During a recent appearance on Spencer Matthews’ Untapped podcast, Chris Jericho discussed a host of topics related to his legendary career. But what he didn’t directly address was what wrestling promotion we’ll see him in next.
If anything, he only made clues about his future more murky.
The wrestling world has been speculating about Jericho for months as his AEW contract has either already expired or will do so soon. The 55-year-old icon could very well re-sign with Tony Khan’s company, but many fans
are clamoring for him to return to WWE, possibly even as a final run.
In November, the Wrestling Observer Newsletter reported strong interest from WWE in Jericho. According to Dave Meltzer, WWE pitched a retirement storyline to Chris, though there has been no indication on his part if he’s ready to hang up his boots just yet.
Jericho wasn’t questioned directly by Matthews about where he’ll be signing next, but he did have an opportunity to at least give a hint when asked to name the Mount Rushmore of his greatest opponents.
However, rather than listing either WWE or AEW stars, Jericho named wrestlers from both companies.
He began by talking about his picks for his “Mount Rushmore of inspirations.”
“The greatest of all time is Shawn Michaels. That’s the best for what I like in wrestling. And wrestling, it’s all subjective,” he said. “Shawn to me is was the best from a from an athletic standpoint, from a character standpoint, from a storyline standpoint. I don’t think it gets much better than than Shawn.”
He then said Ricky Steamboat, Owen Hart, and the British Bulldogs were all also big influences on his career.
“If you’re talking about Mount Rushmore of opponents that I’ve had, I’ll put Shawn Michaels on there,” Jericho continued. “I think [Jon] Moxley would be in there from our our work that we did in AEW, and in WWE when he was Dean Ambrose. I loved working with him. Great intensity.”
He added: “I had great chemistry with The Rock. It was very short because he left to do movies very early on. But when we worked together for about a year in the early 2000s, we never had a bad match, or a bad angle, or a bad promo segment. We were perfect foils for each other.”
Jericho next spoke about his rivalry with Kenny Omega and their 2018 Wrestle Kingdom match for New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW) at the Tokyo Dome. He further claimed that the match played a big part in the formation of AEW.
“We changed the business when we had our match at the Tokyo Dome, which at the time was crazy because nobody ever thought it would happen,” he said. “Digital streaming was through the roof for New Japan Pro-Wrestling, which then led to Tony Khan seeing and deciding that he could form AEW, because there was so much demand for wrestling that was not WWE.”
While the list of his greatest opponents was evenly split between WWE and AEW stars, Jericho at least sounded as if he’s still keeping in shape for a potential run somewhere.
“I’m probably in better shape than I was when I was 45,” he told Matthews. “I know I’m in better shape than I was a year ago from today.”
What do you think? Do you want to see a final run for Jericho in WWE or a return to AEW? Let us know in the comments.
