AEW original and former World Champion Chris Jericho has spilled the beans on All Elite Wrestling's formation. A part of the promotion since its inception in 2019, Jericho also happens to be the promotion's first World Champion.
A former ROH World Champion as well, Jericho has been absent from televised programming since AEW Dynasty 2025. While rumors and speculation have surrounded his current status, Jericho recently appeared in an interview with Spencer Matthews, where he opened up about the foundation of AEW. Naming his NJPW match with Kenny Omega as Khan's inspiration, Jericho shared more details about it.
“If you’re talking about the Mount Rushmore of opponents that I’ve had, I’ll put Shawn Michaels on there. I think Moxley would be in there from our work that we did in AEW and in WWE when he was Dean Ambrose. I loved working with him. Great intensity,” Jericho said. “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, bad angle, or bad promo segment. We were perfect foils for each other.
“Then I think maybe Kenny Omega had put on there. We never had the same thing. 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. We’re both from the same small town in Canada called Winnipeg,” he continued.
“We packed the Tokyo Dome. The 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. So those are my four from an opponent’s standpoint.”
In 2017, Jericho returned to NJPW after a span of almost 20 years and challenged Kenny Omega to a match at Wrestle Kingdom 12. The duo faced each other in 2018 at Wrestle Kingdom 12 in a highly praised match that ended in a no-disqualification.
