After Vince McMahon went through his “poor, pitiful me” stage, and got down to business to stop the bleeding that Eric Bischoff and WCW had caused his company, through the process of turning it all around, I think it’s very fair to say that Vince was 100% focused on the matter at hand.
Once the wheels of the Attitude Era were put into place, from that moment on, neither Vince or myself were worried about what Bischoff and WCW were doing on the other channel on Monday Night. The only thing we were concentrated on was what we needed to do as a company to take back what was rightfully ours.
With that being said, as the ratings would come in every Tuesday, Vince would just look at that number and say, “Vince, we work damn hard for those 3’s”. The reason Vince was so cool, calm and collected was because he knew that we were on the right track. He knew that if we stayed consistent with what we were doing that it would only be a matter of time before we overcame WCW.
However . . .
It was sometime in early summer of 1998. I am bad with dates, and times, and I publicly admit that. However, I can remember landmarks, things of major importance. Then, when I combine that with the surroundings of the event, it usually brings me closer to the time line. In this instance, it was probably about May 1998, and how do I know that? Because it was the exact same time that Stephanie McMahon graduated from Boston University.
And, here’s why that is of major importance when it comes to the history of the Monday Night Wars:
Publicly, no matter how arrogant or pompous that Eric Bischoff was acting at the time, Vince McMahon never let on – in a public forum anyway – that EB and his antics were getting under his skin. If anybody, Vince understood that it was all business, and also knew damn well that he had taunted regional promoters himself when he was younger until putting the majority out of business.
