Who Killed WCW? / S1 EP4 THE FINAL NITRO
The curtain falls on WCW as the cast and crew gather to produce one last episode of Nitro, and the dust settles on the fallout of the worst corporate merger of all time.
Transcript
00:00WCW is about to dominate the globe in professional wrestling.
00:18Ten million people in the United States were zeroed in on professional wrestling.
00:23We were the number one cable rated show.
00:25For almost two years, mind blowing.
00:28And when something gets too big too fast, shit's going to hit the fan at some point
00:32and it did.
00:33Little by little, we just fell.
00:36We already knew that we were running thin.
00:38It is so good to be king.
00:41He cared more about ratings than he cared about advertising dollars.
00:45It was a shit show.
00:48Vince Russo was just another idiot.
00:50He was there to lead to our ultimate demise.
00:54I was done.
00:56It was over.
00:57I could have cared less.
00:59No doubt in my mind, Bischoff was responsible for a little of this.
01:03Another nail in the coffin of a company that was rapidly dying at that time.
01:07I don't control that shit.
01:08I go out and I do my job.
01:10My check didn't change.
01:11It was the easiest money I ever made in my career.
01:14Like they got what?
01:16When guys got those kind of agendas, thinking about themselves, that's pretty much when
01:21the ship started to go down.
01:23This is some fucked up shit.
01:26You ain't in Kansas anymore.
01:28You cannot sweep this under the rug.
01:32This is some fucking television shit.
01:34The real reason men come in lies.
01:37Reed, going out!
01:52I believe WCW has come to an end.
02:03It is at an end.
02:06It didn't feel like a family anymore.
02:08It felt like everybody was out for themselves and it seemed like the blood was in the water
02:12and the sharks were coming to get it.
02:15I think everybody just didn't know what was happening.
02:17We were still hearing the rumors that we were just going to shut the doors.
02:21So I think at that point everybody was just really unsettled.
02:25It's easy to lose sight of how lucky we are to be a part of this.
02:28Hopefully it ain't over.
02:30WCW wrestling is so important to me.
02:33That one guy, Turner, I think just doesn't think wrestling is cool or whatever.
02:37It's on the road for millions of people.
02:40I think Turner finally started looking into the books and said,
02:43we got to pull the plug on this.
02:45No matter how much Ted Turner loved this business and wanted to keep it afloat,
02:51you start looking at the books at that time and seeing how much money we were spending.
02:55I can only imagine how much money went out the window.
02:58Oh my God.
03:01After Brad brought me back to oversee Russo,
03:04it was apparent to me that things were more dysfunctional
03:07within Turner Broadcasting and the relationship between Turner and WCW
03:11than they had ever been.
03:13I'm not talking about what was going on in television
03:15or how much money they were making or losing.
03:17I'm just talking about the relationship.
03:21Time Warner is a company of winning brands and winning people,
03:25and so is AOL, for this merger.
03:28Just like when we put Turner Broadcasting into Time Warner,
03:31it made the company much, much stronger,
03:33and I think we're all committed to making this thing work.
03:36AOL was absolutely ubiquitous at that time in terms of,
03:39in the public consciousness, the company introduced many people
03:43to the concept of logging onto the internet for the very first time.
03:47I've been on America Online two months, and it's really been a revelation for me.
03:52You got mail!
03:55This was at the time where a lot of the new internet.com businesses
04:00were receiving wild overvaluations based on promises of future growth.
04:05If you looked at the assets besides furniture,
04:09they have a subscription list,
04:12and that's the people who subscribe to AOL.
04:15AOL's leadership in the early part of 1999
04:18also were keenly aware of this reality as well.
04:21So one option that was considered was to merge
04:24with a media and entertainment conglomerate, which was Time Warner.
04:27The combined company, which will be called AOL Time Warner,
04:31gives each partner what it now lacks.
04:33What ended up happening is that AOL shareholders
04:36would receive 55% of the new company and Time Warner 45%.
04:42Now, my dad's never been online in his life.
04:45Never touched a computer, never owned a cell phone,
04:47never used an ATM, right?
04:49He's old school.
04:50So I think there was a whole generation gap loss
04:54on AOL's going to buy this giant company with nothing,
04:58where the older investment guys are like,
05:01well, you can't turn it down.
05:02It's hundreds of dollars a share.
05:04This is going to be awesome.
05:05We're only going to make a billion dollars.
05:07But nobody would stand up and go,
05:09this is a Ponzi scheme, man, right?
05:11This is all going to fall apart.
05:13The blockbuster deal still needs regulatory approval
05:16and a nod from Time Warner and AOL shareholders.
05:18AOL had serious, serious issues.
05:22WCW got caught up in that also.
05:26In a sense, you could say it was collateral damage.
05:29Wrestling has become fun, crazy entertainment.
05:33It's an alternative.
05:35It doesn't define our network.
05:36It's one night a week.
05:38It's a hit every Monday night, but it wasn't anymore.
05:41Because it was broken and I had to fix it,
05:43I was a physical presence there.
05:45I was in there trying to do whatever I can do
05:48to get it back on track.
05:50Big mistake!
05:52A bunch of fucking boobs.
05:54It was so bad, I really felt like,
05:58okay, he's staking our heart.
05:59It was a chaotic shit show and a blur.
06:03And I said, I'm about to get the hell out of here
06:06because I've had it.
06:07You had to look out for yourself.
06:09I just felt like Brad didn't know anything about wrestling.
06:12I mean, he knew about the corporate side,
06:14but he wasn't a wrestling person.
06:16He wasn't somebody that was going to try
06:18to help save the company.
06:20It was like going through the motions.
06:22To be completely honest, I couldn't fix it.
06:25And the red kept getting redder.
06:26And the ratings kept falling and falling and falling.
06:29In addition, WCW drove away its paying audience.
06:32Look at the difference in buy rate
06:34between the uncensored pay-per-view in March of 1999
06:38and the same event just 12 months later in March of 2000.
06:41They basically put on the exact same main event,
06:43Hogan Flair, two years in a row.
06:45Hold on to your hats!
06:47One, two, three!
06:48In March of 99, the uncensored pay-per-view
06:51enticed some 325,000 viewers to purchase the event.
06:56But just 12 months later,
06:57only 60,000 people were willing to purchase
07:00the 2000 version of WCW Uncensored.
07:03That represents a drop of 81%.
07:08The narrative is at the end of 2000,
07:12WCW had losses of around $62 million.
07:15That's the narrative.
07:16And I think that there probably is a grain of truth to that.
07:19But what people don't understand is the why.
07:24Professional wrestling is very different
07:26when you're a company like Time Warner AOL,
07:29a lot of answering to shareholders
07:31that have expectations on a monthly and quarterly basis.
07:36I think there was a lot of debt
07:39from other divisions in the company
07:41that could be allocated legally,
07:43but allocated as losses against WCW
07:45because everybody knew it was going to be written off as a loss anyway.
07:49The bullshit internal transfers
07:51that people tried to park all their trash on our books
07:54while we were getting hurt.
07:57It was clear to me at that point
07:59that Turner Broadcasting didn't want anything to do with WCW.
08:03And I said to Brad specifically,
08:05I said, Brad, why don't you let me explore selling WCW
08:11while it still has some value?
08:13Because the velocity at which WCW was losing round
08:18at that particular time was pretty dramatic.
08:21Brad kind of chuckled at me and he said,
08:24Eric, you know this company,
08:26we don't sell anything, we buy things.
08:29So I just let it go.
08:31Fast forward.
08:33Good evening.
08:35Today we announce that the Federal Communications Commission
08:38has approved the merger of America Online and Time Warner Inc.
08:43So the merger was announced on January 11, 2000,
08:47finalized on January 11, 2001.
08:50There had actually been a lot of financial experts
08:54who had been predicting the imminent demise of AOL for quite some time.
08:58Keep in mind that throughout the year 2000,
09:01a number of significant things happened.
09:03We had the dot-com recession.
09:05We had a number of these internet companies
09:08that were going to be the darlings of the future
09:10that went belly up, which affected AOL in a serious way.
09:14Its stock price dropped by 50%,
09:17which of course creates a huge pressure
09:19to look closely at which divisions are profitable
09:23and which are registering huge losses.
09:25That put WCW even more in the crosshairs.
09:28There were a lot of executives at very senior levels.
09:31The only person standing in front of them was Ted Turner.
09:35The merger happens.
09:37Ted becomes vice chairman.
09:39You know, he was excited about that person.
09:41You know, you have an office in New York, you know.
09:44I've made it.
09:45Well, no.
09:46Your name made it.
09:47Your businesses made it.
09:49They didn't want to even hear at the board meetings from him.
09:52Ted Turner was no longer a challenge.
09:54Ted Turner was regulated to the corner
09:56and didn't have a voice or vote in his own company.
09:59You know, Ted is no longer in a position
10:02to have control over WCW and its affairs.
10:05I remember saying, you know, we're Time Warner.
10:09Is it that important to own a wrestling company
10:12that's losing money, bleeding massively,
10:15has lost money every year of its existence
10:18except for one or two years?
10:20Is that really what Time Warner needs to own?
10:23I don't think we need this.
10:30Brad Siegel, tape on.
10:32Mark.
10:33I get a phone call from Brad.
10:35He said, so let me ask you, Eric.
10:37A couple months ago, you brought up the idea of selling WCW.
10:40Do you think you could find a buyer?
10:42And I immediately said, sure.
10:44I had no idea.
10:45I'd never done anything like that before.
10:47But I assured him that I could find someone
10:49who had the resources to buy it.
10:51I said, you want me to put a deal together?
10:53You want me to try to put some people together?
10:55And he goes, see what you've got.
10:57I went to a guy by the name of Peter Goober.
10:59Peter Goober, at that point in time,
11:01owned a company called Mandalay Sports & Entertainment.
11:03He's a very, very, very well-established Hollywood guy.
11:06And he said, look, I'm not interested in investing
11:09and buying WCW, but I think I know some people who may.
11:12And he put me in touch with Brian Badal and Steve Greenberg,
11:15who owned a company called Fusion Media Ventures.
11:18Fusion Media Ventures had created the Classic Sports Network,
11:21which became ESPN Sports Classic.
11:24Brian and Steve understood media.
11:26They had great connections in New York on Wall Street.
11:29And we hit it off and started the process.
11:32I called Brad back, said, OK, I got the investment.
11:35Fusion Media funded the initial round with $5 million of their own
11:39and then went out and raised $62 million in the market.
11:43I felt like I was capable with the financial resources
11:46and the right partners with me, that there was potential for WCW.
11:49The professional wrestling genre as a whole is indestructible.
11:53It's just a matter of the company being in the right hands.
11:57Eric was invested in trying to keep WCW alive and moving.
12:03So it was very exciting when the opportunity came up to buy it.
12:09And it wasn't surprising that he went 100% all in
12:13and just gave it all he had.
12:16We had come up with a loose plan of what we were going to do
12:20once the deal was consummated.
12:22For example, went out to Las Vegas, we met with Hard Rock,
12:25and they were planning on building an entertainment theater
12:28on top of one of their parking garages that would hold about 3,500 people.
12:31So we started to negotiate the opportunity for kind of a full-time location,
12:35producing our shows in front of a live audience in Las Vegas every Monday night.
12:39And one of the initial thoughts we had is,
12:41let's bring WCW back with this pay-per-view called the Big Bang.
12:48So on January 11, 2001,
12:51it appears that Fusiant Media Ventures has purchased the company.
12:55The figure that was reported at the time of the apparent sale to Fusiant
12:59was $67 million.
13:01You know, there's a lot of exuberance about, once again,
13:04this being now the turning point.
13:06Now we've got the new owners in play, now Eric Bischoff's back in his position.
13:09This is where we're off to the races.
13:11The new goal is 100 weeks in a row,
13:13and that's kind of what's in the future for WCW.
13:15We always looked at this as a partnership between us and Eric.
13:20You know, we certainly aren't buying this
13:23because we think it should just stay number two.
13:27We won't be satisfied until this thing is number one again,
13:31and our goal this time is 100 weeks, not 96 weeks in a row.
13:35I was excited. I thought, you know, okay, great.
13:37This is going to open a new door.
13:39We're going to continue to go on like we are.
13:41I think we were going to see a smarter, newer, more refreshed version of Eric.
13:46He looked really gung-ho to make this work.
13:49Turner Broadcasting guaranteed us our time slot on Monday night and Thursday night.
13:54So our job was then to produce the show, find the advertisers,
13:57and turn the show profitable.
13:59I remember that being part of the deal,
14:01and I like that as part of the deal,
14:03knowing that you've got that slot,
14:05then being able to calculate what the advertising value of that's going to be is critical.
14:11So it was a fait accompli as far as we were concerned,
14:15and we were scheduled to close that deal.
14:19On March the 6th, Jamie Kellner is announced as the new CEO of Turner Broadcasting.
14:24Jamie Kellner is someone whose reputation certainly preceded him in the television business.
14:28He's credited with having a huge influence over the growth of the Fox network,
14:32and then actually becoming a founding partner of the WB network.
14:37And upon being appointed to the role, his initial comments to the press were that,
14:43I'm paraphrasing, this is a great company full of great people.
14:46I'm going to try not to mess things up. I'm going to tweak it.
14:50Jamie Kellner was one of the best television executives in the business,
14:54but Jamie hated wrestling. He hated it.
14:57You know, he hated it, didn't get it, didn't want anything to do with it.
15:01It was a pain in the ass, and we were losing so much money all the time
15:06that I think I made the suggestion to sell WCW.
15:10I don't know if it came from me or somebody suggested it and I latched on to it,
15:14and Jamie was like, yep, get rid of this as fast as you can.
15:17I don't want anything to do with it.
15:19March 16th, Brad Siegel sends out a memo advising WCW employees there's going to be a period of hiatus.
15:27Then just a few days later, actually there's not going to be a hiatus,
15:32but the programming is being canceled after a 29-year run on the Turner Networks.
15:37And that leads us to an episode of Monday Nitro in the midst of all of this chaos
15:42that has to occur in Gainesville, Florida that Monday evening.
15:46Many of you may know that for the past six months,
15:49I've been working with a group of people whose goal it was, it is,
15:52to acquire World Championship Wrestling.
15:55But recently we've hit a couple roadblocks that may be, in fact, brick walls.
16:01And while it is still in my power, I want to do something befitting what could be,
16:07very well, the last night of wrestling on the Turner Networks.
16:13That being said, I'll see you all in Panama City next Monday night, the Night of Champions.
16:19Incredible!
16:22We were just getting ready to close, and I got a call from Brian Badal.
16:27And Brian said, Eric, it's done.
16:30I said, congratulations, Brian.
16:32He said, no, you don't understand. It's done.
16:34The deal is over. It's off the table.
16:38We were rounding third, heading for home, and there was no warning whatsoever.
16:43It came completely out of the blue.
16:45Jamie Kellner, he was the head dog.
16:48And he looked at the WCW deal and contemplated us having at least a couple years
16:53of two hours of primetime on Monday night, two hours of primetime on Thursday night.
16:57And Kellner didn't want that beachfront property to be dedicated to wrestling content.
17:02He wanted that primetime schedule for other programming.
17:06The cold, hard truth is that WCW was completely reliant on television.
17:11So much so, in fact, that Eric Bischoff famously quipped that without television,
17:15the company was worth $20, if anything.
17:18So at that point, when you take the television distribution off the table,
17:23you're taking 90% of the revenue out of the equation.
17:26The deal was not worth it to us. It effectively killed the deal.
17:30I was devastated.
17:35What am I doing here?
17:37Stu, Snyder, ready, go, action.
17:42Growing up, I loved wrestling.
17:44I lived in New York.
17:46I remember going to Madison Square Garden once a month.
17:49Bruno Sammartino, Ivan Putzky, Gorilla Monsoon, George the Animal Steel.
17:55I can go on. I enjoyed it. I loved it.
17:57It's a core element of my childhood.
17:59I joined Turner Broadcasting in 1993.
18:02My responsibility was to come on board and head up a unit called Turner Home Entertainment.
18:08And then I left, did a few other things,
18:11including becoming the president and chief operating officer of WWF Entertainment.
18:17The first thing I was looking to do was to keep growing the core business,
18:21to look for new opportunities for the company.
18:24I continued to read about what was happening at WCW.
18:27I kept reading about the behind-the-scenes angst going on there.
18:31The ratings weren't improving.
18:33What's going to happen here? Are they going to stick with this?
18:35Are they not going to stick with it?
18:37And what I recall is picking up the phone and calling Brad,
18:41and, you know, just checking in, first of all,
18:43because we've known each other for a long, long time.
18:46Keep reading about this stuff. Are you okay?
18:48And, you know, he'd share with me some of the angst he was going through.
18:52I may have said something to the effect of,
18:54hey, look, if there's ever a reason to have a conversation,
18:57I think we might be interested.
18:59We were aware that there was another player.
19:02It didn't factor into anything.
19:04I didn't know their deal. I didn't know what they were offering.
19:06I knew nothing.
19:08Internally at WWF, we had made a decision and thought
19:11if we could do a transaction to acquire WCW,
19:15we were going to work really hard to get that done.
19:19On Friday, March 23rd, the WWF announces the unthinkable,
19:23that it has purchased its competition, WCW.
19:34On March 26th, 2001, the final episode of WCW Nitro
19:39is broadcast live from Panama City Beach, Florida.
19:42Oh, what is this for?
19:43We're doing a little documentary on the last two days of Nitro.
19:46The last two days of Nitro.
19:50Believe what you want to believe.
19:52Believe what you want to believe.
19:55But don't leave the game.
19:57You've got to leave the game.
19:59It's great.
20:05Get the fuck out of here.
20:07Do you know what you think is going on tonight?
20:09Brother, I have a computer, man, right here in my back pocket.
20:12Holy shit.
20:14What is that all about?
20:18Panama City, Florida.
20:20Vince McMahon vignette.
20:21Wow.
20:22That's big time, brother.
20:24Here we go, in five, four...
20:29You had Vince McMahon starting the show on camera.
20:33It's hard to overstate just how shocking that was at the time.
20:37Imagine that.
20:40Me, Vince McMahon.
20:43Imagine that.
20:45Here I am on WCW television.
20:49How can that happen?
20:52Well, there's only one way.
20:54You see, it was just a matter of time
20:56before I, Vince McMahon,
21:00bought my competition.
21:02That's right.
21:04I own WCW.
21:07Therefore, in its final broadcast
21:11tonight on TNT,
21:13I have the opportunity to address
21:15what is the fate of WCW.
21:19Because the fate,
21:21the very fate,
21:23of WCW
21:26is in my hands.
21:30We thought we were coming to work like a regular day.
21:33No one knew until that night.
21:36No one knew.
21:38We saw Vince come up on the trot.
21:41No matter how you look at it at that point,
21:43no matter how it's spread,
21:45they win the war.
21:47When WWE acquired WCW,
21:50it felt like the end of an era.
21:53There was a lot of sadness and a lot of uncertainty.
21:56Who they were gonna hire, who they were gonna cut.
21:59We don't really know what's going on.
22:01People are happy and sad at the same time.
22:03They don't know why.
22:05I don't think you want my real feelings about it
22:07because it ain't pretty.
22:08It was very emotional.
22:10I remember Dusty was there,
22:12so I was sticking pretty close to him.
22:14There were WWF signs up,
22:16which was really weird.
22:18You know, because there's always signs
22:19like on the dressing room doors,
22:20you know, wherever,
22:21and you were seeing WWF.
22:23I mean, it felt like a slap.
22:25I remember Shane McMahon coming in,
22:27and he had, like, a little brief meeting with everybody.
22:29And we get told the company's been sold to the WWE.
22:33And tonight, everybody's gonna find out about it.
22:36And a lot of guys were like,
22:37oh, my God.
22:39As I was seeing, you know,
22:41the wrestlers and performers backstage,
22:43you know, shoulders might have been slumped
22:45before they walked through the curtain.
22:47But then when they walk through,
22:48it's back to business as normal.
22:50And then when they came back after their match
22:52or segment or whatever,
22:53it's back to what's going on,
22:55what's gonna happen.
22:56Let's not lose sight of the fact
22:58this is the last Nitro on the Turner Network,
23:00and we're going out with the bang.
23:02Scott Steiner and I,
23:03we had a conversation,
23:05and Scott goes, you know,
23:07what do you think you're gonna do, man?
23:08What do you think you're gonna do?
23:09And I look at Scott, and I go, bro,
23:11who's auditioning that night?
23:13But Bucket King, the cover!
23:15Down comes the one-arm blaster!
23:17Yes, he is!
23:18And he nailed it!
23:19Everyone was working that night,
23:20so we went out and we rocked it.
23:22He's got it!
23:23Here it is!
23:24The one!
23:25Two's gonna be it!
23:26Yes!
23:27Yes!
23:28Bucket King!
23:29I didn't know I was gonna win the world title that night,
23:31but then when I did find that out,
23:33I go, oh, yeah, man.
23:35I got a chip in the game.
23:36They got eyes on me.
23:38You know, so I was really excited.
23:43I was probably perhaps one of the only guys
23:45that was excited, though.
23:48I mean, it was sad, you know?
23:50It wasn't even sad.
23:51It was pathetic.
23:52Why?
23:53Because fucking people actually showed up.
23:56Hey!
23:57You guys wanna be on the Titanic?
24:00Nah.
24:01Good.
24:03I'll sit and watch the fucking thing sink from my fucking house.
24:07I didn't watch it as it happened live.
24:09I feel bad for the talent that were there.
24:11I feel bad for the production staff that were there
24:13that didn't see it coming,
24:14had no idea what their futures were going to be.
24:17It's a big life change,
24:19but as far as the brand itself,
24:21I walked away from it.
24:23I no longer cared.
24:24It's gonna be an emotional thing.
24:26You see a lot of production guys,
24:27a lot of people with cameras taking pictures of the guys,
24:30and to me, I look at it as the day you left college
24:33and guys you might not see again,
24:35but this is a Titanic group of guys we have.
24:38Mike, one of the camera guys,
24:40and what a sweetheart guy.
24:41He'd been working for the company for 27 years.
24:45All of those people lost their livelihood,
24:50and that's why I say fuck you, Jamie Kilner.
24:53I was concerned about a lot of people
24:55that just couldn't walk into a job so easily.
24:58Our jobs are so different.
25:00It's not a factory.
25:01We don't do the same thing every day.
25:03We're a combination of a circus and an army,
25:06and to get that good at it,
25:08we had to have the right people in the right places,
25:11and the way you got to that point
25:13was the trust of one another.
25:23Then now you can't do it together anymore.
25:27Everybody was in a bad space.
25:29A lot of them didn't know what they were gonna do,
25:32but there was a time, you know, you gotta let it go,
25:36but in this business, it's a little bit different.
25:40What was really weird to me,
25:42this multimillion-dollar company
25:44was sold to WWE for, like, nothing.
25:48I'm not saying that there was anything
25:50spooky-kooky going on there,
25:52but I have my suspicions.
26:00I own WCW!
26:03I own the WWF!
26:05And you will treat me with respect!
26:11When you think about the final purchase price,
26:15we're talking about a company that at its peak
26:18was generating in the neighborhood
26:20of $200 million a year,
26:22and a huge part of pop culture
26:24that gets sold for a little over $4 million.
26:27I always thought that when I heard the price
26:29of what they paid for WCW,
26:31it was an inside job of some sort.
26:33Somebody filled their pockets by making that deal
26:36for as cheaply as it was.
26:38Maybe there's an envelope pushed across the desk.
26:42Maybe you got influence with the guy that's selling it.
26:46Look, there's some murky circumstances.
26:49Stu Snyder was an executive at Turner Broadcasting.
26:52Oh, by the way, Stu Snyder, after the fact,
26:55just happens to land a plum executive role with WWE.
26:59Oh, my God, that's Bob Ryder!
27:01That's Bob Ryder from WCW.com!
27:04Bob, run! Run!
27:06Bob Ryder, he was one of the hosts
27:09on shows that were broadcast over WCW.com.
27:12So in the summer following the sale of WCW
27:16being purchased by the WWF,
27:18Bob Ryder puts out a widely disseminated post online
27:22essentially alleging that there had been a conspiracy at play.
27:25Bob Ryder, he was a good man and a good friend.
27:28And I know that Bob had written about a theory
27:31that Brad Siegel helped facilitate the actual sale to WWE
27:36by convincing Jamie Kellner
27:38to take the distribution of programming out of the deal.
27:43Bob's theory was Brad Siegel really didn't want WCW
27:47as a part of the Turner portfolio,
27:50and this was Brad Siegel's way
27:52of using Jamie Kellner to kill the deal.
27:55The conspiracy theory was really something
27:58like out of a wrestling storyline, essentially.
28:01There was a plot initiated by Brad Siegel and Stu Snyder
28:05to clear the path for it to have a quick sale to the WWF.
28:09Stu Snyder at that time was the president of the WWF.
28:12He had previously worked at Turner Broadcasting,
28:15had a relationship with Brad Siegel,
28:17and so the allegation was that there were covert talks
28:21between the two, and the primary piece of evidence
28:24was the fact that WCW was sold for $4.3 million.
28:28I don't know that that's true.
28:30It is a conspiracy theory.
28:32Unfortunately, there are enough questions
28:35and questionable relationships
28:37that lend interest in a conspiracy like that.
28:41Because you were friends with Stu Snyder,
28:44it was a way to ensure the WWF would have an advantage to the sale.
28:48No. Well, first of all, I mean,
28:51we'd known each other our entire careers.
28:54I mean, the fact that Stu Snyder was running WWE
28:58and was a likely buyer for WCW is purely coincidence.
29:05Did you have any advanced knowledge
29:07that the QCN deal wasn't going to fall through?
29:10No. Simple as that.
29:13My understanding is that Brad reported up to Jamie Kellner
29:18and that Jamie made the decision to say,
29:21I don't want it on our end and cancelled it.
29:24If you think about how serious these particular allegations are
29:28and the fact that they would lead to potential SEC violations
29:32and have serious professional and personal consequences
29:35for all people involved, it's quite the audacious plot,
29:38given the high-profile nature of the people that we're talking about
29:42and what they stood to lose
29:44if eventually they would be convicted essentially of corporate espionage.
29:48I'm not saying I'm 100% convinced
29:51that Stu Snyder was part of an orchestration
29:55to make sure WCW got sold for nickels on the dollar.
29:59I'm not suggesting that I know that.
30:01I just lean in that direction
30:03because I don't believe in the number of coincidences
30:06that surround this entire situation.
30:08I'm just not buying it.
30:10I understand gossip. I understand rumor.
30:14But it's easy to sit on the sidelines
30:17and not really understand the economics of the businesses
30:21to say what something is worth.
30:23If there was a deal out there worth $60 million,
30:26I can guarantee you, as I'm sitting here today,
30:29the Turner executives would have made a deal.
30:32We wanted to sell it.
30:34When we sold it, that's what it was worth.
30:36My regret is that when the ratings started to plummet,
30:41we could not find the right story,
30:44the right players in that story to turn it around.
30:48That's a big regret of mine.
30:50We weren't successful.
30:52Sometimes that happens.
30:54You can't always be successful.
30:56I feel a responsibility for it
30:58because I clearly was not the person to do it.
31:01I didn't know the business and the story well enough
31:05to write it myself. I'm not a writer.
31:08So, yeah, I'm really sad about that
31:10and regret it wasn't a different outcome.
31:13Would anything have been done to save WCW?
31:16In my opinion, without a strong advocate
31:22who really believed in the business,
31:25it would have been tough to exist there
31:27with everything else, their challenges as a company.
31:30But that world had passed.
31:32Ted was that person who was its chief advocate.
31:35In the new AOL time, without that person,
31:38I don't know how it succeeds there.
31:40And for good or for worse,
31:42the one thing that all the talent knew,
31:44they knew where the buck stopped at WWF.
31:47It was Vince.
31:49You were either in line or you were out.
31:51That's how Vince ran that place.
31:53That place was a different story,
31:55a different time, different era.
31:57So unless you had somebody like that
31:59who could go, this is the way it's going to run
32:01and have the support of corporate
32:03to leave it alone and let me do my thing,
32:06I think it would have been challenging.
32:08It's been proven that it was challenging.
32:19Let me be clear.
32:21We weren't looking at all to buy something and kill it.
32:24This brand is still good.
32:26It's still relevant to an audience.
32:29We're going to figure out, how do we keep it alive?
32:32And maybe over time, it comes back as a separate show.
32:36In my head, I saw this great rivalry that was under one roof.
32:42First of all, it all started with the famous Shane McMahon
32:45showing up on WCW on Nitro
32:48and proclaiming, you know, the storyline of basically,
32:52Vince was going to buy WCW, but he snagged it out from him.
32:56That's right.
32:58I now own WCW.
33:02I remember sitting down in my hotel room
33:05and writing down all the wrestlers who I had hoped to wrestle.
33:08Goldberg, Sting, Savage, everybody in the NWO.
33:12It's like I remember writing everybody down and going to Vince
33:15and saying, hey, this might be a good idea.
33:17What about this guy and this guy and this guy and this guy?
33:19Let's bring them in.
33:20There was so much speculation as to how it would all work.
33:23What people don't realize is that when WWE acquired WCW,
33:27the assets of WCW, the contracts weren't really part of the equation.
33:31It wasn't like all of the talent that was under contract
33:34automatically came to WWF.
33:36At least not the big names that mattered.
33:39Some of those people had quite a bit of time left under contracts
33:42and they were going to get paid anyway.
33:44I knew that at the time, guys were getting 50 cents on the dollar
33:47on their existing contracts, and that was not happening with me.
33:51I'm not going to give in.
33:52I'm not going to do it.
33:53So if I had to sit out for three years, I sat out for three years.
33:56Not everybody wanted to go to work for WWE.
33:59You didn't have Sting.
34:00You didn't have Lex Luger.
34:02You didn't have Goldberg.
34:03What do you really have?
34:06I still had like over a year left on my contract.
34:09They offered me a 50% buyout and go to work or just sit at home
34:15for the next year.
34:16I said, nah, man.
34:18I said, out of sight, out of mind.
34:21I remember Ric Flair saying a long time ago,
34:24time off is your worst enemy.
34:26So I was like, let's take the 50% buyout and let's go to work.
34:31Wait a minute.
34:32What the hell?
34:36Number T, he's the WWE, WCW champion.
34:41Back then, it was a test.
34:43Let's throw these guys out here and see how good they really are
34:46compared to the WWE guys.
34:49Shane and I decided to join forces.
34:53The invasion storyline was supposed to be the best that WCW had to offer
34:58versus the best that WWE had to offer.
35:02But we were in no shape to actually be able to really, really pull off
35:06an invasion angle just because we did not have enough star power
35:10to really, really get that thing off the ground.
35:13They never really did a WCW, WWE feud correctly.
35:17And I think that was a big mistake by Vince McMahon.
35:20I think he could have done some really cool match-ups
35:23and some really cool things.
35:25Hey, yo.
35:29They were going to write the history that they wanted to create,
35:33and no matter how you looked at it,
35:35we were the Confederate soldiers going to work for the Union.
35:39You thought that you were going to go over one of their top guys.
35:42Bullshit.
35:44They brought us in under the guise of,
35:47this isn't going to work twice.
35:49I looked at Scott, I said, we're gone.
35:51We're done, we're dead.
35:55I get to have the wonderful experience to watch my friend,
35:59who now has been sober for 11 months,
36:02go downstairs and just start pounding drinks.
36:06And he's like, fuck it.
36:08I'm talking about a miserable day in my life.
36:12The way they said, WCW?
36:15There was no room in New York City for a company like WCW.
36:20That's just the way I felt about it.
36:22When the WWE won the war,
36:24not only did they want to win the war,
36:26but they wanted to bury the opposition
36:29and they wanted to plant the flag.
36:32And that's what they needed to do more than anything
36:35to really solidify winning that war, planting that flag.
36:40Yeah, they had to be in a dominant position to do that.
36:45We're back live here, ladies and gentlemen.
36:47This crowd is still buzzing.
36:49Here comes Mr. McMahon back.
36:51He promised to name the new general manager of Raw.
36:55In 2002, Vince McMahon called me.
36:58And while Vince was speaking,
37:00I had already made up my mind that this is my opportunity.
37:03Allow me to introduce you to the new general manager of Raw.
37:07His name is Eric Bishop.
37:12I'm not going to say that everybody in WWE was happy to see me show up,
37:17but the people that mattered could not have made me feel more at home.
37:21I like Eric a lot. We're good buddies.
37:23I've known him for a very long time.
37:25And he has his bust on the Mount Rushmore
37:28of professional wrestling executives.
37:30Everything that went wrong, the fusion sale falling through,
37:34the fact that the narrative is Eric Bischoff, creator, WCW.
37:39I had an opportunity to write the last chapter of my story.
37:43Wait a minute.
37:44What? What the hell is going on? What is this?
37:48You know, I had been with WWE for a few years
37:50as that general manager character, and everything was going great.
37:53And I remember getting a phone call from Stephanie McMahon,
37:55who was head of creative at that point.
37:57She goes, Eric, I don't want you to take this the wrong way.
37:59You've done a great job, but we're going to go in a different direction.
38:03Eric Bischoff has abused his power for too long.
38:07John Cena was going to hit me with his finish
38:10and then drag me out of the ring,
38:12and John Cena was going to throw me in the back of a garbage truck,
38:15and I was going to be hauled out of the arena.
38:17And I very seldom questioned creative.
38:21But I went to Vince and said, it doesn't make any sense for John Cena to do it.
38:24It makes more sense for you to do it.
38:27And I thought, if I'm going to do this, I'm going to have fun doing it.
38:30I'm going to make this fun for me.
38:32And I did, and I had a blast.
38:34And I got to live a dream and rewrite my own chapter.
38:37And I loved it, every minute of it.
38:39There's not a second of it that I regret.
38:48Who killed WCW?
38:50Ooh.
38:52Who killed WCW?
38:55I think it was Turner Corporate.
38:58And some of the people within the booking committees.
39:01AOL, Time Warner, the executives,
39:04they were embarrassed by Goofy Wrestling.
39:07The guys in Turner that didn't want us and didn't like us,
39:11and the top guys not letting the mid-card guys interact with them.
39:16WCW killed itself.
39:19The cast of characters that was WCW killed WCW.
39:24It didn't function as a team any longer.
39:27It functioned as a bunch of self-seeking individuals.
39:31I've never seen anybody that was that high up in the food chain
39:36take less responsibility.
39:39This is what killed WCW.
39:42They were fighting within themselves. They were eating their own.
39:45The Wolves.
39:46Who killed WCW? That's easy.
39:48Turner Sports.
39:50It would have to be the person with the checkbook.
39:52It would have to be Eric Bischoff.
39:54Vince Russo, Eric Bischoff,
39:57two guys that had zero knowledge about how to run wrestling,
40:00and they put themselves in a position to tell people like me what to do,
40:05and that's what killed WCW.
40:08As a matter of fact, I'm going to give myself a round of applause for that.
40:13Yes, thank you.
40:14Bro, they took such a drop from where they were
40:18to where it was when it was sold,
40:21and so much money lost.
40:23I don't think anybody could have done anything.
40:26So I would say a business decision killed WCW.
40:30I don't think one person could have killed WCW by any stretch of the imagination.
40:34There were a shitload of people who contributed to its downfall.
40:38I think it's a collection of factors,
40:40a number of reasons that explain its demise.
40:42There's plenty of blame to go around,
40:44but I think ultimately it was inevitable that it was going to fall apart.
40:50A good buddy of mine, he's one of my best friends,
40:52downtown Bruno.
40:53When I first started, I said, Bruno, give me some advice.
40:56He said, you're going to hear a voice one day,
40:59and that voice is going to say,
41:01go on home, the big run's over.
41:04WCW as an entity, they heard that voice,
41:07and the big run was over, and it was fucking awesome.
41:14Wow, man, what a run.
41:17It was always about the performances for me.
41:19It was always about the fans.
41:21We were rock stars.
41:24Everywhere we went, it was packed.
41:27A whole WCW experience was a hell of a ride, period.
41:33Let us remember the lessons learned and strived
41:36to build a fairer and more equitable future for wrestling.
41:40We've done over 350 or 60 some odd nitros,
41:44and a lot of these people are like family to me.
41:46It was a good ride.
41:47It was fun.
41:48You were like a big family,
41:49even though you're a dysfunctional family.
41:51You may not get along with everybody,
41:53but you're still going to be there when it comes to it.
41:56It was the greatest job.
41:57They let us be as creative as we wanted to be.
42:00The first time I realized WCW was big
42:03was my very first show when I debuted.
42:06There was a palpable energy.
42:08You could feel the crowd.
42:10There's something special and something different
42:13about a wrestling fan.
42:15It just blew my mind to see
42:17what a big deal WCW really was.
42:21He's got him up!
42:22Those were some great times, terrific times,
42:25and it came to an abrupt end like that.
42:27But, hey, man, all good things come to an end.
42:32I still think that, you know, when it comes down to it,
42:35WCW is Eric's creation.
42:37Any success they had was with Eric.
42:40There's nobody on this planet that can look in the mirror
42:43and say, I beat Vince McMahon
42:47at professional wrestling for 83 weeks.
42:52It's a pretty fucking huge accomplishment.
42:58Cool.
43:00Time fucks with your head, you know?
43:03It becomes distorted.
43:05My memory is more like a series of photographs.
43:10There's bits and pieces and moments
43:12that stand out in my mind, but as time goes on,
43:15they kind of just all blur together.
43:17When I look back at my time during WCW,
43:20the journey, the ups, the downs,
43:22the ride all along the way was a rush.
43:24We were the number one wrestling company
43:26on television in the world.
43:28Very proud of that.
43:29I was able to experience and achieve things
43:32that nobody thought possible,
43:34and I wouldn't have had any of this
43:36if it wasn't professional wrestling.
43:38So I'm grateful for every minute of it.
43:40The good, the bad, everything in between.
43:43Very lucky.