Raw Is Jericho

I will start out by saying that Chris Jericho is my all time favourite wrestler. Apologies therefore if this seems a little (or a lot) biased. When I was in my wrestling watching prime as a teenager, I modelled my look on Jericho's. I bleached my hair blond and grew out a beard to look similar to the photo on the right. Perhaps not quite as muscular, and I was never able to pull off a shiny shirt quite as well, but otherwise it was basically the same look.

I remember the first time he appeared on Raw. There was the Y2J countdown on the Titantron for weeks before he turned up, and I recall thinking: "who is this guy?" I never watched ECW or WCW so he turned up and I had no idea who he was.

I quickly started to like him. The sense of fun and his constant mockery and smack talk endeared him to me as it appealed to my childish side. It is sports entertainment, and Jericho provides a lot of entertainment. 

One of my favourite wrestling moments, was when Jericho became the first ever undisputed champion at Vengeance 2001. It seemed like he wasn't the obvious choice to be the champ over Stone Cold, Kurt Angle and The Rock. It felt like my guy had taken on the establishment and won.

And no matter what happens, how many heel turns, how many losses to Fandango... he will always be my guy. The one that I root for no matter what. 

And that loss to Fandango hurt. Jericho has come and gone from WWE and for him to come back and lose to some nobody hurt. My guy doesn't lose to jobbers. Looking at it less emotionally, he was being a pro. Seasoned pros losing to new guys is what helps them get over, and that's what Jericho was doing here. It's one of the reasons I admire Cena - his willingness to lose to less established stars every so often. 

The difference is that Cena generally loses to mid carders to elevate them to main event status - Kevin Owens, AJ Styles and the like. This loss was to someone who hadn't even wrestled a match before. And it hurt.

Since then, Jericho has been in a number of rivalries, although none of them were terribly memorable. The brand split has really helped him though. He was drafted higher than many people thought he should have been, but he has proved his worth to the Raw brand.

The best of friends storyline with Kevin Owen has helped them both have a bit of focus and a sense of purpose. The List of Jericho is just brilliant and stupid fun, as is the fact that their opponents are going to get "it."

I would say that Jericho has elevated himself over the past couple of months to be on the verge of being a main eventer again. The fact that he was close to being added to the Universal Title match at Hell In A Cell shows that the organisation think of him this way too.

I can see Kevin Owens holding the title for a while and the logical way for the story to go is for either him or Jericho to turn on the other and lead to a title feud... with Jericho winning.... well a boy can dream.