Ever the master of reinvention, Chris Jericho has taken on numerous personas throughout his decades-long career.
While he was in an alliance with Kevin Owens in 2016, he began to rail against what he perceived to be unjust treatment from then-General Manager Mick Foley and began putting people’s names on a list. The List of Jericho became a staple of WWE programming, and fans grew fiercely behind Jericho and Owens in their blossoming friendship until it came to a crashing halt when Owens turned on Jericho during the Festival of Friendship ceremony in 2017.
Steve Corino Was The Inspiration Behind Chris Jericho’s List Of Jericho
Speaking on McGuire on Wrestling, former WWE employee Jimmy Jacobs revealed that he came up with the idea for the List of Jericho, taking inspiration from ECW legend Steve Corino.
“We were in Memphis and Jericho was going to come out and air his grievances against Mick Foley. I thought, ‘He should have a list of grievances, like a physical list.’ I thought about, in real life, Steve Corino has the Corino Sh*t List. The people who, in his life and in his career, they make his list and they are dead to him. I thought, ‘What if Jericho has the same sort of thing, except he’s super petty and puts all sorts of people on it for all different reasons.’
“Once I came up with that, I knew it was a good idea because I started having more ideas on top of it. That’s when you know you have a good idea, when you’re in a creative room and someone pitches something and a bunch of people start piling on, you know you have something with some legs.
“I came up with what I thought was good, I pitched it to Chris, and he was like, ‘So, you’re talking about doing this for more than just tonight?’ ‘Yeah, this could be your thing. You’ve been doing the gift of Jericho, drinking it in. This can be like the List of Jericho.’ He got it right away and added on to it and added the big clipboard and the way he would deliver the click of the pen. He really brought it to life. It was a fun time getting a thing that hit the bullseye.
“For a while, that would get the biggest reactions on Raw, when Chris Jericho would put your name on the list. That’s what you build to.”
h/t Fightful