During the latest episode of 83 weeks podcast, Eric Bischoff discussed AEW and how they've been performing on TNT. Bischoff feels the company has flatlined in terms of viewership. 

"I think it’s going to come back and bite him in the a*s is what I think.  Let’s be honest here.  We both have a lot of respect for AEW and the people in it, but, AEW, last week they did about 800,000 viewers which was a high water mark for them over the past several months.  They opened the door with 1.5 million viewers when they premiered and they haven’t been able to crack a million since, or if they have, it’s only been on one or two occasions.  They’ve essentially flatlined at around 7 or 800,00 viewers on average for the last year and a half.  That’s an observation that could, unless something turns around in the next 18 months, come back and haunt someone like Chris because quite frankly, AEW has flatlined.  It’s been that way essentially for a year.  That includes pre-Covid so there’s no Covid excuse built into the equation here.  Going back to probably the second or third episode up until we are now, it’s basically 7 or 800,000 viewers and it has flatlined. 

What’s the solution there?  What’s the problem there Chris.  I love Chris.  He’s a good dude.  He’s a great dude and a good friend, but it’s easy to talk about the business that you’re not really in from a management point of view.  It’s easy from the outside, not suggesting that Chris isn’t in the wrestling business in case people are dying to jump on something I say, but Chris has never run a wrestling business.  Chris has participated in the wrestling business as one of the best performers in the last 20 years, but Chris has never run a wrestling business.  When he made that statement, he was making it from the position of a talent, not an executive who experienced different things in the industry.  It’s easy to have an opinion about something you never actually have done.  It’s easy to have a theoretical perspective on something as complex as running a wrestling company and because you’re in the business in one way, you feel like your opinion is valid with regard to things you have no experience in, but it’s really not."

Thanks to WrestlingNews.co for transcription.