Eric Bischoff Compares David Arquette Winning WCW Title To Roman Reigns/Cody Rhodes

Celebrity crossover in professional wrestling isn't anything new, but sometimes it clicks and sometimes it doesn't. David Arquette winning the WCW World Championship in April 2000 is arguably the most notorious example of celebrities in wrestling not hitting the mark. Though, former WCW boss Eric Bischoff doesn't quite see it that way. And in fact, likened the moment's reception backstage to that of WWE's WrestleMania 39 main event outcome between Cody Rhodes and Roman Reigns.

"It wasn't that controversial when it went down," Bischoff declared on "83 Weeks." "You gotta realize, WCW was so far down morale-wise, ratings-wise, revenue-wise, organizationally ... so, any attempt to do anything that might work was generally fairly embraced." Bischoff dismissed the idea that Arquette winning the title was a ploy to boost WCW's ratings, saying rather that the belief was the company would get some play in the mainstream press rather than the wrestling press. He also said coming to the decision in the first place wasn't some long, drawn-out process between him and Vince Russo. And while he's sure some folks backstage didn't agree with the outcome, this wasn't an instance of heavy backlash.

"But under the circumstances that we were in, there was not a lot of pushback or people complaining about stuff," Bischoff continued. "Everybody was just hoping that something was going to click, and this was one of those," before noting that those in wrestling media at the time were writing things that weren't true. That's when he invoked Reigns going over Rhodes at WrestleMania. "Were there individuals backstage who didn't agree? Absolutely. The same way there were individuals backstage at WrestleMania that didn't agree with what WWE did with Cody Rhodes."

If you use any quotes from this article, please credit "83 Weeks" with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.