Chris Jericho Reveals Catchphrase That Surprised Him The Most, Sounds Off On “Please Retire” Chants In AEW

Chris Jericho recently appeared as a guest on the popular INSIGHT with Chris Van Vliet podcast for an in-depth interview covering all things pro wrestling and AEW.

During the discussion, the ROH World Champion reflected on six years of AEW, “please retire” chants from fans, the Jericho Vortex, the catchphrase that surprised him the most and whether or not he chooses his opponents.

Featured below are some of the highlights from the interview sent to us directly by Chris Van Vliet, where Chris Jericho touches on these topics with his thoughts.

On the Jericho Vortex: “It’s funny how I’ve become kind of public enemy number one, as a heel by the way. Isn’t that kind of the idea? Aren’t you supposed to be public enemy number one as a heel? Aren’t you supposed to not like somebody’s character when that character is a heel? Maybe I’m actually smarter than everyone and I’m manipulating people to what I want them to do. ‘Well, f*ck off, just retire already.’ It’s like, okay, doesn’t that make you mad? Because what I look at is the ratings, and 9 times out of 10 my segments always go up, and they are still some of the biggest ones on the show. So that tells me that whatever it is that I’m doing is working. But I do have a target on my back for that, and that’s once again kind of the idea, I am a bad guy on the show. So, yeah it’s public opinion, and it goes in cycles. When you’ve been in the business as long as I have, especially at the top level, that makes people mad.”

“I always love the concept of The Jericho Vortex and how anybody that works with me gets dragged down. Name one. Name one person that got dragged down from working with me. Maybe afterwards they didn’t go higher, but that’s not up to me. I’m not in charge of booking the entire company. All I can do is influence the storylines that I work on. But everybody that I can think of who worked with me certainly went to a higher level. I did a year with MJF and look where he’s at, Danny Garcia, Sammy Guevara, Daddy Magic last week comes off of commentary and gets a big pop. Who do you think put him in that position? I think Big Bill and Bryan Keith have grown by leaps and bounds from working here with me. I’m not going to go through the entire cast of characters, but I definitely know what my intentions are, and it’s not to bury anybody. It’s to build as many people as I can and give them experience so they can learn how to start shouldering things on their own.”

On the “Please retire” chants: “I mean, it’s one of those things. When they were really at their peak, of course I’m always thinking, okay, I can make a t-shirt out of that. I can make a whole angle out of this. But it kind of went away, they kind of stopped. Plus, I was really good at being able to shut people down. Like New York, ‘Please retire.’ I take the mic and say, ‘I know why you want me to retire. Because you want me to go pitch for the New York Yankees so they could possibly win a World Series, but that’s not going to happen.’ Boo! And then they stop. It’s something that Seinfeld said years ago, or any great stand-up comedian. I’ve got the mic. You can’t heckle somebody when the guy has the louder voice. So, yeah, the please retire was a good one. That was fun.”

On if he takes the chants personally: “No, I don’t take it personally. Nobody who really knows me says that stuff. And probably, if I saw them on the street they’d probably say hi. Whenever I do a convention or something like that, my lines are down the street. That’s not from an egotistical standpoint, but I’ve been doing this a long time, and a lot of people have great memories from the different eras that I’ve been in.”

On if he chooses his opponents: “I don’t choose anything. I might have a suggestion, but most of the time it’s Tony coming up with who he wants me to work with. I know for example with Mark Briscoe, both of us wanted to work with each other, and knew we could have some great matches. I loved working with Mark and what a great kind of mini-feud, or I guess it was a feud. It was a couple of months long. So that was something that we both wanted to do and suggested to Tony. But most of the time, this whole thing that started working with Rated FTR, that was Tony’s idea. So yeah, I still work for my boss, and I have never once as far as I can remember in the six years I’ve been in AEW ever said no to something. I might not like something, but I got to try and do my best to make it work or maybe come up with something that maybe is a better idea as long as the boss likes it. If the boss wants to do what he wants to do then that’s my job. So that’s what we do.”

On the catchphrase that surprised him the most: “‘You just made the list.’ It is one that to this day people still talk about, and you never know what’s gonna get over and what’s not. But to see that one, whereas to this day people still keep saying ‘Put me on the list.’ Yeah, you just don’t know what’s gonna work. It’s just like being in a band. You don’t know what song is gonna be a hit song and what song is not. You can put all your faith into this, and it just doesn’t work. And then you put no faith into that, but you start seeing the signs in the crowd and realizing that people are popping and all these things, and it’s like, wow, you really got something special here. Same with the ‘Hi guys.’ I stopped doing it because it was getting a babyface reaction. But that’s something you think, and you put it in your cap, and you go from there. And people just like to be involved in the show.”