WWE Hall of Famer and former WCW President Eric Bischoff took to an episode of his 83 Weeks podcast, where he talked about a number of topics including if he prefers big wrestling shows to be held in arenas or stadiums.
Bischoff said, “I prefer an arena because the energy is contained. I think the audio is different in Arena. You can feel the audience’s reaction in a different way. I love the spectacle, the big beautiful wide shots and all that, and I understand why they’re important. In terms of my enjoyment of the event, you work if you’re there, maybe even more so if you live in the venue. I much prefer a read-up because that energy is contained and catches people. It just elevates everybody’s level of excitement, enthusiasm, or heat when it’s appropriate. When you have a chance to confine 10 or 15 or 20,000 people in a venue, the energy is just different.”
Bischoff also talked about the limited funds WCW had back in 1993.
Bischoff said, “At that time, because we have limited funds. The reason for this, and I’ve talked about this before, is that it’s not news. The reason I wanted to cut the house shows down or eliminate them was that they weren’t generating revenue, and there was no plan in place to create more revenue. And we had a limited amount of resources. So I wanted to put the resources we did have, i.e. the budget. I wanted to put those assets into something that could affect the arena business down the road in the future, make the product better, make it compelling, and sound familiar. Make it compelling; don’t just have excuses for matches and venues and events and venues, but make it provide a compelling reason for it. And that took time, so when Zayn [Breslov] came in, it wasn’t like he was under pressure to turn the business around right away. Zane became part of the plan, which was to eliminate house shows that didn’t make any sense, focus our resources on those markets that didn’t make sense, and take advantage of Zane’s reputation and relationships in those markets.”
You can check out the complete podcast below.
