411’s WWE Table for 3: Good Enemies, Better Friends Report (Eric Bischoff, JBL, Bruce Prichard)

411’s WWE Table for 3: Good Enemies, Better Friends Report (Eric Bischoff, JBL, Bruce Prichard)

-Another new episode of Table for 3 dropped last night and I didn’t get a chance to watch it when it first aired, so sorry for the delay with this report.  They showed a preview for this one during Extreme Rules and anytime you can get Bischoff involved, I will be there to watch.  Eric is joined by Bruce Prichard and JBL which should make for an interesting show.

-They toast to each other as we start and the food is already being served as JBL makes fat jokes at Prichard’s expense.  JBL wants to talk about the time Eric tried to put them out of business.  Eric says his goal was to make money and never to put them out of business.  He says Vince used that as a way to rally the troops and it only came off that way because Vince was working the boys.  Bischoff does admit that he did say he wanted to put them out of business, but he never meant it.

-JBL goes over that Bischoff took over a company in 93 that was losing millions of dollars and by 98 they were making nearly 500 million dollars.  He wants to know why nobody else has put Bischoff in charge of a TV network or another business.  Bischoff thanks JBL for the kind words and says that wrestling is looked at as a niche business and people don’t think what worked in wrestling would work elsewhere.

-He also says that timing plays a part and that the WWE was having legal issues and image issues that made them vulnerable.  Prichard picks up on that and says Vince put out a hiring freeze during that period as he wasn’t sure what the future was for the company.  JBL interrupts to talk about the roster the WWE had in 1995 and he calls it the greatest roster of all time (Warrior, Austin, the nWo before they became that, Kane before becoming that, Taker, etc).  He has mentioned that before and  I still think he is out of his mind.  WCW’s roster in 1998 was far above anything the WWF every had with Goldberg, Hogan, Savage, Flair, Sting, Hall, Nash, Hart, Luger, Benoit, Guerrero, Jericho, The Giant etc.  That 1995 roster isn’t even the greatest roster in the WWE history as they have made deeper since then: just look at the roster that made the card at Mania XIX and then those who didn’t (Cena, Orton, Batista to name a few).

-Prichard goes off on Bischoff stealing their talent around that time and how it hurt them, but Eric calls bullshit on that claim.  JBL asks who ran creative for the WWE in 95-96 and Prichard asks what does that matter as they know it was him.  JBL says to Eric’s point no matter what talent they lost, the creative at the time was struggling.  Prichard congratulates Eric on winning the ratings war 83 straight weeks and asks him who was creative when that ended and Eric jokes that it was Vince Russo.

-Eric misunderstood the question as he thought he meant who was in charge of WWE’s creative when the 83 week reign ended.  He jokingly says Kevin Sullivan was in charge of WCW’s creative when that winning streak ended.  Prichard says he will give Russo credit as he was a guy that was able to get Vince’s ear (we see footage of Russo going over things with Vince in studio) and make changes.  Bischoff says that Russo watched his show and said, we need to do this.  He gives credit to Russo and Prichard says it was Vince McMahon.  Bischoff disagrees with that and says it was Russo and all he did was rip off their show.

-Things get heated as Prichard says they stole their talent and Bischoff drops some f bombs as he says the talent made a choice to join a side that was gaining momentum.   Prichard argues that they only gained momentum when their talent left, and Eric goes off about the WWE’s lack of creative and their gimmicks like garbage men, repo men, dentists etc.  That gets JBL back into things as he says Hall and Nash only jumped for money and not to advance a company.  Bischoff counters that Hall and Nash each made more in the WWE and they came for a guarantee and less dates.  They wanted a lifestyle change, and they argue semantics about whether making less money, but working nearly half the days means you are actually getting paid more per show.  Bischoff goes over that at the end of the year they made less than the did in the WWE and it doesn’t matter the hours they worked.  Bischoff then laughs that he is arguing finances with someone who appears on Fox News Business.

-JBL says the momentum changed with the Montreal Screwjob as it unleashed Mr. McMahon.  Bischoff points out that his heel character predated Mr. McMahon by over  a year and Prichard shoots that down and says it didn’t play a part in Vince’s decision.  Eric rolls his eyes at that thought and I tend to agree with him.  Prichard says McMahon fought against being on TV and was only at ringside in Montreal because he felt he needed to be there if a pissed off Bret pissed wanted someone to fight.  Prichard says that Vince thought the famous  “Bret screwed Bret” pormo was a babyface promo and.  He says that Vince didn’t want to be an evil character.  Bischoff says that what they are saying is that had he not hired Bret, WCW would still be on top and Prichard says probably. That makes Eric feel great as they all laugh and joke about it.

-JBL kisses more Vince ass as he mentions that he keeps hearing that Vince is losing it.  Yet, WrestleMania is such a big attraction that cities bid on it.  They talk Vince stories as he feels sleep is the enemy.  JBL says Vince is one of the most unique individuals and that while he likes the guy, he is crazy.  Prichard talks about when he came in the company in 1987 everyone was saying that Mania III was the peak and that Vince couldn’t do anything bigger.  Vince was telling Prichard way back then that they were going to go public one day and have their own network.  This was before the internet and everyone was laughing at Vince.  When they finally went public, Vince told him that they had the money now for a network.  JBL asks Prichard how many times Vince has fired him and he says twice.  He then corrects himself and says Vince fired him once and his daughter fired him the other time.

-Bischoff wonders how they all became friends considering the different background.  JBL says that Prichard hired him and Bischoff got him a big raise.  He tells the stroy of going to do a show in Japan right after Montreal.  He noticed Eric at the airport bar and decided to have a beer with him.  The boys told Vince and they were worried JBL was having a secret meeting to jump, so the WWE offered him a new contract worth twice the money.

-Bischoff brings up becoming friends with them when he came to the WWE and it was fascinating as he was viewed as the devil.  JBL interrupts to point out there was never any animosity between the boys as they were all doing a job to fight for the company that employed them.  Bischoff mentions that Prichard was his producer and they got along great from the start.  He is still amazed how easily he was accepted into the WWE.  He says that each of them came into this business from the bottom up as they didn’t get a free ride essentially.

-Prichard brings up meeting JBL for the first time as he thought he was a clumsy version of Stan Hansen.  They have always had an open and honest relationship.  He calls JBL a genius and that he was never “Justin Hawk Bradshaw” or the original Acolyte.  He always just saw him as John Layfield and felt he could succeed as John Layfield.  Prichard went to Vince and went to bat for the JBL character.  Vince’s caveat is that he didn’t want to lose the Bradshaw name.  JBL says that he never understood why Vince liked that name so much.

-Prichard says that nobody wanted to work with Eric so it was given to him because they had no history together.  He says that Eric kicked their asses and he wanted to pick his brain.  He loved working with Eric.  He tells a story of doing a segment early in Eric’s run and as they weree going to shoot, Bruce gets a personal call from his wife.  Eric knows it’s not a good call and he tells Bruce that he has this and then stays there to make sure things are okay with Brice and his family.  That meant a lot to Bruce and he knew Eric was a good guy.

-They talk about putting politics to the side and in the end you are just there for your friends.  They wrap things up with a final drink together as they say “cheers.”

-This show clocked in at 27 minutes which is the longest Table for 3 I believe.  This was fascinating to watch and I loved the opening rehashing of the Monday Night Wars and you can see that there are still some old wounds even as it was 3 friends talking to each other.  At times it came off as the WWE guys ganging up on Bischoff, but JBL did a decent job of trying to stay somewhat neutral.  The back half about how they all became friends may not have been as noteworthy, but I enjoyed the stories.  Prichard nearly getting emotional towards the end talking about Bischoff wasn’t expected, but was a nice moment.  This is definitely one of the better episodes of this show and every wrestling fan should spend the 30 minutes to check it out at least once.