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Ladies and gentlemen, we welcome you to
Nitro!

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It was the most exciting time of my
professional life.

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You're either with us or you're against
us.

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It was like being a rock star. It really
was. Everywhere we went, people

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followed us.

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It was truly expect the unexpected. You
just did not know who was going to show

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up. You can call this the New World
Order of Wrestling, brother!

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And that was my first go around.

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When I went back in 99, things had
drastically changed.

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When Bischoff took a step away, shows
totally took a different turn.

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But he's got the belt still out.

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WCW was so miserable. The morale was so
low.

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This company is more dysfunctional now
than it has ever been.

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Definitely the craziest, wildest two
years of my life.

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I would hear all the rumors about the
new owners and whether it was Eric

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Bischoff. He was going to buy it
outright himself.

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It was a reset. What are we going to do
with championships?

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What are we going to do with current
existing storylines? All that.

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Every question we asked got answered by
three or four more other questions

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because nobody knew.

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So the idea of the Big Bang pay -per
-view, we knew we were going to do one,

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we had no idea who was going to be on
that show or what that show was going to

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look like. We just knew we were going to
do it.

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That pay -per -view obviously never
happened.

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You have to have lived it to believe the
insanity.

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In 1998, I remember it was in the summer
of 98, I got a phone call. I was, you

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know, asked to come over and be a part
of a meeting.

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And I walked into that meeting, and
there was probably, you know, 15 or 18

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people seated around a long table who
I'd never seen before.

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And after the pleasantries in that
meeting, they proceeded to go around the

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table and tell me, not ask me, not
suggest, but tell me how I'm going to

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fix something that was, quite honestly,
without patting myself on the back too

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much, was outperforming beyond anybody's
expectations.

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When Bischoff took a step away, Vince
Russo was pretty much at the helm at

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point in time. The shows totally took a
different turn because we started doing

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a lot of crazy matches, gimmick matches,
everything. It had a theme to it. It

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had a name to it. It was just a bunch of
crazy stuff.

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This match is now officially a Judy
Bagwell on a forklift match.

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A what?

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Vince Russo, who had convinced everybody
in Turner that he was single -handedly

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responsible for turning WWE around. And,
of course, it took about three months

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for them to figure out that they made a
mistake.

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And I got a call from Brad Siegel. And
Brad called me and said, basically,

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what would it take for you to come back?

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It was obvious to me that hiring Vince
Russo was a cataclysmic mistake. They

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finally realized it.

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And I knew when Brad called me that they
must be pretty desperate.

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There was a lot of disgruntled people,
both talent and employees, staff,

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administration, you name it. The fans
were getting frustrated.

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So I took advantage of the situation
just to be truthful about it. I was able

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essentially write my own ticket. And I
said I would come back.

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I would oversee creative. But I have to
say, I didn't feel like I was coming

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back to the company that I love. The
company that I love died in 1998.

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I met with Rousseau.

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I felt like there was a chance that we
could collaborate and do so

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And if Turner was still going to support
the brand, I felt that there was a good

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chance that I could make a difference or
help make a difference.

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Well, I know they made one final last
push, you know, to try to make that

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last. Everybody wanted WCW to stick
around.

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I know they did.

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And me personally, I don't know.

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I don't know what it was. I had a gut
feeling. I had a really, really sick

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feeling in my gut that the company was
not going to last. I felt like the

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company was going to go under. I just, I
could foresee it happening.

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We're going to go now to Mean Gene
Okerlund, Gene.

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Okay, one of them little technical
difficulties that your announcer's got

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cover up for here.

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It was a mess.

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The July pay -per -view being the straw
that broke the camel's back.

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And I went to Brad and I said, Brad,
this company is more dysfunctional now

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it has ever been.

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You guys are never going to give it the
type of support that it needs.

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Why don't you sell it while it's still
worth something?

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And at first, Brad laughed at me.

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And I went home and about a week later,
Brad called me and said, are you

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serious? about trying to find somebody
to buy the company.

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And I said, absolutely.

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And he gave me the green light.

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I heard all those rumors. I heard that
Derek was, you know, planning on, you

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know, trying to buy the company himself.

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And, you know, but one thing you got to
understand is Eric Bischoff had signed,

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you know, so many wrestlers to that
company. A lot of those guys would just

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at home, collected money.

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Even thinking about buying the company,
it would have been a lost cause. And

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that was the biggest mistake Eric, I
think, made.

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you know, trying to corner the market,
you know, trying to beat WWE.

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It took a little while, but through a
company called Fusion Media, which was

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headed up by a guy by the name of Brian
Badal and Steve Greenberg, looked at it

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and said, okay, let's do it.

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It was as random as getting a phone call
out of left field from Eric. He gave me

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the pitch and I thought, you know, this
could be, if the deal is right, this

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could be fun.

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The first I ever heard of it, My father,
he basically said, hey, I want to give

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you a heads up.

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Ownership is going to change hands.

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I literally went in one ear and out the
other. I didn't believe it for a minute.

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Turner was desperate to get out of the
business.

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Whatever the number was that we were
paying, we were getting in return a

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big check from Turner to effectively
cover.

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almost all of the talent contracts.

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More importantly was we had negotiated a
10 -year agreement to control

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the Wednesday night slot on TBS.

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They raised $67 million.

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Turner agreed to sell it. We were making
our plans to acquire WCW from Turner

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Broadcasting and relaunch it as a
separate autonomous entity.

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to our staff that Turner Broadcasting,
Time Warner, has

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sold WCW, World Championship Wrestling,
Inc., to Fusient Media

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Ventures. I just wanted to comment on
how excited we are to

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be making this acquisition from Turner
and to be partnering with Eric Bischoff

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to do this.

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We believe in the product. We believe in
the future. And I think all the

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ingredients are here to produce a
winning franchise again.

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We were nailing down our strategies and
tactics on how to relaunch the brand,

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what it was going to look like, feel
like. We knew that we weren't going to

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able to travel the show the way we did
with Nitro.

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I had a relationship with Peter Morton,
who owned the Hard Rock at the time.

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We had reached.

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a handshake with a hard rock to create a
permanent venue for

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WCW in Las Vegas.

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Eric had talked to me about moving to
Vegas.

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I was going to be Eric's right -hand man
to help run the company once Fusion

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bought it and we moved the whole
operation out to Vegas.

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I think having somebody like Johnny in
there that would have really allowed us

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to come up, and I used to refer to it as
two - and three -dimensional finishes,

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where you think you see the finish
coming or you think you know what the

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is going to be, and just when you're
absolutely convinced you're right, bam,

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story in the ring kind of takes a
different direction.

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Now you're really sure you know what the
finish is going to be, and bam, it

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changes direction again.

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Well, I mean, everybody was on edge, as
you can imagine, because...

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everybody's thinking, what if this
happens? How does that include me into

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And as a talent, especially, they would
be asking, what is going to be my role

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within this company, or am I out of a
job?

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We had to overcome a lot of bad
branding. It was my opinion that we

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a hiatus for three to six months.

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During that period of time, building
anticipation for the resurrection, if

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will, the rebirth, the rebranding,
whatever you want to call it.

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So the idea of the Big Bang pay -per
-view, we knew we were going to do one.

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We knew we wanted to call it the Big
Bang, but we had no idea who was going

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be on that show or what that show was
going to look like. We just knew we were

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going to do it.

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We weren't interested in going back to
what we used to do in any way, shape, or

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form, and the emphasis would have been
much more on wrestling.

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I think it was going to be from the hard
rock, and I think it was just going to

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be... You know, a pyro filled, you know,
I think that part of the name of Big

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Bang was that, you know, there were
going to be sort of, you know, the kinds

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explosions that, you know, happened in
action movies, but not in wrestling. It

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was going to be a spectacle.

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And then you started hearing rumblings
of the relaunch. And I don't think I

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saw any documentation about the Big
Bang, but I remember going, OK, I like

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name. It's new. It's fresh. We're
heading somewhere. But what is it?

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Anything is better than the environment
we're working in now.

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I remember thinking that I thought the
Big Bang thing was terrible.

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Because the Big Bang is you create
something out of nothing. So you would

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admitting that WCW is nothing.

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I can honestly say this is the first
time I ever heard about the Big Bang.

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heard anything about pay -per -view that
was going to bring us out of all that

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debt, put us back on the map, and get us
back in a winning position.

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We started looking at the talent roster
and determining who we could afford to

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keep, who we wanted to keep, who we
didn't need to keep, who we couldn't

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and just going through that analysis.

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We were looking to get away from sort of
the in -your -face, day -to -day

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sort of competition that we thought,
let's go and build something that

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is similar but feels very different.

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establish our own tone and personality,
and at some point,

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you know, sort of go and begin to be the
battle brand.

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And I remember being really excited
about the creative plan.

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You like to think it would work, but,
you know, who knows?

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What would have been, I think, a
crisper, more fluent storytelling team

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creative team?

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along with the execution in the ring
that would have really brought a great

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story to life in a much bigger way. The
majority of the people that I talked to

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really genuinely.

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you know, miss WCW. And it had its own
loyal audience.

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Despite the fact that we lost many of
them, if we would have been able to,

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through the absence makes the heart grow
fonder factor by, you know, shutting it

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down for a period of time and building
up the right kind of anticipation from a

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marketing and PR point of view to make
people even more excited about what it

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could be, that kind of thing takes time.
But I firmly believe that as I do now.

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That had it been done properly and
executed properly, we might not have

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everybody back, and we may not have made
people decide that they would rather

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watch us now, but we would have
certainly been able to reclaim a good

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if not the majority, of the audience
that had just grown sour on us.

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Nobody could really fathom this whole
thing's going away overnight.

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burned down like instantaneous.

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I don't think anybody could really
fathom the thought of that.

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So it was more of, in my opinion, okay,
what is the transition going to look

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like? They're going to rename it.

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They're going to throw out some old
stuff, add some new stuff. It was more

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less a rebranding with new ownership.

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We had some high hopes that we were
going to come out of the corporate funk,

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to speak.

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We were literally a week or so away from
closing.

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And I knew that once we closed the deal,
I knew that I was going to go back to

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working 18 -hour days, seven days a week
again, which I was excited about. But I

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also knew that I wouldn't have a lot of
time for my family.

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So I flew my wife and my kids and a
couple of their friends, and we all went

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to Hawaii.

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And it was while I was in Hawaii, I got
a phone call from Brian Badal. And he

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said, Eric, it's done.

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I was about ready to jump in the air at
the beach and spill my Mai Tai all over

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me and my wife and scream like a village
idiot on the beach in Waikiki.

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And he said, no, Eric, get it. It's done
like it's over. We're not going

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forward. All of a sudden, everything I
thought that was going to go on for the

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next couple of years just evaporated
into thin air. I was stunned.

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The big get was owning this two -hour
Wednesday night slot on TBS for...

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10 years.

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And ultimately, that was a big part of
what killed the deal.

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You know, I got a call one day, I think
it was from Brad basically saying, great

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news. You know, I think it was Jamie
Calder had come in.

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Jamie has approved the deal with just
one slight tweak.

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The Wednesday night slot, instead of
being guaranteed for 10 years, we get a

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day out.

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It wasn't acceptable to us. They made it
clear that the Wednesday night slot was

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off the table, and I think that we said,
you know, without that, we just don't

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know how we can make the deal work.

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Eric had had his ups and downs.

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had the highs to highs and lows to lows,
if he had that other opportunity again,

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knowing what he went through, the good
and the bad, I believe he would have

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taken the reset of a huge opportunity to
sort of get out of the weeds of the

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corporate BS that him and so many others
had to deal with.

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Eric Bischoff, he did a whole lot for
me.

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If it would have been a pay -per -view
there for us to have been able to try to

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pull off, I would have been there for
it.

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It wasn't personal.

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TBS during that period of time was, you
know, the comedy network.

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TNT was the drama network.

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Jamie Kellner came in and decided that
he didn't want wrestling, not because it

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was WCW.

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He decided he just didn't want wrestling
on the network, regardless of how

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successful it was or wasn't.

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a word that, all right, this is it. It's
ending this weekend. It was in Panama

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City. You kept hearing, it's over, but
nobody could really slice and dice what

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actually that meant. But as the days got
closer, the word events and the

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rumblings, and you still were like, how
is this going to happen? The simulcast

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wasn't discussed, but there were
rumblings.

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A little bit more information would come
out, a little bit more, a little bit

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more, and you go, wow, this is
interesting.

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You see, it was just a matter of time
before

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I, Vince McMahon, bought my competition.

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That's right.

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I own WCW.

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Nobody really knew what was going on
when Shane McMahon walked in that room.

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That's the only time everybody
concretely knew what had happened.

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So one man that I was working with had
an idea, and he realized this was going

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to be the last day.

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After hearing what was planned for the
show, that there was going to be a

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simulcast, he...

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came to me and said, I got an idea.

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Let's go out with a bang.

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And proceeded to tell me his plan to
jump the ring and tackle Shane McMahon

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the simulcast went live.

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And I'm standing there with him at go
position. They go live, and I'm looking

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him like, you know, he could hit the
ring. He could jump in the ring.

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would not stop him because everyone
knows who he is.

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And he could really ruin this moment.

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And I looked at him, and he looked at
me. He smiled.

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And I said, don't even think about it,
man. I said, not worth it.

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He said, all right.

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But it literally was, I'd say, about a
51 % to 49 % likability that he was

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actually going to do it. It was that
close.

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And what would have happened, I don't
know, but it certainly would have

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history at least for a few moments.

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The right thing happened.

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When I look back at it all now, the
absolute best thing that could possibly

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happened. It did happen.

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I think WCW could still be here today if
that company would have been managed

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properly. I really, really do.

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It happened on God's time, but it
happened perfectly.

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I mean, Jeremy Morash, who's here now,
we call it the summer of no worries. I

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went out on a lake every day and had
time to sort of like clear my mind.

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TNA was born out of a lot of lake time
the summer of 2001.

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It's just that simple.

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It worked out magnificently for me. You
know, if it wasn't, if the buyout didn't

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happen, there might not have never been
a hurricane. And that was, you know, of

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course, the best thing that I did in my
career and still continue to do is to be

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the hurricane.

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I always believe that things happen for
a reason.

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And I believe that had I not taken the
opportunity and retired.

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in Japan and went to work for Eric that
I would not have learned as much about

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production, creative writing.

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So I have no regrets.

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I'm confident that.

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It turned out exactly the way it should
because wrestling is bigger now than

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it's ever been.

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I still get an opportunity occasionally
to do some things with WWE.

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Nitro lives on in the WWE network. I
have fans that I meet at different

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autograph signings and conventions and
things that are 12 and 14 years old that

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tell me how much they love Nitro.

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Nitro still lives on to this day.