The storyline that saw Ric Flair getting promoted to co-owner of WWE was quite the mixed bag for WWE. While it gave the legendary performer something to do during a not-so-great time in his career in terms of his in-ring work, it also didn’t pan out as well as Vince McMahon & Co would have liked, although it did bring to fans the oft-criticized draft system.
Speaking recently about this period in WWE on his Something to Wrestle with Bruce podcast, specifically WWE Armageddon 2002, Bruce Prichard revealed that Vince wasn’t a fan of Flair’s promos during this phase, but that was not entirely the 16-time world champion’s fault:
“I don’t think he was a big fan of Ric’s promos by any stretch of the imagination. But also, in this era of Ric being the “owner” or general manager and whatever the hell it was, it was trying to present Ric in a different way, represent a different side of him, a business side of him, and not to be that character that he had been for all those years as a performer. We were looking for a different side of him (h/t to Sportskeeda).”
Flair ultimately went back to only wrestling in the company after recovering from his crisis of confidence, while McMahon ruled WWE with an iron fist until mid-2022.
