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JBL thinks Vince McMahon made a positive difference to the wrestling business.
The former WWE Chairman bought the company from his father in 1982 and transformed the wrestling business. He went back on all his agreements and began dismantling the territory system and taking the WWE national.
By 2001, the WWE was the only major wrestling company left, following the death of WCW. With WWE now signing multi-billion deals with Peacock and Netflix, there is no denying the impact Vince McMahon had on the wrestling business.
JBL spoke about Vince McMahon on a recent “Something to Wrestle” podcast (H/T to WrestlingInc for transcription).
He denied criticism that Vince McMahon was the worst thing to happen (his many crimes aside) talking about how awful wrestling promoters were before Vince McMahon became the top dog in the wrestling.
“People say, ‘Oh, Vince was the worst thing to happen to wrestling.’ I hear that a lot of times,” JBL said. “He took a company that he bought from his father for $1 million and sold it for $9.3 billion, and retained the rights. Now, I was in professional wrestling, and I was also in sports entertainment. There ain’t no comparison as far as money, as far as medical, as far as how you’re treated. What Vince did, he changed the business, massively, for the better.”
“I started in the territories, I saw how shitty it was,” JBL said. “I saw how shitty promoters were, how they treated you, I saw how you couldn’t do anything about it. But people talk about professional wrestling/sports entertainment, there is no comparison. And most of that is attributed to Vince McMahon. So when people say, ‘Vince McMahon really hurt wrestling.’ No, he didn’t. Brother, we’re standing on the pillars that he and Kevin Dunn built.”
