Top AEW Star Believes Leaving WWE For AEW Was The ‘Greatest Risk Of Their Life’

WWE/AEW

When AEW launched in early 2019, many top names were announced as being among the initial roster for the upstart promotion.

One of the biggest names was Chris Jericho, who was tasked with carrying the brand for the first year as it’s inaugural world champion.

Jericho was a definite future Hall of Famer in WWE, so jumping from a guaranteed top spot to the new company was a major risk, and he himself believes it to be the biggest of his life.

Speaking on the Allison Hagendorf Show, Jericho was asked about the biggest risk he took in his life, to which he said:

“Probably leaving WWE to go with AEW, which was an unproven. We didn’t even have TV at the time, just my boss, Tony Khan had a lot of passion and he had the money for it. We had a roster of guys that I felt could do something, and then when I got involved we were able to get on TBS and then kind of went from there.”

“So I just think it was one of those things where I thought I have done all I can do in WWE, and I can stay here but I don’t want to just stay here, I don’t want to be just a guy. Let’s try and change history, let’s make wrestling a better industry, and we have done that. Because we now there’s a viable second company that people can work at and fans can watch.”

“But it was a real risk man, because WWE is such a monopoly for so many years, for us to come in there and get such a great demo and a great fanbase out of the gate was something I don’t think anybody really expected. They thought we’d be dead and gone in six months.”

transcription via WrestlingMania Fan

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• chris jericho
• AEW
• wwe

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