IWC Scum — A GOAT Amongst the Sheep (Put Some Respect Baaack on Chris Jericho’s Name)
Welcome once again to the type of clickbait that puts the incessant woofing and chirping in IWC. I’m the crude columnist known as SkitZ, and these animal puns are spiraling out of control.
Blame my girlfriend who has me feeding birds and squirrels before breakfast, and leaving leftovers out at night for the skunks and racoons. These Italians aren’t satisfied unless every man, woman, child and chipmunk is stuffed to the gills.
We were eating dinner with my lady’s parents two Saturdays ago, and after clogging our arteries on meatballs and eggplant parmigiana, the four of us melted into the living room couch cushions. Wrestling just so happened to be on TV in the background, and it was AEW Collision. The girlfriend and her dad used to watch WWE religiously when she was a kid and – to my delight – he didn’t groan and change the channel. We joked about how nearly every wrestler on the show wore a mask; one of them being Bandido, who was challenging Chris Jericho for his ROH World Title. I found myself getting sucked in as the match went along and thinking “the Nueve looks damn good for 54!”. Didn’t slow his opponent down or seem out of rhythm at all, contrary to the chatter on X about him being ass these days.
Now admittedly, it’s been a minute since I’d watched an entire Chris Jericho match, but I drove home from that one feeling pretty impressed. The weathered rockstar would drop an Instagram post praising his performance as you’d expect from him. He then followed it up with a similar post 3 days later touting the critical acclaim his match with Bandido had received, which cracked me up. That’s Chris Jericho in a nutshell. The living legend needs no hype man, because he’s a shameless self-promoter. Think Bret Hart, but far less bitter towards 90% of the wrestling business. Jericho is such a mark for himself that it’s become a more fitting first name than Chris. And there are plenty of big stars who’ve spoken at length about their own successes in interviews and podcasts over the years. The first-ever AEW World Champion just does it in a way that comes off a tad… braggadocious shall we say.
Hence where a lot of this Jericho hate stems from. The Learning Tree habitually whores out every resource within his reach, and he’s not even humble on paper (probably why he’s a multi-time bestseller though). Jericho never hesitates to put over his own stuff, and that rubs many people the wrong way. You may be one of the GOATs in wrestling, but if you’re referencing it more often than fans and critics, they’re going to revolt. There’s naturally gonna be WWE diehards who take the piss out of everything the guy does, but much of the blame belongs to these AEW fans being more wishy-washy than the touchless faucets in public restrooms. Like Jericho mentioned in his post, their chants changed from “please retire” to “thank you Chris” within the span of 10 minutes. In the words of the great Dave Chapelle, that’s a brittle spirit.
This so-called ‘Jericho Vortex’ strikes me as the type of shit storm a bunch of IWC nerds stir up for the sake of complaining. He’s been wrestling longer than the gap between Twister and its’ sequel, but The Learning Tree’s mindset for the business remains as limber as AEW’s overall roster. If anything makes Jericho look old or washed, it’s the fact that he works for a company full of highly athletic, spot-centric wrestlers. I’ve read the occasional tweet of “Jericho can only have the best match of the night if he’s the only match”, and it’s hilariously accurate. The Fozzy frontman is clearly in the Flair circa 2000s stage of his career, which means he still has the ability to put forth a good to great performance on any given night. They’re just fewer and farther between. Jericho’s the wily veteran who works with the younger talent, but doesn’t lose to them enough according to the internet. Has the man lost a few steps? Duh. Every pro wrestler reaches a natural decline once they hit route 50.
What really tickles my funny bone are these armchair experts banging on about Chris Jericho not elevating any of his rivals in AEW. Why on Earth would you expect a young star’s career to skyrocket after working with him when Y2J made a living from getting his own inventions over? Jericho’s job is to offer advice, experience and a platform for others to improve. It’s the other guy’s responsibility to seize the opportunity and keep ascending once he moves on. Plus let’s be real… a large portion of AEW’s roster hit their ceiling as soon as they walked through the door.
Jericho’s wrestling window might be closing, but he isn’t letting anyone else drop the curtains on his career. Why bother when there’s already so many fans throwing shade at him? You’ve gotta be the caboose of bandwagoners to bitch about Chris Jericho hogging the spotlight and stealing screen time from “more deserving wrestlers”. Le Champion hasn’t been anywhere near the AEW World Title in FIVE YEARS. He’s gradually moved down the card since then, and worked with just about every notable name in the company. The man could do no wrong pre-COVID, but everyone has seemingly grown sick of his shit since then, and I think it’s an overreaction.
From the stuff with Kenny Omega to The Inner Circle, Jericho helped launch AEW and Dynamite with a rock solid World Title reign that didn’t overstay its welcome. Between his feuds with MJF and the Don Callis Family, people love to criticize the lengths of Chris Jericho’s programs. They fail to realize that The Learning Tree’s trying to teach the importance of cohesive longform storytelling, which is an area the company often struggles with.
Speaking of plotholes, that whole narrative of the bestselling author actively ruining his legacy is a tired argument. Chris Benoit is the true embodiment of ruining one’s legacy. Wrestling into your 50s at the level that Jericho does it is no midlife crisis. Take the Nature Boy for example, who’s about 4 decades past his prime. No matter how many times the crazy old bastard rants online or comes out of retirement, he’s still Ric Flair – the greatest to ever do it in the eyes of many peers and pundits. Debate it until your thumbs are sore from button mashing, but Chris Jericho belongs in that same conversation.
He’s a GOAT amongst the sheep that live for leading his name to slaughter. Their tales of his demise are cock and bull. This man can wrestle for however long he damn well wants to. He’s earned that much. And folks are free to discredit Chris Jericho as often as they like, but feeling entitled enough to declare when a wrestler should retire is wild to me. The aging rocker suffered through a health scare and fat phase, but the only thing weighing him down now is his wallet. The dude‘s loaded. Jericho wouldn’t still be wrestling if he wasn’t passionate or genuinely enjoying it. The reigning ROH World Champ could easily be working a part-time schedule, yet he continues showing up and performing on a weekly basis. I respect the hell out of him for that.
The day will come when Jericho realizes he no longer has the body of work physically or creatively to carry on (and it’s quickly approaching), but that day’s not today. I could realistically picture him going full-time for another 2-3 years, which is probably a terrifying prospect for most of the people reading this. At least Jericho was merciful enough to spare us from a destined letdown against Sting. If Y2J were still donning the wrestling tights at 64, I’d have to come back and nuke this entire column.
Granted, Sting had something to prove in AEW after being sidelined for years in WWE, but that only makes Chris Jericho’s longevity all the more amazing to me. He’s gotten so much mileage out of his name value that people with short attention spans can’t fully appreciate it. The guy’s a rock star on the side for crying out loud! Throwing sticks and stones at The Learning Tree for his revolving door of cuckoo ideas has little effect on a man rooted in figuring out “what’s next?”; whether it’s inviting Goldberg onto his podcast, planning a cruise, or landing a brief but bloody role in Terrifier 3.
Chris Jericho is seen as an attention-seeking narcissist to a large section of the IWC, but it’s merely part of his charm to me. I admire The Nueve’s hustle, and the fact that his career has had 9 lives with no deadline in sight. Rather than resting on past accomplishments, the dude is constantly pushing forward and trying to evolve. Testing new gimmicks and catchphrases, writing autobiographies, recording hit songs, the list of Jericho goes on and on. He’s the ultimate showman, and you’re gonna hear about it ad nauseam anytime there’s a microphone nearby. The multi-faceted celebrity is skilled at so many things, and wrestling fans are the only ones who seem to hate him for it.
What a miserable bunch we can be. When the rest of you settle on another over-the-hill wrestler to target and torpedo on Twitter, feel free to circle back and put some respect on Chris Jericho’s name.
Twitter: writersblock_skitz (@SirSkitzAlot)
Email: skitztmrlop@gmail.com
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