The Rise & Fall of ECW2004

Paul Heyman:
ECW was the first victim of the Monday Night War. Oh, in August 1995, WCW stole Chris Benoit and Eddie Guerrero and Dean Malenko all in one swoop.

Eric Bischoff:
I-I need to point out that one man's raid is another company's acquisition. We never raided anybody. We never raided the WWE, despite everybody's opinion to the contrary. We never raided ECW, we never raided anybody. I mean, when you think about it, did Vince McMahon raid all the local territories when he accumulated talent that made a decision that they would rather work for Vince McMahon as he was expanding his national territory as opposed to working for local promoters? Was that a raid? Certainly not in Vince McMahon's mind. Or certainly not in the minds of the people that work at WWE currently. Or the fans of WWE, or for that matter mine. Did some talent leave ECW and come to WCW? Of course they did. Because A, they probably weren't getting paid and they had to, in order to pay their bills and feed their families, and B, they recognized that WCW was a much stronger, much more secure, much larger international platform for them to ply their trade. Did they make that choice to come to WCW? Of course they did. Did some of them make those choices to go to WWE? Of course they did. But that's not a raid, despite what Paul Heyman and others would have you think.

Paul Heyman:
Eric Bischoff is full of sh*t. And much like a lot of other people, never gave ECW the credit that ECW deserved. Eric Bischoff stole Chris Benoit and Eddie Guerrero and Dean Malenko from ECW in one fell swoop. Same way he signed Chris Jericho from ECW, same way he stole the cruiserweights from ECW. And it was a smart move by Eric Bischoff to do it. Because he was in a competition with WWE and he had to have the talent, and he found it them in ECW before WWE had a chance to sign them as well. It was smart by Bischoff to do it. I just don't like the fact that he never says "Yeah, I stole them from ECW."