Paul Heyman and ECW's Books

[RLStern]

Impact will never die. Its lasted longer than WCW did. If TNA would have kept running live TV shows they would have done a lot better.

You’re comparing apples to oranges.

SMW, ECW went out of business due to not drawing enough,

WCW never ever went out of business and never was going to go out of business. It drew until its last day. It was bought by another company that refused to do anything with it and put it on the shelf.

Impact/TNA is smart because they adjust their business.

 

[Swamps]

That’s what I’m saying, ECW drew in a niche but didn’t draw enough to be mainstream because it was out of touch with Late 1990’s/Early 2000’s pop culture.

Despite that they kept trying to force it to be mainstream when it wasn’t. If they wanted to be mainstream they needed to be like WWF 1999-2002/WCW 1997-2000, instead of 80’s/early 90’s Morton Downey Jr syndication.

He refused to do so, while insisting to make it mainstream when it wasn’t in touch with mainstream late 90s/early 2000’s pop culture, therefore he went out of business.

ECW was going to always go out of business if they continued to have the same out of date 80’s/early 90’s style with the amount of debt they had, it was gonna catch up to them, Heyman simply sped it up by forcing the issue.

He kept trying to force it to mainstream audiences, and they rejected it, it wasn’t in touch

Dude, you were saying they didn’t draw at first. Not that they didn't draw enough. That would have changed the dialog between you and I. Or at least, that is what I saw. Like I said, I didn't read all of the responses the previous three or so pages before I began responding. So if you did say "didn't draw enough " I apologize for missing it.

 

[Swamps]

TNA/Impact used the Dragon Balls to wish for immortality.


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Hell, I wish they would have stayed in Orlando, never hired Bischoff, and just continued using the Indy talent with a few veterans here and there. I will say, Jeff Jarrett's reign of Terror was worse than Triple H's.

 

[Smart Marx]

ECW was drawing in what it needed to. It sold out the smaller arenas and did adequate ppv buys.

The issue was attempting to compete with mainstream wrestling on a production level. Paul was just spending too much.

And he was incapable of holding people to contracts. That includes talent, PPV providers and his tv deal.

Half the people WCW stole from ECW were under a deal that Paul didn't know how to enforce.

 

[Smart Marx]

Dude, you were saying they didn’t draw at first. Not that they didn't draw enough. That would have changed the dialog between you and I. Or at least, that is what I saw. Like I said, I didn't read all of the responses the previous three or so pages before I began responding. So if you did say "didn't draw enough " I apologize for missing it.

Two entirely different dialogues. ECW was outspending, but drew enough for what it needed to be.

ECW needed to cut back on the production and let guys asking for more $250K a year go to WWE.

Then he needed to hire someone to run the books to get his payoffs and enforce his contracts.

 

[Hidden Blaze]

Hell, I wish they would have stayed in Orlando, never hired Bischoff, and just continued using the Indy talent with a few veterans here and there. I will say, Jeff Jarrett's reign of Terror was worse than Triple H's.

I like Bischoff. But I’ll agree. Like him and Hogan really didn’t help at all. I loved the company still and followed for awhile after. But until recently I didn’t get back into it. I would watch here and there for the last maybe 2-3 years. But now I recently started watching weekly again.


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[Brad Boyd]

The fact that it went out of business shows it sucked.

It doesn’t matter if those in a niche bubble liked it.

ECW is another example, it sucked, no matter what excuses Paul Heyman makes it simply wasn’t good enough to generate enough people to watch, most didn’t like it, even if a niche bubble did.

Ecw was on an extremely low budget though. If the business had more money i wouldn't doubt it would've drawn more. That is speculation of course but how many ideas did Vince steal from Heyman? Plenty especially in terms of all the crazy table spots. Those ideas contributed the overall success of the attitude era.

 

[Swamps]

I like Bischoff. But I’ll agree. Like him and Hogan really didn’t help at all. I loved the company still and followed for awhile after. But until recently I didn’t get back into it. I would watch here and there for the last maybe 2-3 years. But now I recently started watching weekly again.


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The whole Garrett Bischoff thing made me turn it off.

 

[RLStern]

Dude, you were saying they didn’t draw at first. Not that they didn't draw enough. That would have changed the dialog between you and I. Or at least, that is what I saw. Like I said, I didn't read all of the responses the previous three or so pages before I began responding. So if you did say "didn't draw enough " I apologize for missing it.

Whenever I say something doesn’t draw I’m talking about a mainstream audience/drawing enough.

For what ECW/Paul Heyman was trying to do, he didn’t draw. He was trying to be mainstream when his company, was behind the times stuck in the 80s/early 90s world of adult Morton Downey Jr syndication.

He was going against the grain with that because we’re talking about a Late 90s/Early 2000’s society that was obsessed with

-Teen comedies(Can’t hardly wait, Scream, American Pie etc),

-Bubblegum kids & teen pop(Backstreet Boys, NSYNC, Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera)),

-numetal(Limp Bizkit/Kid Rock)

-Reality based shows like Total Request Live, Tom Green, and Survivor.

Everything during that era needed storylines and characters. TRL is proof of that, because it was a music video countdown show with famous musicians exhibiting characters and having stories on the show(Mariah Carey on TRL, Justin Timberlake pretending to be a Britney fan in a funny skit when we know that was his girl, Eminem hosting TRL... The Rock IN CHARACTER hosting TRL, video below)

If a music video countdown show needed storylines and characters due to late 90s/early 2000’s culture, why did Paul Heyman book a cheap syndication of random adult stuff(beer drinking, t&a) with shitty to zero storylines and characters?

Because he was out of touch with that culture.

 

[Brad Boyd]

Even creatively, because they were tapping into pop culture an entire half a decade before WCW and WWF were, then when WCW and WWF tap into late 90s pop culture ECW becomes an out of touch grunge era/Morton Downey Jr show.

The WWF and WCW did pop culture better than ECW, they were already into the whole post grunge, nu-metal, teen-pop Tom Green, TRL, American pie pop culture while ECW was stuck in the grunge adult late night era of the 80s-mid 90s.

WWF and WCW were blockbusters while ECW remained that show you saw after 1:00am.

The Late 90s/Early 2000s weren’t about shock for shock sake like the 80s-mid 90s were, it was about reality based television.

In ECW sandman had no defining character, he was just a guy who drank beer, that’s a gimmick, whereas Stone Cold had a character who happened to drink beer, see the difference?

ECW was full of traits and sex, but no story and character behind them.

Sable didn’t just show her tits for no reason, there was a story, she was rebelling against her abusive husband Mero and later boss McMahon.

Trish didn’t just do sexual stuff like they did in ECW for no reason, she did it because they were part of a story, whether that be T&A, rebelling against the RTC, the McMahon affair,etc

One of the reasons why the Ruthless aggression era failed is because they started doing stuff with no story. Such as HLA, Bischoff just nonsensically put two lesbians making out with no character, no story, just a phony competition as an excuse

If ECW was in touch with society, they would have drawn, and if they drew they wouldn’t be in debt.

They should’ve drawn to the point where even if TV was stripped they could still have money to hold over a year.

Not only didnt they have enough money due to not drawing, but networks didn’t want it because it was out of touch.

People didn’t want hokey ultra violence with shitty to zero characters and story that was out of touch with society.

They wanted reality based television that was in touch with society, and that’s exactly what WCW and the WWF were.

Paul Heyman hates Vince Russo to this day, because Russo didn’t get to make WWF edgy until 5 years after ECW did, and Russo was more in touch with late 90s/early 2000s pop culture than Heyman and Bischoff could ever dream over.

Then it gets worse with Kreski, because unlike Russo this guy was outside the wrestling world completely.

Austin was influenced by sandmans gimmick and Raven influenced Takers ministry gimmick with all the crucifixion stuff. Tons of things from ecw were borrowed by wwf. The hardcore division wouldnt have been what it was without those ideas ECW gave birth to. Gotta give credit where credits due in this case bruh.

 

[RLStern]

Austin was influenced by sandmans gimmick and Raven influenced Takers ministry gimmick with all the crucifixion stuff. Tons of things from ecw were borrowed by wwf. The hardcore division wouldnt have been what it was without those ideas ECW gave birth to. Gotta give credit where credits due in this case bruh.

Sandman’s gimmick was drinking beer... he didn’t have a definable character. Austin was a rebellious redneck who happened to drink beer.

Raven did an actual crucifixion and mocked Christianity which led to a major backlash, near riot in the crowd to where he had to apologize, causing Kurt Angle to walk out, and almost ruining the company.

Taker put Austin on his symbol, not a cross, up in the air 10 feet high while Austin was strapped to it, not crucified or with a rose of thorns or on any cross.

Another example of how Heyman shouldn’t book anything as he mocked an entire religion, a religion of 95%the audience.

Apples to oranges here.

Again, hardcore division... ECW was an exact rip off of Memphis and Puerto Rico. With ultraviolent weapons that repulsed and drew away viewres(another example of Paul Heyman sucking as a Booker/writer)

WWF Hardcore division was completely different, it was a reality based match where the match was taken outside the ring, traditional rules broken and use of gimmicks and comedic weapons such street signs, fire extinguishers, shopping carts like a Road Runner, Looney Tunes skit.

Headlined by a belt(hardcore title) could be won by anyone that later on Chris Kreski made to be defended 24 hours/7 days a week providing some of the most unpredictable comedic moments.

Once again apples to oranges, ECW had zero influence on that, if anything something like Looney Tunes and 3 Stooges did.

ECW deserves zero credit for that as it was completely different and ECW in of itself was a rip off, WWF was doing that stuff with Patterson & SGT Slaughter.

 

[Brad Boyd]

ECW deserves zero credit for that as it was completely different and ECW in of itself was a rip off, WWF was doing that stuff with Patterson & SGT Slaughter.

They absolutely deserve credit because these ideas whether or not they were well received, they were directly taken from ECW. Yes they weren't as successful and objectively not as good, but if it wasn't for these angles and gimmicks that came about in ECW, we probably would've never have seen Austins success as a beer drinker, the ministry of darkness, the hardcore evolution etc. That was my point. They took ECWs ideas and made them more succesful. NWO was taken from NJPW and also influenced DX. eg; Dx spray painting their rivals in 97.