Chris Jericho Calls NXT The Minor League, Says It Was Genius Of Vince McMahon To Put NXT Against AEW

Chris Jericho isn’t trying to knock anyone.

The term “minor league” has made headlines in wrestling over the past week with Seth Rollins calling AEW “minor leagues” when asked by a fan about a potential match with Kenny Omega. Rollins said he would face Omega, “When Kenny is done playing in the minor leagues over there.”

Jim Ross took exception to the comment, believing it made Rollins and the business look bad.

Knowing how to make headlines himself, Chris Jericho used the “minor league” term when discussing AEW’s “war” with NXT.

“We’re not at war with NXT. This is going to make people mad, and I’m not being an asshole. NXT is still the minor league, no matter how you slice it,” Jericho said on The Wrestling Draft podcast. “Those guys are still unknown performers. It’s not a competition to us, and I knew we’d win because we have more star power. When you look at the end of our first week of TV who was out there at the end? Chris Jericho — we know him. Dustin Rhodes — we know him. Jon Moxley — we know him, he used to be another name and but we know who that is. Cody is out there. Pac is out there. There’s Jack Swagger. Jim Ross is commentating – I know that guy. Tony Schiavone and Justin Roberts — we know them. These are all people who have done WrestleMania on our TV. On NXT, they have guys I’ve never heard of. This is not cutting them down, they are great performers. But to a mainstream fan, they don’t know Kyle O’Reilly or Johnny Gargano or Tommaso Ciampa or Velveteen Dream.

“Our competition is RAW, is SmackDown, is Seth Rollins and Roman Reigns and Brock Lesnar, and all those guys. I think it was a stroke of genius by Vince to put NXT on against us because it took the focus off ‘the main show and AEW’ and put it on ‘the minor league and AEW.'”

Jericho has been at the forefront of the media war of words between AEW wrestlers and WWE/NXT superstars, making similar comments in the past.

Wednesday night hasn’t been much a war between NXT and AEW as AEW has won all four weeks the two have gone head-to-head. You can check out the viewership numbers at Fightful’s viewership page.

If you use any of the quotes above, please credit Wrestling Draft with a h/t to Fightful for the transcription.