Eric Bischoff Explains Why the WCW Women’s Division Didn’t Take Off, Talks Current Women’s Wrestling Scene

– During the latest 83 Weeks, Eric Bischoff discussed why WCW’s women’s division never went anywhere and how women’s wrestling is different today. On the episode, Conrad Thompson discussed the match between Madusa and Luna Vachon at Slamboree 1997 and asked why the women’s division never took off.

“Well, there just wasn’t as many credible, athletic, believable women in 1997 as there are today,” Bischoff said. “It wasn’t like there were women all overt the United States, or all over the world, training to become professional wrestlers, number one. There was no Performance Center, not too many women were interested in coming down to the Power Plant to train, to become professional wrestlers. You couldn’t really put an ad in the paper and expect to have much luck. So there just wasn’t the talent pool in 1997 of women wrestlers as there are today. It wasn’t until recently — we’re talking about 2019.”

Bischoff pointed out that many of the women competing on the indy scene and in the bigger promotions were influenced and brought in by the expansion of WWE’s women’s division during the 1990s.

“Now, you know, you look at WWE’s roster and you can look at the independent scene and find a lot of women out there performing on the independent scene today,” he said. “But they’re doing so as a result of what probably took place primarily in WWE back in the mid- to late-90s and early 2000s, when all of a sudden WWE was making room for women wrestlers. Granted, the way they were making room for them creatively was not anything like it is today. And the world has changed, everything has changed.”

He concluded, “But go back to 1997 and make me a list of all of the women who were available on a worldwide basis to create a division from, and you have a small handful of people. A handful of women. That was the reason why we never did more. That was the reason why in 1997, we didn’t get the traction the women’s division is getting today, is because there were no women desiring to become professional wrestlers. Or if there were, they were in small pockets and not very many of them. And quite truthfully, those that were there weren’t really all that great. That’s the reason.”

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit 83 Weeks With with a h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.