Steve Austin helped shock the wrestling world earlier this week when it was announced that AEW’s Chris Jericho would be appearing on an upcoming episode of Austin’s Broken Skull Sessions interview series. This marks the first crossover between WWE and AEW, and both Austin and Jericho have stated in interviews that Vince McMahon and Tony Khan have signed off on the idea. Austin gave an interview with Wrestling Inc. prior to the interview’s announcement where he explained why the success of AEW can actually benefit WWE rather than hurt the much larger company.
Videos by ComicBook.com
“Man, I love it,” Austin said. “I think it’s competition by proxy just because they’re wrestling, WWE’s wrestling, but I don’t think they’re directly trying to compete. But in essence, they are and I love it because it gives more people within any of this jobs. It gives more people a chance to work. And it makes WWE, you know, forces them to push the envelope rather than just sit back and push out content. Competition makes everybody better.”
In a separate interview with Sports Illustrated he explained how the interview with Jericho came about.
“I texted Vince and said we had this badass idea about Jericho coming on the show,” Austin said. “Vince goes, ‘It’s cool. Go ahead.’ But me and Vince don’t always do well with phones and texts and all that, so I texted one more time, ‘Are you sure it’s O.K. to have Chris Jericho on the show?’ Vince gave me the thumbs up, and Chris came out to do the show.”
“Jericho’s one of the most influential wrestlers over the last 30 years and he’s still going strong,” Austin said. “The guy has gotten over in every territory he’s ever been in. Chris has always been able to reinvent himself and do something new and fresh. He’s a worker’s worker and a student of the game. Think about all the holy s— moments he’s had in his matches, or how he can light up a place on the microphone. Chris is one of the biggest personalities in the world, he’s the real deal.”
