On a recent appearance on Busted Open Radio, Chris Jericho spoke about the upcoming USA Network debut of NXT, and how Vince McMahon getting his hands on the show will affect it.
“If it’s another show on the USA Network – not on FS1, and not on the WWE Network. If it’s an official, legitimate, nationwide cable show on the USA Network, do you think Vince McMahon is going to be involved in it? Of course he is!” Jericho exclaimed. “It’s Vince McMahon; he is a genius. But here’s the thing – I think the appeal of it is that it’s its own little entity outside the WWE, and when Vince McMahon gets a hold of it and gets involved with it it is going to become another SmackDown and another RAW.
“I think you are going to see all three of those shows interacting with one another,” Jericho continued. “I think it’s going to be just another WWE show, so whatever the appeal is with NXT, whatever the specialness of it is is going to be changed to another RAW and another SmackDown. I think if you like RAW and SmackDown then you’re going to like NXT on Wednesday nights. If you don’t, then I don’t think you’re going to like NXT on Wednesday nights because there’s no way that Vince McMahon is going to stay home and not be involved with it. That is what he does, so, great. I think it’s another 2 hours of incredible WWE programming on Wednesday nights. If you love WWE then there’s more for you to love, and if you don’t, then I don’t think it’s going to make a difference.”
He said that AEW will have to capitalise on the “cool factor” that the company has, being the new kids on the block, and that no matter how much Cody and the Bucks will want to avoid a wrestling war, it is now unavoidable.
“You do have the cool factor in right now. Part of it is because we are brand new and it’s always cool to have brand new, but we never came into this trying to be in a war or go to battle anybody. Obviously, we are all grown ups here. The very fact that we exist, the war begins,” Jericho explained. “But I think the war started when Chris Jericho signed with AEW – I think that was the first real deal thing. I think that started a war in Vince McMahon’s mind. I think he likes it, I think he thrives on it which, of course, he does because this is what he has done his whole life, and he wins every war he has been in. I told the guys in AEW, ‘There is going to be a war’. Their response is that we don’t want a war but I told them that it doesn’t matter what you want, there’s going to be one. I said, ‘Let’s have some fun with this’.”
