As seen at WWE Payback, live on the WWE Network this Sunday night, Chris Jericho defeated Kevin Owens to become the new United States Champion. Because of a stipulation added to the match during the recent “Superstar Shakeup”, Jericho will now move to Smackdown Live on Tuesday nights, while Kevin Owens moves back to Monday Night Raw.
In the video featured above, Y2J says goodbye to his long-time friend and old rival Kurt Angle and gives the Red Brand fans one last hilarious moment on the way out. When Raw backstage announcer Mike Rome interrupts the touching goodbye to get Jericho’s thoughts on winning the title, he is interrupted by Smackdown backstage announcer Tom Phillips, who asks the exact same question, word for word.
For those who have followed the product closely, this provided some comedic closure to a long-running joke wherein Jericho (and during their partnership, Kevin Owens) would confuse the names of the interviewers, in particular Mike and Tom. After looking utterly confused, the self-proclaimed “best in the world at what he does” exclaimed that he “finally gets it”, coming to the conclusion that the interviewers are in fact clones, before putting them both on the beloved List of Jericho.
As we noted, WWE will more than likely run an angle to write Chris Jericho off television on Smackdown Live this week, as his band Fozzy prepares to start a U.S. tour for their upcoming album. How that plays into the United States Championship, at this point, remains to be seen. What we do know is that AJ Styles is owed a championship match that will take place at WWE Backlash on May 21st.
This is Jericho’s second reign as United States Champion, adding another accolade to his long and storied career. In total he is a six-time WWE World Champion, a seven-time WWE Tag Team Champion, a record holding nine-time Intercontinental Champion, and a one-time European and Hardcore Champion. Not a bad resume, if this is in fact his final championship run, and that’s not including any of his accolades with WCW, ECW, or any of the other promotions he’s competed for all around the world.
