“Le Champion” Chris Jericho recently spoke with Sportskeeda for an interview to promote this Saturday’s AEW ALL OUT 2020 pay-per-view at Daily’s Place in Jacksonville, Florida.
During the discussion, the “Demo God” of AEW and the leader of the Inner Circle spoke about Brock Lesnar possibly joining the mix in All Elite Wrestling following recent rumors of his WWE contract expiring, his own AEW status, his thoughts on Maxwell Jacob Friedman (MJF) and Jon Moxley topping the PWI Top 500 list for 2020.
Featured below are some of the highlights of the new Chris Jericho interview.
On not seeing himself wrestling anywhere but for AEW for the time being: “I never put a time limit on anything that I do wrestling-wise. I mean, I thought, back in 2015, it was time to wrap it up and then I got into the angle with Kevin Owens and things became fun again – which led to me going to Japan, which made it even more fun, which led to me coming to AEW, which is the best time I’ve had in the business in 10 years, 15 years maybe. So I won’t go anywhere. I have no intention of leaving AEW and I have no intention of not wrestling – but even if I don’t wrestle ever again, I’ll just be a commentator after that – which is something that I never really thought about until I had to do it where we filmed four weeks of TV in one day and I just said, “Well, just put me on commentary. That way we don’t have to worry about angles,” because I really had no storyline to talk about at the time, “so let me just do commentary.” Suddenly, that became a thing. So yeah, there’s no reason for me to go anywhere. I’m very happy in AEW. I’m very creatively stimulated here and I enjoy coming to work every time, every week, every month, whenever it may be, and to me, the fact I’m having as much fun as I’m having and doing the work that I’m doing now after almost 30 years in the business is a testament to the longevity that I have and also to the great environment that AEW is providing for me.”
On the possibility of Brock Lesnar coming to AEW following rumors of him becoming a free agent with his WWE contract expiring: “The only reason why the rumor’s there is somebody said “free agent”. I don’t think he’s really a free agent at all. I think it would take so much money to pry him away from Vince McMahon on Brock’s end and then for Vince to approve that…I mean, Vince has two billion dollars in the bank. What are you going to spend on Brock Lesnar that Vince isn’t going to match? And Vince and Brock have a strange love affair, to begin with. So would Brock fit in at AEW? Would he pay back his salary that you would pay him to be in AEW? Who’s to say, but I think UFC, AEW… I think it’s just another one of the dances that Vince and Brock like to have where Brock’s contract expires, Vince lets it expire, and then they stay away from each other until the next Saudi Arabia show or the next show that has people in the crowd, or WrestleMania, whatever it may be. So I don’t think Brock is really a free agent in the sense of the word, I just think he’s like currently not under contract right now. The amount of money it would take him to tear him away from from the world of WWE would, A, be astronomical, B, Vince will never allow it to happen and, C, I don’t know if you could make that investment back, or if it would even be worth it for AEW at this point in time or UFC, or any company other than WWE.”
On what he thinks about AEW performer MJF: “I think MJF is great. He is wise beyond his years, he’s experienced beyond his experience, so to speak, in the ring and he’s a great heel, he’s a great talker. He’s still learning a little bit about his character, how far he can go either way with the goofiness of it but, whether he’s the Champion this week or not, either way, he’s worthy of that spot. And he’s in the main event of our pay-per-view that people are going to pay to see so it doesn’t matter if he wins or not, so hopefully he wins. If he doesn’t, it’s just another step to making him a top draw for AEW. He’s done so much of it on his own and now being put in that position of being in the main event and possibly winning the Championship, that does nothing but good for him, for Moxley, and for our company.”
On Jon Moxley coming in at number one on this year’s Pro Wrestling Illustrated annual PWI Top 500 list: “I mean, I don’t disagree with it. I mean, I should be number one on every list ever published from now till the end of time but if it’s not going to be me, I think it should be the guy who has made the biggest transition from WWE to AEW and also taking AEW directly on his back. Again, he won the title about two weeks before a freaking pandemic shut everything down. So he’s done a great job with that situation that he was put in. I think I would put him at number one. There’s a couple other guys you could put in there but Mox has given his heart and soul to AEW, and he’s a completely different performer than he ever was under any other name in any other company. And this is the guy that I think he always envisioned he could be and that I envisioned he could be when I started recruiting him to come to AEW a year and a half ago.”
Check out the complete Chris Jericho interview at Sportskeeda.com.
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