Eric Bischoff discussed Ronda Rousey on the latest episode of his 83 Weeks Podcast, just days after the former WWE star worked Friday’s ROH TV tapings.
Rousey had left WWE after the SummerSlam event in August, where Shayna Baszler defeated the former WWE Women’s Champion in an MMA rules match.
She worked a tag team match at the ROH TV tapings following Collision and Rampage this past week. Rousey was under a handshake agreement with the company, which hopes to use her again if she wants to do more matches in the future. The decision to broadcast the match on ROH TV was made to increase HonorClub subscriptions.
Bischoff believes Rousey is overrated in the wrestling industry and that she never clicked with him when she was getting a lot of attention in WWE.
“Eh, I think she’s….I don’t want to say [she’s] overrated, but I think in terms of the professional wrestling industry, she’s overrated,” Bischoff stated. “Obviously very accomplished mixed martial artists, very accomplished in judo. Phenomenal athlete, but she never clicked for me in WWE despite a push from the gods. She got an amazing push, but there was something lacking with her, and she never clicked with me. I don’t think she really clicked with the audience. Not long after she first arrived. I think the shine kind of wore off the star pretty quickly, and I never got the feeling that she was really serious about the industry.”
Bischoff stated that he does not believe Rousey did not give her all, but that it takes more than just the performance because he believes she never embraced wrestling. He mentioned her loss to Holly Holm in the UFC as a point where she whined a little and didn’t handle the fallout well in the media before joining WWE. It should be noted that after the Holm fight, she fought Amanda Nunes and lost before joining WWE.
“I just don’t think she’s as big a name as people sometimes think she is,” Bischoff stated. “I don’t think she’d matter to a buyer. I don’t think there’s going to be a media buyer out there or a programming buyer out there, or an executive that’s going, ‘Oh, wait a minute, you got Ronda Rousey. I wasn’t too sure about this deal, but now I really want to do it.’ I don’t see that.”
You can check out the complete podcast below:
(h/t to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription)
