10 Iconic Wrestling Images That Show History Repeating
6. Paul E & Easy E
The above graphic was produced by WWE as blockbuster news broke of a June 2019 restructure that seemed almost entirely in tribute to how the wrestling landscape had looked nearly two decades earlier.
With ratings tumbling, Vince McMahon bizarrely turned to a past he'd previously bantered off to try and make the future a little brighter. Naming Paul Heyman and Eric Bischoff as Raw and SmackDown Live "Executive Directors", the Chairman allowed the respective former ECW and WCW chiefs a chance at managing his brands.
The positions reimagined the creative process somewhat, but the organisation's familiar failings (systemic rot, McMahon's own narrow-lensed autocracy, browbeaten roster) overpowered any creativity either man still had in the chamber.
Bischoff was gone amidst rumours of staff hardly ever seeing him outside of catering, while Heyman's short-term position of power seems to have done him few political favours. AJ Styles, Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson have all been outspoken critics of the now-former Raw and SmackDown boss, with 'The Phenomenal One' requesting a move to SmackDown to avoid working alongside him in the wake of his friends' April 2020 firings.