Chris Jericho: "Most of the time when people work with me, they end up on a higher platform than they were prior"

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Originally published at Chris Jericho: "Most of the time when people work with me, they end up on a higher platform than they were prior"

Elevating the younger crop of talents has always been Jericho’s mission. 

The duo of Chris Jericho and HOOK scored a win over Toa Liona and Bishop Kaun on the Big Business edition of AEW Dynamite. Afterwards, Jericho approached HOOK for a singles match and it was set up for the 3/20 Dynamite in Toronto, Canada. 

HOOK and Jericho’s on-screen interactions were brought up during Jericho’s appearance on Gabby AF. Speaking about what he was involved in prior to working with HOOK, he stated that storylines got thrown through a loop when Kenny Omega was sidelined. He added that those remaining in the Don Callis Family story had to do their best. 

He went on to express that his mission in AEW has always been to elevate younger talents and added that contrary to popular belief, it usually works. 

Yeah, well, things got kind of thrown into a loop storyline-wise when Kenny (Omega) got sick and so, you do the best you can when you have to switch midstream and we kind of did the best we could with the Don Callis story and then it was kind of time to go into something new and the idea of working with HOOK was something I had thought about for a while and it just really kind of seemed to fit with the match that we had at Revolution with the eight-man Scramble and HOOK was in that and I thought, well let’s do something with this and the story’s just beginning. But, I think we got some good ideas and some good stuff going on. That’s kind of what my mission in AEW has been since day one is to do the best I can to elevate the younger guys and in contrary to popular belief, which you might see, it usually works. Most of the time when people work with me, they end up on a higher platform than they were prior. If you look at Orange Cassidy to Darby Allin to MJF… (Powerhouse) Hobbs and (Konosuke) Takeshita and all those guys. The list goes on and on and on. Even the guys in The Inner Circle and the Jericho Appreciation Society. I mean, look at Dani Garcia now compared to where he was a year ago. So, I think HOOK is another guy we’ve done a lot with, I think we can do some more with and add some depth to him and give him a little bit more experience because you’re only as good as the guys that you’re in the ring with and if you look at HOOK versus Samoa Joe, I think that’s probably the best match he’s ever had because Joe has such experience. I think with the experience that I have and then working with HOOK and his persona’s so unique and I think he’s lightning in a bottle, something that we can really get to the next level and that’s kind of what my idea is for this story.

Jericho reacted to comments he’s seen that have to do with people feeling Daniel Garcia began to grow once he got away from Jericho. While addressing that, he dove into his role in the development of Garcia, ‘Daddy Magic’ Matt Menard and ‘Cool Hand’ Angelo Parker. 

And that’s the thing when people are like, ‘Oh, Dani Garcia, once he got away from Jericho, he really started to blossom’ but it’s like, that’s where he kind of learned and got that confidence. When he first came into the Jericho Appreciation Society, I had those guys come in because the storyline worked. I didn’t know anything about any of them to be honest with you. (Angelo) Parker, (Matt) Menard and ‘Cool Hand Ang’, ‘Daddy Magic’. There was no Daddy Magic prior. It was Matt Menard. There was no Cool Hand Ang. It was Jeff Parker and the first thing I said was, ‘You guys gotta change your names…’ I said, ‘Who’s your favorite musical artist?’ And they said whoever it was. I said, ‘If you were going to an exclusive party hosted by this artist; it’s at the top of a penthouse, there’s gonna be Playboy models there, there’s gonna be influencers and celebrities. What would you wear? And I don’t care what that is. What would you wear to go to this top-level party? Because whatever it is, that’s what I want you to wear next week on TV’ and they all showed up with their various outfits and right away, they’re different guys. Dani’s a sports entertainer. When he said that he got heat, well, ‘I’ll try dancing.’ Dude, you need to entertain. Once again, great matches are important but character is everything. The dance put him into a completely different level. That wasn’t there before he was in Jericho Appreciation Society so, all of those things work to help build your persona and like I said, that’s something that I’m very proud of Dani for; what he’s able to do because he’s not the same performer he was two years ago when he first came into the JAS.

As of this writing, here’s the updated lineup for the 3/20 edition of Dynamite:

  • Chris Jericho vs. HOOK
  • AEW Continental Championship: Eddie Kingston (c) vs. Kazuchika Okada
  • TNT Championship — I Quit Match: Christian Cage (c) vs. Adam Copeland

If the quotes in this article are used, please credit Gabby AF with an H/T to POST Wrestling for the transcriptions.

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Mike Santana is laughing his ass off reading this

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In fairness, he said “most of the time” not “all the time”.

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How’s Action Andretti doing?

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You can joke but I think it’s fair to say most of the audience didn’t even know his name prior to the win over Jericho. I was in the crowd that night chanting “jobber”. So I would say the win over Jericho increased his recognition and value 10 fold. It’s on AEW and not Jericho that they haven’t done anything with him since.

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I’ll give Jericho some credit here. I don’t know how many stars he’s actually made along the way, but he’s consistently gone out there and worked hard and put pretty much everyone over outside of his initial title run. And this includes a literal jobber in Andretti who would probably be working security for Goldberg otherwise.

We’re always asking why guys like Miro and Malakai are never on TV but let’s be real… we know why they aren’t on TV at this point. That don’t work for them, brother. Jericho has done everything he reasonably could in his role as a performer to help out the rest of the AEW roster.

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@McGuire72 is bang on. There’s a lot that can be said and speculated about Jericho’s personal beliefs, actions, etc., and yes, I’m in the camp that is currently very burnt out on him (especially after the shock to the system which is the arrival of Ospreay, Okada, and Mone he just feels indicative of a whole other era of the company). But I do think that he gets a lot of unfair stick about leeching off of young talent. We can (and should!) look at how Starks and others have been used -after- their Jericho programs, but the programs themselves, and Jericho’s work within them, are almost always dedicated to building the younger opponent.

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The whole “leeching off hot talent” thing would fly with me if somehow Jericho actually benefitted from it. His angles of late seem to take him and his dance partners down together. It doesn’t strike me as malicious; he’s just in a creative funk.

A heel turn has been long overdue. Off the top of my head I can’t think of a single angle he’s had as a babyface that has worked out well. Like, maybe the MJF feud in bits and pieces? His track record as a heel in AEW is pretty great. He just can’t seem to get a handle on how to present himself as a face.

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Yep, and that’s not even taking into account a good portion of the fanbase’s predisposition to boo him for extra-narrative reasons (see also Sammy, whom TK seems pigheadedly dedicated to booking as a face despite his entire indie run and his natural talents). If you still want to get value out of Jericho, give him a few months off, then reintroduce him as a heel.

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The Action Andretti comment was a joke, but Jericho is in control of his own creative and whatever happened with that storyline was a mess. He shouldn’t have lost to Andretti if there was no plan after.

I think Jericho has actually been too forgiving and lost too much to be taken seriously. He is also extremely overexposed. He doesn’t need to be on TV every week.

I would say sit him for a few months and find something completely new for him to do. They don’t need him every week anymore

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My take is that Jericho is trying very hard to be a “good veteran”. He works with – and often puts over – younger talent and seems content being in the middle of the card as long as he’s still on TV and the checks clear. Unfortunately, (depending on your opinion of the Golden Jets), it’s been a couple years since he did anything interesting or had any standout matches.

I was very high on Jericho signing with AEW, and he was pretty important for the first year or two. I thought he would be more in the role that Sting ended up playing as an attraction, but also as a heel that’s super easy to heat up for a major program. Maybe he just hasn’t hit that part of his career yet. But currently, I agree that he needs to go away for a bit and then come back for a meaningful run of some kind.