Former WWE creative team writer Jimmy Jacobs recently appeared on the "Insiders" podcast to discuss a number of topics such as how when he first arrived in WWE he found out that everybody is so scared of Vince McMahon and that his closest friend, who was also on the writing team, almost got fired because he walked into Vince's office without knocking.
Jimmy Jacobs said:
"Vince is a legend. Anything I say, it's with a certain amount of respect and love, and it's only from the perspective and the experience I had there. So none of it is meant to disparage him because it's his company. It's his sandbox. You're playing it. That's what you have to understand when you're there. You go, 'Why isn't this different? Because it's not your show. That was my motto. That was my mantra. It's not my show. If it was my show, this is how I would do it. It's not my show, so we're gonna do this.”
“When I first got there, I thought that Vince was going to be a dude, a billionaire, but a dude. Like when I first got there, I was like, why is everybody so scared of Vince? Everybody, like, just treat him like a human, guys. What are you talking about? Then I learned almost immediately I was like, oh, yeah, and I started becoming scared of Vince. One of my first, maybe my first month there, my closest friend on the team, on the writing team, almost got fired because he came into Vince's office without knocking. Vince had said,' Fix up this promo and come back to me.' So he fixes the promo and he comes back to him. He doesn't knock, and Vince wanted to fire him. Dave and Ed, great bosses, great dudes, they saved him. The guys name was Ryan Callahan. Saved his job. He just, have to go on the home team. Can't go on the road and be in front of Vince. He’s got to bring him to the home team. Ryan, Callahan, not Ward, Ryan was an incredible writer, and he's there now. He's one of the lead writers of SmackDown. He's brilliant guy. You start to realize that you're one weird interaction with Vince away from being in the doghouse or being fired. Then you just start to behave in a way to try to not get fired. Then your ideas become ideas in an effort to not get fired. Pretty soon you have a whole bunch of people that are playing to not lose instead of playing to win."
You can check out Jimmy Jacobs' full comments at this link. H/T to WrestlingNews.co for transcribing the above quotes.
