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In 2019, WWE added two new roles to their backroom management team, with both WWE RAW and SmackDown getting Executive Directors to run the roost on each brand. RAW got Paul Heyman while SmackDown's Executive Director role was filled by Eric Bischoff, former WCW President who also played a character on-screen in WWE.
Bischoff was relieved of his duties just four months after he took up the role in June 2019. He was replaced by Bruce Prichard, who is the Executive Director of both RAW and SmackDown currently.
The former WCW President, in a recent interview, spoke about taking up the role as Executive Director of SmackDown and revealed the reason why he took it up.
Eric Bischoff on why he took up the role as WWE SmackDown Executive Director
Eric Bischoff, in an interview with Stephanie Chase of Digital Spy said that he had no regrets taking up the role. He said that working with the likes of Prichard and Paul Heyman was what excited him about the role.
"I was excited about working with my friend Bruce Prichard and I was looking forward to working with Paul Heyman. Paul Heyman and I have known each other and worked in the same company off and on since 1987. So I'm very familiar with Paul. But when the opportunity came for me go to SmackDown, both Paul and I had reached a stage in our lives where the potential of working together, at least in my mind, provided a much bigger opportunity than it might have 10, or 15, or 20 years earlier, because we were two different people. I think Paul has matured and evolved much like I have, it just comes with age."
Bischoff said that he "gravitates" towards the "impossible", and felt that becoming SmackDown Executive Director was seen as impossible by many people.
In the same interview, he stated that he wasn't unhappy about his WWE exit and said that there was "nothing personal about it". Bischoff has made a few appearances on AEW television since being let go by WWE last year.
