Chris Jericho is quite proud of helping make Action Andretti a new star to keep an eye on in AEW.
The Ocho discussed this topic during his recent appearance on comedian Marc Maron’s WTF podcast, where he revealed some additional details about Andretti and when he came up with the idea to put over a “jobber” and turn him into a solidified name. Highlights from the interview can be found below.
Says he had the idea to have the match with Action Andretti back in the fall of 2022:
We did something, just a few weeks ago. I saw this kid back in October. Good looking kid, pretty agile, and I said, ‘Let’s do an interview with him.’ He was a good talker. I said, ‘Let’s hire him, but keep him at home, I have an idea.’ Action Andretti. Two or three weeks ago, I lost my title, and now I’m going to have a tune-up match against some jobber and I’m going to get back on track.
How much Andretti got over by beating Jericho in his debut match:
This kid comes out, we have a match, and I’m treating him like a jobber, a squash match. Throwing him around, he gets no offense, people are chanting, ‘Let’s go jobber.’ They’re behind it and laughing along. Hit him with my finisher. One, two, he kicks out. People are like, ‘Oh shit.’ Then the buzz starts going. ‘What’s going to happen now?’ We’ve never seen this guy on TV, ever. Then, we continue forward and suddenly, he gets me again. He hits me with this and that. Boom, boom, boom, hit me with a move. One, two, three. He wins. Crowd goes fucking crazy. He’s running around, slapping hands, people are going nuts. It’s one of the greatest moments we’ve had in AEW history because no one knew this guy, and by the end, we made a new star. It doesn’t hurt me to lose, and we made this guy. It’s about making stars and making people react. No one would’ve guessed he was going to win.
(H/T and transcribed by Fightful)