Eric Bischoff recently spent some time on his podcast discussing the commentary team in TNA during his tenure with the organization from 2010 to 2014. According to Bischoff, he wanted to hire Jim Ross to work for TNA in 2011.
Conrad Thompson asked Bischoff on the show what he thought of the commentary team of Mike Tenay and Taz that was in TNA at the time.
“I loved them both individually, I think they are both incredibly talented,” Bischoff said about the team. “I’ve said this before, I’ll say it again, and I’ll probably keep saying it until the day I can no longer say it. You’ve got two guys doing color. There was no play-by-play and I think that doesn’t serve the product.”
Bischoff continued to say that Mike Tenay was great at color commentary but did not know how to do play-by-play.
“To me as a producer, it was a huge, glaring, blackhole and a void in the product.”
Bischoff then said that it was the reason why he tried to get Jim Ross to TNA in 2011.
“It’s one of the reasons why I was instrumental in supporting Jim Ross coming to TNA,” he continued. “I was the one who supplied Dixie Carter with Jim Ross’ phone number to get that ball rolling. I knew we needed a good play-by-play guy with Taz in order to complete the story, complete the package.”
Ross never did sign with TNA. He continued to be employed by WWE at the time up until being fired in 2013.
Bischoff’s comments can be heard in the player below: