Chris Jericho would suffer one of the most embarrassing losses of his professional wrestling career at AEW Dynamite: Winter is Coming.
In one of the most surprising results in AEW’s short history, Jericho would lose via pinfall to relatively unknown wrestler Action Andretti, who was described as a jobber by Le Champion earlier in the night. It was later announced that Andretti was the newest signing to All Elite Wrestling by president Tony Khan.
Chris Jericho Was Defeated By Action Andretti In Andretti’s Debut Match
While the fans in attendance were ecstatic with the shocking result, many fans were unaware of who Action Andretti was before this match took place, with the recent signee not being seen on AEW Dynamite or Rampage before the Winter is Coming special.
Speaking on Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer stated that the reason why Andretti was put in the high profile position was becasue Jericho was impressed by Andretti’s performance on AEW Dark:
“The story behind this is that Action Andretti had a match on one of the streaming shows (Dark) against QT Marshall, and Chris Jericho was watching the match, and decided at that moment, ‘This guy’s gonna be a star’.
“And so he decided that he was going to make him a star.”
Meltzer would continue, mentioning that the decision was made some time ago, but would have to wait as Chris Jericho was already involved in various feuds involving the ROH title.
“This was way back, he had all this stuff to do, the Claudio feud, these other matches… This match on this date, this was not something where it was decided like yesterday. This was weeks and weeks and weeks ago.”
Jericho has pitched multiple ideas to Tony Khan to elevate other talent within the company. Recently, The Ocho revealed that he asked Khan to sign another former Ring of Honor World Champion to AEW.
H/t to WrestleTalk for the use of transcriptions