Eric Bischoff shoots on WHY Raven wasn't presented like a main event guy in WCW
Вставка
- Опубліковано 25 сер 2024
- Since 1984 every wrestling promoter has tried to best Vince McMahon and the World Wrestling Federation unsuccessfully… except one, Eric Bischoff. Eric beat Vince McMahon’s Monday Night RAW head-to-head in Monday Night Wars 83 consecutive times. 83 Weeks will take a deep dive into the highs and lows of Eric Bischoff’s unparalleled successes in the wrestling business.
Ask a question about next week's show on Twitter: 83weeks
Get all our shows Early and AD FREE at AdFreeShows.com
Stop throwing your money on rent! Get into a house with NO MONEY DOWN and roughly the same monthly payment at SaveWithConrad.com
![Lp. Сердце Вселенной #1 НАЧАЛО ПУТЕШЕСТВИЯ [Новый сезон] • Майнкрафт](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/380Q7gLWGvk/mqdefault.jpg)
Bischoff refuses to admit he dropped the ball. Great promo great worker.
Did he? Was Raven supposed to challenge Hogan for the title? Raven seems like he was perfectly used for what he was. Middle of the show heel.
@@JackFlowers-lc3xsTrue. He loved the sound of his voice. Promos were arse.
@@TheAmazingPearlthat’s the thing with fans these days if they not wcw champion or wwe champion they were missed used. There is nothing wrong bout being a midcard worker. Now wwe dropped the ball with raven wcw didn’t.
When you really look back on it who dropped the ball the most and the killed WCW. It's Eric bischoff. He had all the talent. He had everything to make the right moves but he made all the wrong moves and it failed and no one could recoup it. Vince Russo was n't in any position experience wise to change things for better. He at least tried to change them though
Maybe, but Vince didn't really use Raven either.
He was one of the 4 wrestlers on the cover of one of the best video games. It felt right for him to be there.
Not disagreeing, but they had the four leaders of their groups on the cover. That's all that was. Look at the way the roster in the game was set up. nWo black and white (Hogan) nWo Wolfpack (Nash) Raven's flock (Raven) then Goldberg for WCW.
I'm a Raven fan. But that cover wasn't saying Raven was one of the top 4 guys in the company. They were just leaning heavily on the faction stuff and had the leaders on the cover.
@@ryantiller5624You're not a Raven fan. If you were, you'd know the story that Raven tells. He says that the cover guy liked him and pushed for him to be on the cover. That's the only reason he got on. It never occurred to the Mensa genius that the group leaders were on the cover.
@kazman_6899 haha. I do remember hearing there was someone there that was a big fan though, and that's why all of Raven's gear including his face and tattoos were in No Mercy even though he signed with wwf long after the cutoff date
@@ryantiller5624 There you go. Raven was always going to be on that cover (it was the rational move), but the mark convinced him that he was instrumental in the decision. I didn't know about its continuation to No Mercy.
Raven had one of the greatest fueds in wrestling history versus Tommy Dreamer. No one chants WCW but they still chant ECW.
Yep, well said. Levy was a wrestling genius. A main eventer wasted by Bischoff.
You’re edgy using his real name
You could replace his description of Raven with Austin, Foley, Taker, HHH.. meh everywhere until someone put together a reason for ppl to watch them. Bischoff shows himself to be what he was- a purchaser and not a creator.
There you have it.
He fired Austin over the phone 😅😅
Some of my favorite matches from WCW were the Raven vs DDP, amazing matches and stories!
Hindsight is 20/20. Why would Eric have signed Raven thinking he is a c level talent? The company was already bloated with contracts, so they didn't NEED him at all.
I think the only reason Eric signed was Raven out of fear that WWE could sign him and use that character better during what would become known as the Attitude Era.
The problem is Vince and especially Pritchard and Brisco did not like Scotty because Scotty quit as the Monday Night Raw executive producer to go run the ropes in Philly.
Scotty had the mic skills to be a main eventer in both WCW and WWF, but both Eric and Vince couldn't see the REAL WORLD past their nose.
& wwe didn’t use him better either
@@bmstyty3549 I think because at that point they didn't have to. AOL/TW were desperately trying to unload WCW when Raven left Philly for New York. ECW was in the middle of shutting down for good.
Trying to push Raven to main event status AT THAT TIME would've been damn near impossible with everything that was going on.
Now if he left ECW to go the WWF instead of WCW when he did I think the WWF would've been forced to use him better and might have negated Mark using the American Bad Ass gimmick.
@@ComaAlpha raven was in wwe 6 months before wcw closed done & they weren’t doing anything with him he was feuding with jerry lawler & thrown into the hardcore division so no wwe were never going to use him right
@@bmstyty3549
Bro Raven was in WCW in '97 with the Flock. WCW closed in 2001. He was there a lot longer than 6 months but regardless they did nothing with him & he had SO MUCH POTENTIAL but creatively I don't think that they knew what to do with him
Raven is not ONLY about blood and gore, that's the thing, Eric! He did it, sure, especially in ECW, but he was first and foremost about STORYTELLING. he was NOT JUST A MISERABLE PERSON, he put together a stable(gang, or even a cult, if you will) of disgruntled youths. there were so many opportunities and possible ways to go from there, and you walled past all of them. if you ask me, Raven could've even saved WCW
Its so funny that Bischoff is talking about how much he hated the character he didn't realize Raven's heat. the stories that could have produced instead dragging the nwo along.
I'm listening to Eric frame Raven and part of me is thinking if Austin were there in his Stone Cold persona, Eric would be saying Steve had a limited ceiling because he was just an angry redneck. From what I remember, the problem was the NWO overshadowed EVERYTHING, so a lot of the Raven's Flock stuff felt like padding for the rest of the show. And also, a lot of people remembered him as Johnny Polo. Who really wasn't that big of a deal in WWE. His highlights were literally managing the Quebecers and getting a pinfall win over Marty Jannetty.
The problem was the NWO overshadowing everything? not everything. The problem with raven is that he was a mid card talent, not a main event talent. And he was of course overshadowed by the main event guys because he wasn't a main event talent. And that's ok. Goldberg, Sting, Luger, DDP weren't overshadowed by the nWo. Macho wasn't either when he wasn't in the nWo. Benoit was a wrestler strongly ascending in 99
@@leonardoyi3183one of the biggest events in Goldberg's character arc was beating Raven for the US or TV title. Raven (with help from the Flock) gave Goldberg his first real competitive match to put him over even more.
@@jordan_8329 yeah sure...raven gave goldberg his first real competitive match, but you just have to take into context who goldberg was fighting. He was fighting mid and low carders like hugh morris, fit finlay, norman smiley, maybe someone like Meng/haku. He wasn't fighting the big boys before fighting raven, so saying raven was his first real test doesnt mean much in the big picture. Was raven better than all those names i mentioned? probably yes, but that doesn't mean much either. The discussion here is that he wasnt main eventer. Being better than Meng or fit finlay doesn't make you a main eventer...
@@leonardoyi3183You're right that Goldberg was squashing jobbers basically up to then. But I definitely remember as a kid thinking oh $hit, how is this going to play out? We were definitely talking about that match the next day at school as opposed to whatever the heck was happening at the time with the NWO. WCW should have never made the NWO as bloated as it was and let Raven and the flock get involved more with either 4 horsemen or nwo. Not to say the flock should have prevailed. But the dynamic of misfit Raven along with Saturn, Kidman, Stevie Richards, and whoever else was in and out of the flock was more over with the viewing audience than Eric wants to give credit. After about 3 months all of the double crosses of more big names (or midcard and even lower guys) joining the NWO was played out. The last hour became way too unbalanced. The memorable segments on a week to week basis in WCW of those years were often from the Lucha openers, Jericho's antics, or Raven and his flock.
@@leonardoyi3183wcw ended up using David Flair, David Arquette, and Vince Russo in valuable airtime. They definitely could have used Raven in a higher profile role. The fact he got type cast to midcard status doesn't nean he would not have had great feuds with higher profile people. His stuff was getting over, especially the first 3 or 4 months in WCW.
Raven had some killer matches with DDP and Benoit and really knew how to tell a story. No reason whatsoever not to push him more.
Because Eric couldn’t get enough of NWO lol
@@montrealflo3922 Lol, could be.
The reason was that Eric didn’t know how to create stars. The only thing he knew how to do was sign guys who became stars in WWE to big money deals and put them on tv. Other than that he’s fucking clueless.
@@justinfortner7411 made Goldberg
@@justinfortner7411 have respect for the man that started the second golden age ...do you really think Vince would have ever let the Attitude era happen if Wcw did not put the boots to them? I think not ,Vinnie Mac would have turned stone cold into Chilli mcfreeze & have him come to the ring wearing the Mr freeze outfit from the Batman & Robin movie
Raven was the guy you worked with when you were a Mid carder about to be thrown into the main event scene. (Benoit, Booker, DDP, Goldberg) He was like the Final Boss in the Midcard and his Flock made them all look good destroying an entire group without it having to be the nWo.
When I saw or remember Raven in WCW, he really was a leader in his own gang(The Flock). Think about it.
We had nWo vs WCW all the time. Then add in the wild card, Raven Flock. It was really a riveting story telling for the mid card since you can't really have nWo vs WCW all the time. Raven Flock served it's purpose and Raven was a great representative of that 'wildcard' factor who went for the WCW United States title in which was regarded as very highly at the time, well respected similar to the intercontinental title.
It was another way of saying, you're next up on the ladder of being that main draw/heavyweight champion...and Raven did what he had to do, decieve, cheat, and would have his flock members fight for him.
Man, he was awesome. That was one of my favorite stables in wrestling.
I always thought that the Sting Crow character was the Raven character with face paint. Slightly different, but essentially the same. Eric’s criticism is that the character was “ambivalent.” Wasn’t Crow Sting ambivalent for a year or so? Instead of ambivalent in the front row, he was ambivalent in the rafters.
Difference is that Sting was a well known and well loved character, not a new guy who is an unknown (and who presents himself in a way to stay unknown). Also, Sting's ambivalence was arrived at by storyline in show, as a reaction to the other characters on the show. Raven's ambivalence was a reaction to the world outside the show, arrived at by the character being shaped by pop culture. Fan investment in Raven is dependent on your feelings about the things he's bringing to the show. Or your knowledge of the character from his stint in ECW.
WCW tried to tell stories with Raven that built his relations and rivalries with the other wrestlers in WCW. But there was a lot going on on WCW TV in that era - that was the period where Nitro expanded to three hours. Raven needed the hook of you caring about Raven. Otherwise, your mind wandered to the other parts of the show. Even when the stories Raven was telling worked. Like how Kanyon established himself by bouncing off Raven.
Raven and the Flock, as a teenager, I was able to relate and connect to it. Having said that, it was a very limited character to try and push. There was a very real ceiling for him as Raven, especially at that time with as many over characters as they had to work with. The mid-card alone was constantly stacked with great talent. You can only push so many characters so far at any one time.
I think you hit the nail on the head. Raven was a great character for the late 90s audience, but that character wasn't a main eventer. How would you make Raven the champion? If he wins and he's happy, it kills the character. If he wins and he's still unhappy, then he's the guy who's never satisfied.
If your Paul heyman u exactly know how to do it..dude was Johnny polo in wwf and he did a 180 and was raven in ecw..that’s range and would be more so as world champ..
Well Said. Raven turned out to be a degenerate. Skilled Wrestler, he never caught on because there was no solutions in his character IMHO. Hogan Yes, Brock Yes. Respect 83!
@@seanwilliams7655 Paulie knew how to make him Champ and how to make the character still work
I completely disagree, I think the Raven character had a lot to work with, he was a great heel and he even had his anti-hero moments. You can't tell me that Goldberg, Benoit, Jeff Jarrett, Sid and others that got a bigger push had more going on. Those 4 guys really couldn't cut a promo and they became WCW champions.
Raven was never going to work in WCW. WCW, ECW, and WWE had some crossover fans, but most for the most part the 3 companies had different audiences. That’s why when WWE purchased WCW, many fans did not follow and literally gave up on wrestling completely.
Are you sure it wasn’t due to how badly booked the Invasion was and the fact that almost every main event WCW star couldn’t show up on TV until their Turner contracts expired?
@@Airthugger No they could. They had the option to go to work for WWE immediately or sit at home and get payed.
To which you kind of found out who loves wrestling and who does it just for the money. There are some other things in there as well and there will always be exceptions to the rule or under certain circumstances and stuff like that but no one had to stay home under contract.
@@josheisert8380 given that WWE let it be know that they'd be getting paid less money, I'd have stayed home too.
@@seanwilliams7655 I don't know if it was that way for everyone either way they wouldn't go under WWE contract until the WCW was over. Had they wrestled they would still be getting paid WCW money I believe.
I stopped following back in '99. both WCW & WWF. Never got into ECW.
Too bad things went sour. Raven + Saturn should have reigned as tag team title champs for much longer, that would have worked so well.
"He's only a mid card guy". This is the career arc of Steve Austin, Brett Hart, Shawn Michaels, Chris Jericho, Eddie Guerrero, Curt Henning, Rick Rude, Edge, and a dozen other legends. Sometimes you just have to give someone the opportunity.
I enjoyed Raven in WCW and enjoyed him and the Flocks storyline. I believe a lot of the WCW was involved in it. I believe if actually given a title, he could’ve broke out. The 1 day US title run was basically a way to switch the title from DDP to Goldberg.
I mean, it’s hard to “break out” at that time when 90% of your show was written for Hulk Hogan/nWo storyline.
Exactly
I thought Raven was awesome in WCW. Really enjoyed his matches with DDP and Benoit.
11:04 Eric explaining what he thought about Raven's character in WCW about being that 'dark' 'depressed' 'grudge' like character. Conrad's reaction is priceless LOL.
"i don't know why I get so excited about this" is him not recognizing Raven's heat lol.
@@joshmakeitrite Bischoff couldn't figure out Raven's character? What a ret*rd.
Raven explained it perfectly. When you come in your destiny is already set and you can't move beyond your destiny.
Eric spits nothing but contempt then says "I had nothing against him but he sucked and I didn't like him and I dont understand it!"
Did the Raven character even care about being the champion? Did he have the drive? He's miserable and depressed so he's stuck just being a mid card guy.
He really called Raven a C character Lmaoo that’s crazy he was easily B - A material
No. In WCW Raven was a C character. You could argue B - A character in ECW.
@@bluecollartradesman715 no he was a B-A in wcw
Montreal Flo+ he could been a B character but he was C character in WCW in reality
Eric: "Raven never broke out in ECW, etc."
Raven main-evented many shows in ECW and was World Champion for about 1.5 years.
The Raven character was already pushed to the max in wcw. He got his own faction, got a lot of airtime and great feuds. He was a lot more entertaining and over than the Raven of ECW as he appealed to the main crowd, not the niche controversial ecw audience. Not to mention Ravens underwhelming run in wwf. Raven was the most over in wcw
@Robbie Mulvanynot all jobbers. Some of the flock members like Saturn and Kidman were pushed and elevated with Saturn having a great singles run and a match with Goldberg in a ppv and Kidman being the star and champion of cruiserweight div for very long.
@Robbie Mulvany Saturn had an angle and a series of matches with goldberg while he was in the flock. So too was kidman, he had many wins and developed his persona while he was in the flock. The rest i would say were outright jobbers but the ravens flock definitely build up these 2 wcw stars.
@Robbie Mulvany i suggest u watch the nitro segments beginning with the goldberg flock angle till the spring stampede 98 ppv that goldberg had with saturn. It wasnt a jobber like squash match like most of his previous matches and saturn looked good. By your definition it seemed all wrestlers who lost to goldberg inc hogan are jobbers.
LOL all jobbers except the 3 that weren't is a pretty big caveat. It's what all good factions are. You have the over people not be jobbers, and then you have a few guys who can take Ls in the faction to advance the feuds with faces. @@hardysa5257
Should’ve had world title reign
Not pushing Raven and Benoit is a forgotten piece of who killed WCW
The reasons why Eric didn’t like Raven’s character is exactly why Raven was over in WCW. People wanted to see a baby face destroy him and his flock, and it was very entertaining to watch at the mid-card level. Probably should have had at least one main event storyline with someone like Sting or Bret Hart.
I think Raven could have been huge if booked correctly. I think a huge problem was that the "Flock" faction was kind of an offshoot storyline that didn't tie directly into the WCW vs NWO plotline. Imagine if, for instance, Sting came to someone's rescue as they were getting jumped by the NWO, as was common in those days. He clears out 10-15 goons but eventually runs out of steam and the heavy hitters like Nash and Scott Norton eventually take over and start beating Sting up with his own bat and Tenay and Schiovone are going crazy about how Sting is always the rescuer but there's one one to rescue Sting. The camera cuts up to the rafters and shows a raven fly over and perch next to Sting's crow. The lights in the arena go dark. We hear a raven's caw. When they come back on, Raven is in the ring DDT'ing NWO goons, Saturn has Buff Bagwell in the Rings of Saturn, Kidman is doing a top rope plancha onto X-Pac.
Of course we would need to think about the Flock's motivations and why they would do this, but I don't think it would be that hard.
I think something like this would've made a lot more sense than the eventual WolfPac that happened, which always felt unnecessary and nonsensical to me even if it was kinda cool.
He wasn't a dad on a motorcycle wearing an nWo shirt so Bischoff had no idea what to do with such a heel.
Raven is one of my all-time favorites. With that being said, yeah, he fits a lot better in ECW than WCW. WCW main eventers wrestling with Raven, just would be a bit strange. I mean, could you imagine Hulk in ECW? I know Hall was, barely, and same with Dusty. I also know Raven had one of his best WCW feuds with DDP, but I wouldn't call him a full-fledged main eventer.
Raven "A" Character indeed.
Why are Conrad"s mic and video feed poor quality? It's bugging me to no end.
GUYS! I was a teen in the 90s and guess what --- Raven was GREAT on WCW TV. He was an alt / grunge character that matched the MTV era of the time to the tee. Raven was GREAT.
But not a main eventer, at all which is the dispute
Eric clearly hates Raven. To call Raven a C character is insane. A wrestler can't get over unless he has the company to back him up which Raven did not. Eric didn't understand his character. But younger people did. Raven was the top guy in ECW or in the top 3. It's a different audience but he didn't have some crazy bloody ruthless character like Sabu that was great for ECW. Raven could have easily fit into WWE or WCW if given the chance. He goes over to WWE and Vince doesn't understand the character. So they make him a lower card guy.
Raven probably rubbed Eric the wrong way. Eric didn't push him. Raven bashed the company which infuriated Eric and has hated him ever since. Eric already expressed how bad he thought it was for Raven to do that. You can hear the passion in Eric's voice. He clearly hated Raven.
I loved the Raven character. I was a morose, depressed guy in the 90s. It was easy to identify with, but I get that it wasn't for everyone.
He was your archetypal mopey '90s teenager type character, as was the flock. But I always liked Billy Kidman. He was the best wrestler in that stable.
I can't say Eric is wrong but as heavy as grunge was in the 90s he may have left money on the table that type of person was in back then in the real world
Benoit vs raven is still better than hogan vs sting. The real fans knew what they were watching
I believe Eric truly thought that but the Raven character in WCW was as hot as ever. Everything he did there was classic, he could’ve been pushed to the heavyweight title if they wanted to.
His description (“he didn’t stand out anywhere”) could easily have applied to guys like Austin, HHH, Undertaker, etc until you give them a push and a chance to break through. Raven did get a great mid card push but wasn’t given the chance to intersect with the biggest players and who knows what could’ve happened? Hogan would’ve probably buried him ultimately but it shows a limited imagination
Why does Eric say he didn’t get over? Raven was over pretty huge for the opponents and feuds he was given.
Those Raven promos meant alot more to us in Middle School at the time over Hogan coming out in Jncos trying to fool us into being his fans
Fwiw, I only saw Raven in WCW and I still remember him 25 years later so there was something noteworthy about that character. However to Eric's credit, he did give the Flock a lot of air time.
While I liked Raven, I'm kind of with Eric on this one. Raven had a brief moment in WCW but never quite took it to the next level. He floundered badly in WWE. Conrad is talking Nirvana and grunge--but was that where we were in 1997?
Where was The Crow in 1997 and why would Sting keep to the character heavily inspired by a 1994 movie? Eric literally stumbled into dumb luck with NWO and having Ted's deep pockets. Talents like Raven exposed how little he actually knew and why he will forever be a one storyline wonder.
Even tho i love raven, and was on his balls back then, Bischoff is actually 1000% correct about every thing he said here.raven admitted how easy it was for him to be Raven...and how he used the same few moves every match. He really never did change or do anything special to make himself a #1 guy above ECW
Raven had a beginning, middle and end of his wcw character. Imo, he was far more successful than most in wcw at that time.
By his own admission, he was not a main event guy.
Raven could have been a main eventer. Raven was the most developed, in depth character in wrestling history.
Swell job, Eric.
I think Raven with the right push could’ve been really good as the character. That straight edge, kinda Stone Cold Steve Austin ‘break the rules’ character; it definitely could’ve worked.
We wouldn't have gotten the Wyatt family without Raven and his Flock.
Equating Raven's character with violence exposes how out of touch Bischoff is.
At that time, other than DDP and Goldy, Bischoff couldn't create a main eventer, he just held guys down to satisfy the main eventers
Raven fit a niche product. He never drew to a mainstream audience.
Don't be a mark Conrad
The one thing Bischoff doesn't realize though is that prior to WCW, RAVEN had only been in ECW. Scotty Flamingo in WCW, Johnny Polo in WWF, those were managers/lower card personas. That's a problem WCW had even before Bischoff. If you came in from somewhere and you were just a midcarder, you were a midcarder for life. Bischoff just never "got" the Raven character but it did feel like at first he had intentions on making him a big deal. But Raven himself has said he was his own worst enemy and WCW had quite the roster with a bunch of huge draws that IDK if Raven would've been able to crack through.
Raven was one of the most compelling personas of the 90s and had all the tools to be a bigger deal in WCW. He, like many others who were world champions elsewhere, just wasn't given the opporunity. Eric said he wanted to be proven wrong, but he didn't allow Raven to prove him wrong. After the Flock disbanded, Raven appeared so much less on the show. It was personal bias and Eric admitted that several times in this clip.
I had not idea who Raven was when he showed up on Nitro. I did not see why WCW onscreen management was pursuing him
I wonder if Bischoff actually believes his own BS or not? "I hired him to see if my opinion was wrong" hahaha get real. Raven brought eyeballs to ECW, amazing storyline, great champ. And on top of anything else, he had a ton of buzz in WCW and a devoted fanbase. Always felt like someone Eric listens to didn't like Raven and so they held him down
Raven reminded me of that leader in vampire movies that turns into a demon and has a following of like 100 thousand people 😂
He could have been Randall Flag from Stephen King’s The Stand.
I 💯 %respect Eric bishoff he was spot on with his answer and Raven and Mortis a.k.a kanyon my two favorite of ALL TIME
That character was one of my favorite characters ever! Now I know who to blame for it not working. I actually like Eric but he messed up. Just because you don’t like something doesn’t mean that people won’t.
As a teenager, Raven was relatable. His moody, no one understands thing worked for me. But I couldn't see him at the top. As much I love Jericho, Malenko, & Ultimo the person out if those 3 I could see at the top was Jericho. For the American audience, the talent has to be good enough at all aspects of the game. You look at the newer talent & they could get the audience to react every time like Jericho, The Rock, & Stone Cold. Raven didn't have that. People would react, but it was never the entire audience like it was with those 3. And to Conrad's point about the Grunge character, like Glacier he was a couple years too late. By the time Raven was in WCW, Grunge wasn't the in thing anymore. It was Rap, Pop, Boy Bands, & the Latin Invasion.
Raven was a great character and Bischoff dropped the ball on a big money grab with the right storyline.....the generation at the time wanted Raven to get over but WCW were strung up on NWO and Hogan's nuts to bother
Exactly.
Was Raven that guy though? DDP was, but was Raven.
@@sadiki1980 even WWE never seen much in him
@@avalond1193 Not everyone is meant to be world champion.
Unfortunately, The internet marks dont represent the main wwf or wcw audience. Just look at his run in wwf.
bischoff and mcmahon definitively didn't get raven's character. raven represented the 90s
Raven brought a dynamic to ECW that it needed abd is one of the main reasons ECW holds its place in history as one of the most legendary promotions
Bischoff often thought there was no merchandising possibilities with Rey Mysterio and that Steve Austin had nothing going for him.
Eric appears to have to idea how many fans Raven actually has.
Im surprised Bischoff even has to explain this. Everything he said was just common sense to me. Raven was a great character for WCW. His flock was great too but he was by no means something that could close the show every week. I think they used Raven as good as possible. This shouldn't have to be explained to Conrad unless he was literally Raven's biggest fan. And thats what it kind of looks like.
That was the problem with those guys in WCW.. they didn’t see guys like Austin, Triple H, Mick Foley Taker, Booker, or Eddie as main eventers but Vince did that’s why he won the war
everything he said before 7:20 begs the question: why hire him?
Bischoff in this interview just reveals that his entire metric was whether or not someone was WWF champion. He says Raven had stops in WWF and ECW and hadn't done anything to show his viability, Conrad points out that he was ECW Champion, Bischoff then dismisses ECW. That's not hard math, lol.
im the biggest fan of raven, my most favourite wrestler ever, and even i cant see him as main event guy.. raven was midcard act and he was perfect for that spot. just like the grunge music. he was underground type character. never to be mainstream.
Really? Because smells like teen spirit literally has 1,800,000,000 views right now on youtube. Nevermind sold more than 30,000,000 copies and went #1 in most of the countries in the western world. The difference between wrestling and music is that there aren't strong objective measurements like that, so your boomer boss can still say "you suck, we're not using you."
I love the way Conrad responds to Eric…he’s so dense sometimes.
Insane to look back at the roster they had and never developed. Again looking back they should have made Thunder just as packed as Nitro. They had 2 more hours a week to develop stories and stars. They had Guerrero, Jericho, Benoit, Raven, Mysterio, Ultimo Dragon, DDP, Steiner's, Booker T, Big Show, Nash and Hall, Hogan and Macho, luger, sting, Goldberg and so many more. Yet through the extra 2 hours a week in Thunder to the side...insane. Wht could've been. Bis always breaks his arm tapping himself in the back for beating wwe for 83 weeks when he had the guys and time to shut them down alot longer.
Scot Levy is a god damn genius. His best speech occurred the night the greatest video game ever was released: Starcraft 1.
Bischoff totally dropped the ball on Raven those feuds Raven had with Tommy Dreamer and Sandman are classics plus I remembered there was a Monday Night Nitro episode and Raven did a stare down with Macho Man that crowed popped the brawls that Raven and Macho Man could have had
Growing up during this time I remember being so bummed that Raven left ECW for WCW.. after all these years I almost forgot this happened.. the Flock was decent but I wished he had went to WWF.. he fit the attitude era so much more but of course now looking back, the WWF would have buried him and ruined him.
Obviously TNA seen meaning in the raven character .. and it was nice seeing him on top ..
Raven’s gimmick was a lot like Kevin Sullivan’s. And we saw how far that went. He got his shot unlike some people.
Going into 1998, Raven would have been the perfect opponant for Sting after winning the title, shattering the NWO & restoring WCW. The NWO were about to feud with each other so they didn't need to be in the main event scene. Raven quickly won the US title & was neither part of the NWO or really WCW itself. He & his flock were the true outsiders.
What is great about this interview is the same could have been said about Stone Cold , Undertaker, Foley. Its really great to see the ill effects of group think in business. I understand that the character was ahead of its time but when the dark knight and Heath Ledgers Joker entered the consciousness of the public it was a mistake by wrestling promotions not pushing the character.
Eric u SERIOUSLY DROPPED THE BALL on Raven. There's SO MUCH that u could've done with him & he had a good fanbase. Creatively u guys didn't do shit with him. Fans LIKED Raven
Raven was probably one of my top 5 favorite wrestlers ever. Period! Eric is definitely lowballing him. He simply didn't get the proper chance. Raven's Flock was great stuff.
Raven and Benoit were there for us fans that were getting sick of the whole show being nwo.
I still to this day contend that a Raven and Sting rivalry in 98 would’ve been sort of what most of us think Sting and Undertaker would’ve been to a degree!! The way they took the belt off Sting then put him right into the NWO Wolfpack group was off putting. Instead they could’ve had Raven who just came off a great 3 way match with Benoit and DDP, cost him the title sorta like Macho Man did to the Warrior back in the day!! Then you could’ve had a rivalry for the rest of the year between those 2 that would’ve made Raven a main event player
'99. '98 was too early.
He was already the US champion coming off a feud with DDP and Benoit while just losing the belt to Goldberg. He was more than ready for a feud with Sting… what did Sting do in 98 after losing the belt, played on which side of the NWO he would join for 2 months then for the entire summer, nothing, he doesn’t make another ppv til fall brawl in that terrible war games match before giving us a underwhelming dream match against Bret at Halloween Havoc and is out for 4 and a half months.
With the younger crowd (14-24), Raven was waaaaaay over back in the day. I'm not sure how the timeline would have lined up but he should have run in during the Hogan and Sting match helping Sting win and then have an angle with sting and the nWo with them constantly running in and messing with their matches. It would have been so much better than that wolf pack crap we got.
Recently I thought that if they had presented Raven as more of a main event that a flock-nwo encounter could have been a big deal. Not unlike when the Wyatt family and shield first crossed paths...
Love ya Eric but dont bring up his successful ecw... and get it wrong, his run where he steer the company to great storyline telling and classic matches/fued that are still talked about 25 years later.
I love how absolutely defeated Conrad looks at the end of this. Bischoff is 100% correct.
i used to love Raven's promos. also, his matches. as already noted here, were great. the one with DDP and Benoit especially, like when they double-supplexed each other from top rope and also one of them, i think it was indeed Raven, fell into a stage light and in the words of Bobby Heenan, went 'blinking' ))
50/50, i don't see him becoming a Main Eventer in WCW it's too much of a niche character, but i do see him having a very solid US title run and don't understand to this day what the point of having him job to Goldberg was
Me as a little kid seeing all the raven wcw promos the feud with ddp.. him being the leader of his own stable .. him literally having his own match type (ravens rules) seeing him win the us title (despite loosing it to bill) I could’ve swore he was A- tier character
On one hand, yes the Raven character was kind of one dimensional. However, he was known as a very talented guy with a great mind for the business. And if Eric put more effort into figuring out how to add depth to the character and/or understood that Nash & Hall actually liked him and could have been talked into doing angles with him & main event matches with him, who knows?
Raven was WCWs Goldust- no matter how talented they were, they did not have the character for champion.
Ecw was peak Raven, because the dark and grimey character worked there. I'm with Eric on this one.
Raven should have been the Psychological Villain with no remorse or Empathy to fight guys like Sting, Goldberg, Booker T. Malenko and Guerrero. Ravens rules clause at any time makes him Always interesting
He was one of the best promos in the business and I loved how different he was compared to everybody else that was there at the time. I also thought he was a pretty good worker... He wasn't Bret Hart but he could put on good matches if you gave him someone else to work with. I hate that he got put in that hardcore bin and was just left there.
The reason people ask you why he didn’t get a bigger push is because he was super over in the fans mind. This type of management is why WCW lost the ratings war. The Flock was essentially the WCW version of DX which was on fire at the time.
When u gonna post the debate
I always think Raven would have worked wonderfully with Stone Cold or The Undertaker.
But I don’t think against Hogan, Triple H, The Rock, Jericho, Nash. There is much storytelling there.
Mid-Card is Raven’s spot with an occasional main event spot would be sufficient.
To me Raven is very much like a Mick Foley. Great for the younger wrestlers coming up the card.
I think raven was properly slotted at the upper mid card.
This coming from a guy that didn't see steve austin or undertaker being stars
why sign him if you aren't going to use him? what was the point?
He's so wrong. I was understanding where he was coming from but i think Raven was a breath of fresh air in storylines, compared to the " same ole, same ole" wcw BS
I agree with Eric on most things but not on Raven. I would respect Eric a hell of a lot more if he were honest and told us Raven didn’t succeed because Hogan and the other vets held him down to protect “their spots”. I’ve noticed that Bischoff can never really own his mistakes as well as he can gloat about his successes. Raven had a unique presentation and was one of the few ECW talents who perfectly adapted his style to fit into WCW’s style of show. The truth is if Bischoff had smartly pushed younger talents who could create new stories, WCW would have been much better off. Instead, he ran the nWo story to death and it ended up negatively affecting the WCW product. There was no excuse to not use a talent like Raven at the upper mid card to main events.