The final two years of WCW were complete and utter chaos for all involved, but they were specifically wild of Eric Bischoff.
The WCW President was removed from his position in September 1999 as the company began to falter and Vince Russo and Ed Ferarra were brought in from the WWF. Although Bischoff returned as an on-screen character and tried to work with Russo backstage, the company was falling and falling fast.
With WCW on the brink of collapse in January 2001, Bischoff launched a bid to buy the company with Fusient, and despite a deal being a real possibility, Turner Broadcasting boss Jamie Keller cancelled WCW, and the company was later sold to the WWF.
As part of his plans to relaunch WCW, Bischoff began sketching out how his roster would look and that included utilising exciting young talent such as AJ Styles who had passed through the company in 2001. Before finding fame with TNA, New Japan, and WWE, Styles wrestled five times in WCW, including four times on television.
Speaking on his 83 Weeks podcast, Bischoff said that he wanted to feature Styles and stars such as Shannon Moore if his bid for WCW had been successful.
“Yeah, I would’ve,” Bischoff said. “I’ll be honest, I didn’t have my eye on AJ Styles at the time he was in WCW. So, I can’t tell you that I analyzed him and watched him and thought he was gonna be a great fit for the cruiserweight division.” “I wanted to bring in more cruiserweight-type guys,”
I wanted to bring more of that style in. Jimmy Yang came in, along with Shannon Moore and some of the other guys that were part of that late cruiserweight recruitment, and I liked Jimmy. Jimmy was a good friend of my son, Garett. I think they went to school together. So, I was a big fan of Jimmy Yang’s. I certainly would’ve kept him around, and I certainly would’ve kept AJ Styles around, and built on the cruiserweight division.”
Eric Bischoff Rules Out Return To WWE
Following the demise of WCW, Eric Bischoff eventually found his way to WWE before heading to IMPACT Wrestling and then back to the sports entertainment giant. However, the WWE Hall of Famer hasn’t held a position with a major promotion since 2019, and that won’t change any time soon.
Bischoff recently stated that he might be tempted to return to WWE if he was younger, but at present, he’s loving life as it is and has no desire to get back on the frontline.
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