Chris Jericho On Why The USA Network Wants WWE NXT Opposing AEW
To celebrate the 700th episode of the Talk Is Jericho podcast, Chris Jericho reunited with Karl Anderson, Doc Gallows and Rocky Romero of the Talk'N Shop podcast to hang out and tell stories of their crazy adventures. Their conversation eventually got into the Wednesday Night War, and Gallows congratulated Jericho and AEW for hitting one million in the ratings. Jericho then talked about his new nickname, "The Million Viewer Man", and referenced Talk'N Shop's whiskey that will come out by joking that a "Million Viewer Man vodka" could come out.
"This isn't a burial to anybody, but how about the fact that you guys are kicking so much ass, you're hitting over a million viewers on TV now that the other show is not on the same night now," Gallows remarked. "Is that a big Horowitz to the back, or is that a, 'hey this is awesome and wrestling's great'?"
"My segment was the highest drawing segment all year on any Wednesday," Jericho noted. "So now I'm going to start calling myself 'The Million Viewer Man;' [let's make] T-shirts, bandannas. Stay tuned for the Million Viewer Man vodka coming out next week."
Jericho later sent a message to WWE and NXT telling them to move out of Wednesday nights, pointing out that NXT has done better numbers when running unopposed to AEW Dynamite on Tuesdays. Jericho also asserted that it wasn't just Vince McMahon that wants to keep the war going but also USA Network because Dynamite has slowly been reaching similar numbers that RAW has done. There have been reports of NXT possibly moving nights, but Jericho said that either way, AEW and other wrestling companies will continue to try to put on the best show possible.
"Here's the thing, this is what I feel and I said it online so I'll say it here too, NXT, just go," Jericho stated. "You guys gave a good college try. Go do your own thing on a different night and draw as many numbers as you can. Get great demos because when you come up against us, you're gonna have an egg on your face every time. 'The demo thing is a joke.' It's not a joke! It's real. They go from a 26 in the demo to a top 10 when they go to Tuesday. Just go; you made your point. Do your thing, but here's the problem, I don't think it's just Vince that wants the competition. I think their network does as well because, listen, when we do 1.2 million, whether it's for 10 minutes, 12 minutes, two minutes, whatever, RAW's lowest hour that same week was 1.6. We're now getting within striking distance.
"So what if they decide to put NXT on a different night, and then suddenly the next two-three weeks or whatever, what if we get one minute higher than RAW does and USA is paying RAW $250 million dollars a year? Whatever it is, that's bad... So I think it's all a calculated chess game. But listen, and you guys know this, we're just doing what we do. We don't care, we just worry about our own stuff. New Japan, you're worrying about your s–t. Gallows and Anderson with IMPACT, everything you're doing. We're just worried about us. Let's put on the best stories we can, the best show we can."
If you use any quotes from this article, please credit Talk Is Jericho with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.