallasBlack wrote:

Once again Brock is Universal Champion. This was foreseen. The only reason Rollins got the title was because Roman was out fighting cancer. Now Roman is back and now it's time to get him ready for the title run he was originally supposed to have.

I still don't like him. Oh well. I just think the Superman punch is dumber than Hogan's leg drop. Rollins is a better champ than Roman.

mikeinfla wrote:

DallasBlack wrote:

Once again Brock is Universal Champion. This was foreseen. The only reason Rollins got the title was because Roman was out fighting cancer. Now Roman is back and now it's time to get him ready for the title run he was originally supposed to have.

I still don't like him. Oh well. I just think the Superman punch is dumber than Hogan's leg drop. Rollins is a better champ than Roman.

Don't get me wrong, I'm no big fan of Roman myself (I have no problem with his in ring work, he just doesn't have enough personality and his promos sound robotic. It's just obvious that this was going to be the plan. I too like Rollins although he was wasted in a feud with the charisma vacuum known as Corbin.

BTW, I agree, the Superman punch is stupid, but it's still a better finishing move than Baley to belly.

Interesting factoid, 2 years ago at this time:

Bray and Balor were in a feud
The New Day were Smackdown! tag team champions
Brock Lesnar was Universal Champion
AJ Styles was U.S. Champion

Not quite this time two years ago but not long after that year's Summerslam:

Shane and Owens were in a feud

Right now:

Bray and Balor are in a feud
The New Day are Smackdown! tag team champions
Brock Lesnar is Universal Champion
AJ Syles is U.S. Champion
Shane and Owens are in a feud

Dark Side Of The Ring has been greenlit for another season! Two episodes already in the can, Dino Bravo and Chris Benoit. Looking forward to seeing more of this show on Vice!

Flipped over to Raw in between innings in the Cardinal game and who do I see???  Santino Morella!!!

Wow!  Now there's a way for Raw to turn around their dismal ratings...


EDIT:  Flipped over again and this time I saw Roman Reigns vs Samoa Joe.  Like we haven't seen that match a million times already.  C'mon Paul H., you're supposedly running Raw now so do something about this lame-o BS...

Flipped back again in time to see Rob Van Dam come out.  Holy crap does he look awful; he looks like he can barely walk.  Maybe it was just the way he was walking.  I hope so because he was one of my favorites back in ECW.  His matches with Sabu there were simply BRUTAL.

RVD was there? He is signed with Impact at the moment, maybe they let him appear. I do have this one on DVR because I wanted to see who would show up.

Cardinals are off tonight so I'm watching Raw.

So far I've been typically unimpressed until the last segment with Maria forcing her husband to lie down so she could pin him and become the "first time pregnant 24/7 champ".  She walked through the gauntlet of B and C grade wrestlers who have been feuding over this stupid belt going "Pregnant champ coming through" and even told everyone where she'd be at her next gynecologist appointment so "anyone can attack me when my feet are in stirrups".

That whole angle smacks of Paul Heyman.  First time I think I've seen his fingerprints on the Raw show because that angle is brilliant IMO.  Who is going to attack a pregnant woman for this title?  That has a Heyman idea written all over it.

Ha! That's actually pretty funny! I bet someone attacks her next week. maybe we will even see the return of the HAND?? hahaha

RIP Harley Race. One of my all-time faves and one of the greatest wrestlers ever.

 to the "Greatest wrestler on God's green Earth".

"Handsome" Harley Race

I remember always thinking of Harley as a very mean man. Not a "bad guy" wrestler but a MEAN one. I grew up thinking that. In the early 90's (or maybe even late 80's) I attended a house show. Our seats were on the floor near Gorilla position where all the wrestlers would walk out. Out came Harley and I said to him "ALL HAIL KING HARLEY!" He looked at me and smiled and it made my day. I had never seen him smile before and it was a nice gesture and he seemed gracious. RIP Harley Race.

Bobby Heenan once said “The only two men in the world that Andre the Giant feared were Meng and Harley Race.”

Dude beat polio, cancer, and a car crash. And had a reputation in the locker room as someone you did NOT want to piss off.

RIP Harley