WWE Hall of Famer and former WCW President Eric Bischoff took to an episode of his Strictly Business podcast, where he talked about a number of topics including why an investigation is needed for the CM Punk-Jack Perry incident if AEW President and CEO Tony Khan was standing right there in the middle of it all.
Bischoff said, “That’s another bulls**t thing, okay? I hear this so much, oh it’s under investigation. Tony was standing right there for crying out loud. It is what it is. What investigation? Are you calling in the CSI team? That kind of flakiness doesn’t work for me, brother. This is the time when a leader leads and if that means [he has to say], all of you that bought tickets because you thought CM Punk was going to be a part of this event, we apologize. The situation happened and it had to be handled in the correct way. For the sake of the rest of the roster and the business long term, we apologize he won’t be here this time. Maybe next time. Take the bullet. It’s a wound, it’s gonna bleed, it’s gonna hurt. You’re gonna limp a little after. But people will respect you for that, the rest of the roster will respect you, the fans will respect you. They may not like it at first, especially if they bought tickets because they wanna see Punk. But at some point, the answer is yes or no. Under investigation? For crying out loud. As much empathy as I have for Tony and as much as I’m trying to put myself in his shoes, because I’ve been in situations that are parallel in many respects, but you’ve gotta make a stand. Being wishy washy and saying we’re not really sure, you owe it to your audience to say yes he will or yes he won’t. There’s nothing wrong — if you need a compromise, because he was advertised, let him work the show and then suspend him. But this, I don’t know if he will or he won’t, that’s weak. I don’t care who you are, I don’t care how much you love AEW, that’s just weak.”
Bischoff also talked about how Tony Khan would actually earn the respect of the fans and the AEW locker room if he was just honest about the situation surrounding CM Punk.
“He would actually make himself a babyface. Social media is a hate fest, you’re gonna get people that are going to react negatively, but I would venture to say the vast majority of the audience would have some respect for Tony for having a backbone and because it also respects the rest of the roster, which is important. Here’s another advantage calling it down the middle and quit playing games with the audience, it holds Punk accountable. Tony didn’t choke Jack Perry. Tony didn’t do that, those two did that. Let them pay the price. That price also includes, aside if they’re suspended with or without pay, we don’t know that either do we. If they are suspended without pay, they’re also going to pay the price with the audience because the audience is upset with them instead of being upset with Tony. I don’t get it. This is not hard. You don’t have to call in the FBI or the Secret service. You don’t have to do any of that, you were standing right there.”
You can check out Eric Bischoff’s complete podcast below.
(H/T to Fightful for transcribing the above quotes)
