12 Misconceptions About WCW You Probably Believe
8. Thunder Was All Eric Bischoff’s Ego
WCW was winning the Monday night ratings war between Nitro and Raw when Thunder debuted on 8 January 1998. Therefore, it's easy to think that a swaggering Eric Bischoff wanted this new show as a means to stroke his ego and flex WCW’s dominance over the McMahons, but…he didn’t want it. Like, Bisch didn't want Thunder at all.
He was horrified when Turner top brass called him into a meeting and said they'd mandated another 2 hour show every Thursday night. Rightly, Eric didn’t think adding another couple of hours of TV to the WCW product load was a good idea, but he had no say in the matter and had to do as he'd been told. Make the best of it and smash it out of the park like you did with Nitro on TNT, kid.
Initially, Bischoff kinda wanted Thunder to be a vehicle for Bret Hart and separate his roster to give each show a more bespoke feel (pre-empting WWE's brand split from 2002), but that didn’t happen because TBS wanted all the big stars from TNT’s Nitro on their station too. Otherwise, what was the point in asking fans to tune into programming that didn't feature the red hot nWo or other top names?
Eric's hands were tied.
Thunder wasn't about ego, it was about milking the WCW cash cow dry for those at the top above Bischoff's head. Additionally, a freeze on hiring production staff made bolstering the weekly lineup even more difficult. WCW's road crew were knackered as it was, and the last thing they needed was another show to set up, run and produce on top of that.