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Eric Bischoff Believes MJF Is One Of Wrestling’s Top Heels

By TJR Staff • Published 13th September 2022

Eric Bischoff has heaped praise on AEW star MJF, claiming he is one of the best heels in pro wrestling right now.

Maxwell Jacob Friedman made his triumphant return to AEW at All Out on September 4th. The star appeared under a mask early in the night as the Joker in the Casino Ladder Match and was helped to victory by Stokely Hathaway and several of his recent recruits. He later revealed himself following CM Punk’s World Championship victory over Jon Moxley

Before All Out, MJF had been absent from AEW TV since the June 1st edition of AEW Dynamite when he verbally eviscerated everyone and everything associated with the company.

MJF has many admirers for his work as a heel in AEW, including WWE Hall of Famer Eric Bischoff.

During a recent edition of his 83 Weeks podcast, Bischoff named MJF as one of the stars he would choose to start a new promotion with today, praising him as one of the top bad guys in the business.

“I don’t know, man, it’s too hard to pick talent like that. I mean, right off the bat, again, I’ve been saying this for a long time, I think MJF I’ve been saying it for at least a year and a half or two years, I think MJF is going to if he’s not one of the best heels in the industry right now he’s going to be, um just needs a little more time.
“Not because he needs to get better, he’s already great. But the wrestling audience is a weird audience. You know, they’re incredibly loyal, I think more loyal than maybe even NASCAR fans or pro sports fans in some cases.
“But they’re also very challenging in the sense that they don’t accept you right away, no matter how good you are, you have to earn their respect. And it’s hard for anybody who’s only been in the business for a year, or two, or three or four, even, to really get over with the audience.”

Bischoff went on to say that only two wrestlers have made it to the top in their first five years, The Rock and Goldberg. He explained that they had the advantage over MJF because of the way the industry was when they broke in.

“And if you go back in time, and you look at some of the biggest names in history of wrestling over the last, let’s just say 20 years, 25 years, there’s only two people that have made it to the top that haven’t been in the business for at least five or seven years. And that’s Rock and Goldberg.
“I think the reason that they were able to collapse that cycle, or that trajectory is because wrestling is so freakin hot at the time that they essentially broke in. And because they had such exceptional charisma, and they found their way with their characters and their personalities, and they were given the opportunity.
“Obviously, in Rock’s case with WWE and Goldberg’s case with WCW, they were given the opportunity to showcase that special charisma and that talent at a time when the wrestling audience was at a fever pitch. I mean, you could have vomited in the ring, and the vomit would get over at a certain point, that’s how hot wrestling was.
“So it made it easier for two people like Rock and Goldberg who are incredibly gifted. In the case of Rock, I mean, sounds silly to even say he’s gifted, he’s just amazing. But I don’t think either one of them would have had nearly the success they had if they made their debuts three years earlier.
“It was a perfect storm and it was their incredible personalities of talent combined with the peak of the wrestling industry at that point.”

H/T to Inside The Ropes for the above transcription.