The biggest story of this past weekend happened on Sunday when we found out on Sunday that Chris Jericho is going to face NJPW’s US Champion Kenny Omega at WrestleMania Kingdom 12 on January 4, 2018. Fans were left to wonder how it’s going to happen, why it’s going to happen and they probably got excited because it’s a dream match for a lot of people.
There’s a connection between Jericho and Omega because they are both from Winnipeg, Manitoba. Omega was on Jericho’s podcast earlier this year and you could tell they got along great although they haven’t wrestled before. Since Jericho has only wrestled in WWE in 1999 and Omega is happy in New Japan, so it was possible that this match would never happen. Never say never in wrestling, of course.
The details of how the match came together are interesting as reported by Dave Meltzer of Wrestling Observer Radio on Tuesday. Meltzer said they started planning this Jericho/Omega match in August. He noted that Jericho got the idea from watching the buildup to the huge Floyd Mayweather vs. Conor McGregor fight.
Jericho was wondering how to do something just like that fight ,and the idea was that it had to be a match the people thought they would never see. That led to Jericho talking to Omega and Gedo, New Japan’s booker (and former tag team partner of Jericho), which in turn led to the match being announced this week. Meltzer said they had meetings in New York, negotiated and came to a deal.
It was noted by Meltzer that for right now it’s a one time deal. Considering Meltzer has done multiple hour long podcasts with Jericho in the last few months (I recommend podcasts about their podcasts about Chris Benoit and Brian Pillman), they get along very well and he may have got all that info from Jericho himself.
If you’re wondering about WWE, Jericho isn’t under a WWE deal right now and is a free agent. What’s a bit of a surprise about this match is that Jericho has wrestled only for WWE since 1999 and prided himself on his royalty. I don’t know if WWE expected him to ever wrestle anywhere else, so it’s not known what WWE might think of this or if Jericho will go back there next year. The “one time thing” could certainly turn into more. For now, Jericho vs. Omega is a go for WrestleKingdom 12 in January. Less than two months to go now.
On another Jericho note, he turns 47 years old November 9. Happy birthday to him.
