10 Things Paul Heyman Wants You To Forget About ECW

9. Getting Paid By Vince McMahon

To the ECW faithful, the WWF and WCW were the scum of the professional wrestling. Vince McMahon's promotion was stealing all of ECW's ideas and stars, cared more about wrestler's height/weight than their talent, and had admitted that wrestling wasn't legitimate. WCW was run by the Devil himself, Eric Bischoff. WCW had fired Paul Heyman so Heyman had made it his personal mission to see World Championship Wrestling in ruins. However, while the WWF may have been criticized on ECW's television, they would never think of taking it too far because of one simple fact. Paul Heyman was on Vince McMahon's payroll. Heyman and McMahon struck a deal which allowed McMahon to use Heyman's wrestlers while ECW was allowed to promote themselves using Vince's television. In February 1997, with most of the WWF's wrestlers on an overseas tour, ECW was permitted to "invade" Monday Night Raw and put on matches. It was the first mainstream exposure of the ECW product and Heyman has McMahon to thank for it. Later on, when Vince started to sign Heyman stars, he simply started paying Paul Heyman a weekly salary. This money helped keep ECW afloat long after it should have went out of business. Heyman admits on his DVD that the WWF was paying him $1,000 due to a sponsorship agreement. There are claims that number was actually higher but, either way, McMahon himself was helping to pay the bills.