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On a recent episode of his podcast 83 Weeks, former SmackDown executive Eric Bischoff discussed the debut of SmackDown on FOX. The first episode of SmackDown on FOX saw Kofi Kingston defend the WWE Championship against Brock Lesnar. Kofi's 180-day title reign came crashing down in under 10 seconds, as Brock beat him with one F5.
Bischoff said that he was not a fan of Brock Lesnar facing Kofi Kingston because, in his opinion, it was not believable. Bischoff went on to say that the match was "set up for disaster".
Eric Bischoff on Kofi Kingston's reign as WWE Champion
Eric Bischoff also said that he wasn't the biggest fan of Kofi Kingston's run as WWE Champion. He felt that the storyline did not feel very organic:
I think they pushed too hard. I don’t think it was too early, but it didn’t feel organic to me. It felt a little too contrived for my taste. That’s just my taste. I need something to be believable in order for me to get really excited about it. I need to see a story that I can kind of wrap my head around and allow myself to get sucked into as opposed to a premanufactured push. It’s a little bit like Roman Reigns a couple of years ago – when you try too hard, sometimes you don’t reach a level of success you’re capable of reaching because it doesn’t happen naturally. You don’t allow the audience to take you there, you’re taking the audience where you want them to be…..I just think it was a little too premanufactured for my taste. H/T: 411 Mania
Despite what Eric Bischoff said, it did look like fans were behind Kofi Kingston. Kofi had the fans behind him from the gauntlet match on SmackDown to the Elimination Chamber and all the way to him winning the WWE Championship from Daniel Bryan at WrestleMania. Kofi held on to the title until he faced Brock Lesnar on the debut of WWE SmackDown on FOX. Kofi and Xavier Woods were recently drafted to RAW in the WWE Draft while Big E will remain on SmackDown
