In December 2022, Action Andretti made his AEW television debut on Dynamite: Winter Is Coming, defeating Chris Jericho in an upset that drew comparisons to the May 17, 1993 bout between Razor Ramon and “The Kid.” Following the match, AEW president Tony Khan announced that Andretti had signed a full-time contract with the company.
During a recent appearance on WTF with Marc Maron, Chris Jericho discussed the logic behind his loss to Action Andretti on AEW Dynamite and how the program had been planned since October.
You can check out some highlights from the interview below:
Chris Jericho on the logic behind his loss to Action Andretti: “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. 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 s***.’ Then the buzz starts going. ‘What’s going to happen now?’”
On creating a huge upset moment: “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 f***ing 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.”
Jericho on the television graphic showing his name after Andretti got the win: “It was a mistake, but it was a happy accident.”
