The legacy of Chris Jericho as AEW's first world champion

On February 29, the first AEW pay-per-view of 2020 took place and in the main event, we saw Chris Jericho lose the AEW World Championship to Jon Moxley. With this, Jericho’s first title reign as AEW Champion ended, but his work as champion was phenomenal.

Jericho won the AEW championship at All Out in an intense match against Adam “Hangman” Page. The reign of “Le Champion” as AEW’s top champion was crucial for the first months of AEW on TV.

The Inner Circle

Jericho’s faction has been a tremendous success in all possible metrics. From TV ratings to merchandise sales, The Inner Circle is a must-see act in AEW. The shenanigans and things this faction did during Jericho’s title reign was amazing television.

The biggest winners in this faction have to be Sammy Guevara along with Santana & Ortiz. These three wrestlers took the opportunity to work with Jericho and made amazing work with it. Jake Hager as Jericho’s bodyguard was the perfect job for him and did the best with the limited role.

The segment involving The Inner Circle has to be the spoof documentary about Jericho during his feud with Cody.

Putting Young Talent Over

Jericho helped a lot of younger talent to get over with the fans. The two best examples of this were Jungle Boy and Darby Allin.

Jungle Boy’s mini-feud with Jericho that culminated in a 10-minute draw was the best thing to happen to Jungle Boy and showed the world the potential star that he could be one day.

In the case of Allin, Jericho’s title match with him was just a phenomenal match and made Allin look like a star. Jericho’s work once again was crucial into putting young talent over.

Guevara as Jericho’s understudy has been an incredible run. As weeks go by, Guevara is becoming a better performer and that is in a huge way thanks to Jericho. Guevara in the next couple of years will be one of AEW’s biggest stars.

What’s next?

Now that Jericho is no longer the world champion for AEW, the options are open for what do next with him. A story could be the rise of Guevara as the new leader of The Inner Circle, but this is too early to do.

Other stories to tell could be Jericho’s rematch against the current AEW champion in Moxley for Double or Nothing. An interesting story to book could be the end of the feud between The Elite and The Inner Circle on the upcoming war games match for AEW Dynamite: Blood and Guts.