5 Things To Expect From WWE’s Heyman & Bischoff Hirings

This year has been such a huge game-changing time for the professional wrestling world. AEW has quickly come into existence and WWE is having to adjust to where they might have actual competition for the first time in almost two decades. A great majority of fans have complained about a vast number of things they deem wrong with the WWE product: such as lack of character development, not enough superstars getting the proper time to shine, and just an overall bland product.

The story that has taken over the wrestling world is the hiring of Paul Heyman and Eric Bischoff to run the creative direction of Raw and Smackdown. This has been met with a mostly positive reception and it can only be looked at as a necessary change. The WWE product has pretty much been run exclusively by Vince McMahon for years now and even though they will still be reporting directly to him, it seems like the grip has at least been loosened on the creative control.

But now that we have two new leaders in the director department, what should we expect from the former respective leaders of ECW and WCW.

 

5. A Clean Slate

Hopefully, these new hirings will start off a new era in the WWE where the metaphorical reset button is hit. Over the last few months, the WWE has tried a few ideas out that just haven’t really stuck. We still don’t have a solid understanding of the wild card rule. Are there three superstars allowed for each show or can just any wrestler come and go as they please? We have seen both situations happen since the rule was implemented. Even more recently, we’ve seen many matches be slapped with the “two out of three falls” stipulation. They are apparently doing this to cut out commercial breaks during the matches but it has just came off as forced and unnecessary.

Hopefully with two new minds calling the shots these random ideas can be recalled and they can just start over and rebuild each brand as an independent entity. No goofy gimmicks, regular wrestling matches, and commercial breaks when necessary, it really doesn’t have to be more complicated than that.

 

4. An Added Edginess

Paul Heyman and Eric Bischoff both made their names during the 90’s with ECW and WCW. This wasn’t a time of PG television. Both shows were edgy, especially ECW, and knew that they were catering to a certain audience that didn’t want a childish product. Now with both working for WWE in the PG era, they will most likely test the waters to see how much room they have to get out of the WWE comfort zone.

Eric Bischoff wrote a book called “Controversy Creates Cash” and that’s exactly how he ran WCW. He made big moments that would shock and awe the crowd and keep them on the edge of their seats. Paul Heyman simply shot out enough hardcore wrestling that people weren’t necessarily worried about the story it was trying to tell. The bloody action was different than what the other companies were doing and it worked out for years. Both men had their directions to create success and expect them both to build off of that and implement it into the new product. Not broken glass, bare knuckle brawls or naked strip teases like the 90’s we remember but a more mature wrestling show that can cater to many different age groups.

 

3. More Long Term Storylines

In the grand scheme of things, we haven’t had a huge storyline over the course of many months since the Authority a few years ago. This used to be a pretty common occurrence from WWE, such as: the Nexus back in 2010, the Invasion angle in 2001, and possibly the greatest storyline in wrestling history, Stone Cold Steve Austin versus Mr. McMahon.

Most storylines in the past few years seem so one dimensional where two people fight in around three contests and someone wins the rubber match and the rivalry. You need a big story to come along every once in awhile to involve almost an entire portion of the roster to keep things fresh.

In WCW, the big storyline there was the NWO. This lasted for literally years and that was seen as overkill by the end, but in the beginning it was all anyone could talk about. The big group uniting and destroying everyone in their paths to reign supreme. In ECW, we saw an incredible storyline with Tommy Dreamer and Raven that really shaped the direction in which storytelling went from there on forward. Some of the ideas like the background where they all knew each other from childhood and the pregnancy part of the story was so insane but like some of the reality television of today, we were drawn into it and had to see where it was going next week.

 

2. A Significant Production Difference

Back in 2005-2006 Raw and Smackdown we’re viewed as practically completely different companies. The superstars of each brand were tied completely down and would rarely travel to the other brand. We saw Survivor Series as a war for supremacy and it was built as such. The video game franchise was literally called Smackdown Vs Raw. The last few years we have seen the brands become almost mirror images of each other. The stages are the same, wrestlers are coming and going on whatever brand they want, and they are run with practically no difference production wise.

With the two new writers, this would be a great chance to separate the two brands. Giving both shows completely different stage setups will show right off the bat that these aren’t the same. Adding the old school referee uniforms with the Raw and Smackdown logos would also be a neat little addition. Having one platform for each cluster of superstars will provide the most opportunity for the most wrestlers instead of just a certain group getting the spotlight on both shows. Making Smackdown and Raw as WWE and NXT is the perfect example. Both are under the same umbrella but should be promoted as two different companies.

 

1. Young Talent Getting the Spotlight

Most people would agree that WWE has had a hard time building new stars. They seem to be a lot happier about bringing back stars with nostalgia and squashing the younger wrestlers. WWE has arguably its best roster in history and with NXT at its peak popularity, the young stars are everywhere you look. People like Elias, Buddy Murphy, Aleister Black, Bray Wyatt, Ricochet, and Finn Balor could be mega stars across the world but haven’t gotten the huge push to be in the Seth Rollins and Roman Reigns level yet.

Paul Heyman has always preached that the youth should always be pushed to the top because that’s how the sport is sustained. Bischoff has been “Veteran biased” in the past but has also talked about needing the young wrestlers now more than ever. We haven’t seen a true megastar in WWE since John Cena and maybe we won’t again with how global the company is getting. It seems that there are so many wrestlers that there can be 10-15 big stars but not one pure mega-star anymore. With the new creative direction, expect the young stars to get a bigger push than we’ve seen in the last few years.