Chris Jericho and Eddie Kingston have been involved in quite the feud in recent weeks. In the story being presented, both men seem to have nothing kind to say about the other, and as is often the case with AEW, those feelings seem to be truth as opposed to a storyline fabricated to sell a few tickets.
In the past feuds he’s had, Kingston has been very vocal about his feelings, he often sticking to the same story he tells on TV while being interviewed on podcasts and for magazines about a particular wrestler he’s in a feud with, and I’m sure if we asked him right now, he’d say that Chris Jericho is Lucifer himself in the flesh, here on earth.
We can recall how opinionated he was about CM Punk during their feud. But where does it all end? Or is this real hate he harbors for his opponents?
And what does Chris Jericho think about all of this? Just what does he think about Eddie Kingston, the man? These questions have been answered in a recent interview. He told FITE In Focus just what he thinks about the man, the myth, the legend…Eddie Kingston. Here’s some of what he said:
“When you’re a babyface…You have a little more restraints on you, but you still can do it. You just have to be completely confident and, what’s the word I’m looking for? You’ve got to really be into it. If you can really commit to that, you can really get it over as well. So it all depends on the performer and it all depends on how much of a level of commitment you want to give to it…
I knew from the start that Eddie Kingston and I would be able to create something that’s a little bit different from the norm, that’s a little bit more intense because there is a little bit of dislike between us…There has been since day one. Now we’re both professionals and we work together, but I really don’t like him…
And I’m not saying that as a gimmick or a work; I just don’t care for the guy as a person. I feel he’s a bleeding heart with the smallest violin. ‘You know, I had so many hardships.’ Bulls—. We all had hardships. What I said in my promo about him, I really believed…
I’m not saying he’s a failure. He believes he’s destined to be a failure because of his lineage. I said from the start that he had what it took to be a top guy and I was right. But I also said that he doesn’t, he can’t handle the pressure of being the top guy. He can’t handle the pressure of going to the top of the mountain because if he ever made it, he would crumble and fall off the other side…
I think he’s got that achievemephobia, which is actually a word. I didn’t just make it up. He’s afraid of success. He fears success. I’ve never had that because I’ve been on top of the wrestling world in different countries since I was 22 years old on the cover of every Mexican wrestling magazine in 1993. Google it. I wasn’t making that up, so I think there is some jealously there with Eddie Kingston.”
About their upcoming bout, Jericho apparently has high expectations despite for their apparent negative feelings for one another. He said:
“I expect it to be very hard-hitting…I expect it to be very impactful because there is real-life animosity between us. So if you want to call that brawling, or you want to call that just a hard-hitting fight; you want to call it a fisticuff or whatever you want to call it, I think it’s going to be different from everything else on the show.”
via FITE In Focus /Wrestling Inc. (Transcription)
So yeah…there is real animosity between the two, as Jericho said, and/or so they would have us believe. They’ve done this before and it only adds to all the drama, which is making us believe there is real heat, or real animosity between two individuals. Especially with Kingston and whomever he is facing at a given time…Danielson, Punk, etc..
It’s familiar, but yeah, it also works so well in their favor, which is perhaps the point after all. So if it works, why not go with it? It should make for an exceptional match whether there’s real heat or not. The two will be squaring off on March 6th at AEW Revolution on Pay-Per-View. It’ll be interesting to see who comes out on top.
Domenic Marinelli is an author and freelance writer/journalist. His work has appeared in The Sportster, E-Wrestling News, Pro Wrestling News Hub, CFL News Hub, XFL News Hub, Ringside News, Daily DDT, USFL News Hub, Slam Wrestling, as well as other print and internet publications. He is the author of Generic V, Summer of the Great White Wolf, His Old Tapes (stories & poetry), Across a Dark River in Palermo and so many others. He lives in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. https://linktr.ee/AuthorDomenicMarinelli
