Vince Russo Comments On Conspiracy Theory That Vince McMahon Sent Him To Work For WCW
In the past, Vince Russo was at the center of the rumor that he was a mole during his time in WCW — a sleeper agent, sent by Vince McMahon to torpedo the competition. However, in an interview with the "Insight" podcast, Russo outright denied such a conspiracy theory.
"Anybody can look at WCW ratings, and they can look at the first three months before Vince Russo got there," Russo said. "Then they can look at the first three months when Ed Ferrara and myself started tearing down the building and building a new foundation. When you look at those first three months, bro, the ratings are going up." Russo stated that his and Ferrara's plans for the struggling company were working, as the two former WWE writers felt that they needed burn down the company and start anew.
"We've got to build new people, we got to build new stars. It was working perfectly," Russo recalled. "Then of course, bro, politics played its ugly head." Russo then went home during that stressful stretch with WCW, and different people were brought in.
"In the three months that we had built, after three months, bro, they had brought it right back down to where it was before we got there," Russo lamented. Russo was asked to return to the company and he did, but the former WCW World Heavyweight Champion was not in an optimistic headspace.
"I knew we lost the audience," Russo admitted. "I knew there's no way we're gonna get the audience back. We had them, we were building for three months, then they went backwards three months to the same crap they were doing. It's done, it's over."
According to Russo, he only returned to the company out of contractual obligation, as he didn't believe there was anything that could be done to save the company. WCW was sold to WWE less than two years after Russo joined the company.