Chris Jericho Explains Why He Will Always Be Proud Of His Feud With Shawn Michaels

In an interview with The Players’ Tribune, Chris Jericho promoted his match against Kenny Omega at New Japan Pro Wrestling’s Wrestle Kingdom 12. Here is an excerpt where he lists his favorite opponents over the years, including his feud against Shawn Michaels.

“The intensity of this feud is what really sets it apart. It was only supposed to be a one-off kind of match – a few-week program – but Shawn and I both knew that we had a lot more to give than that. We had first worked together in 2003, and had both really enjoyed it, and ended up having a great match to cap things off at Wrestlemania XIX. But 2008 was an entirely different animal. It started after Shawn retired Ric Flair, and the story we told from there just sort of had a mind of its own.

Every time we went back and forth with ideas on where to take the program, things would evolve and we would manage to take it a step further on TV. It wasn’t the same Jericho that had become popular from my WCW days, but a much darker and more serious wrestler. It was just a brutal, violent feud. We had a great match at The Great American Bash, and then for the following two months we continued to roll – there was a retirement announcement, Shawn’s wife got involved, and I even got so much momentum from the feud that when it all finally culminated in an epic ladder match at No Mercy, the world championship belt was actually on the line.

The whole program ended up lasting a little more than seven months program. A hundred years from now, Shawn will probably still be talked about as one of the greatest performers in the history of wrestling. Being able to work with him in such a big way in 2008 is something I will always be proud of. I’m still waiting for WWE to release the two-disc, special edition Blu-ray featuring Shawn and me and the Undertaker-Edge feud that was happening on Smackdown around the same time. WWE has never mentioned plans to release such a Blu-ray but, nevertheless, I’ll continue to wait for it.”