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Chris Jericho was instrumental in helping AEW take off in the manner that it did, but the Demo God feels that the company has grown so much that his absence will not be noticeable.
After the success of the All In pay-per-view, Kenny Omega, Young Bucks and Cody Rhodes got Tony Khan on board to start All Elite Wrestling. While the aforementioned stars were huge on the independent scene, they needed someone with the star power of Chris Jericho's level to get serious eyes on the product.
Le Champion was the company's first world champion and rightfully so. He then put over Jon Moxley as the biggest star in AEW and has taken a backseat from the title picture since. Speaking to Newsweek, he said the following:
"We started it and we made it something viable right out of the gate. I'll always take great pride in that and I'll always take great pride in that fact that now I can be in Ireland on tour with Fozzy, missing a couple of weeks of Dynamite, and I don't have to worry like I did before. Because now our roster has so many stars on it that they can take a couple of weeks with no Chris Jericho and some people might not even notice."
Does AEW need Chris Jericho anymore?
Chris Jericho will go down as a bonafide wrestling legend. His lengthy career has spanned across generations and he has held championships in the biggest companies in the world. As important as he was to AEW in the beginning, the company would do just fine without him now.
At his age, it's not easy for the Inner Circle leader to wrestle a great match and his physique is showing the toll that his career has taken on him. He has done his job of getting the company off to a solid start and building a number of stars.
Sammy Guevara is the TNT Champion while Santana and Ortiz are one of the most popular tag teams in AEW. Jericho's loss to Jon Moxley helped the latter become the unanimous face of the company and Chris Jericho even lost feuds to Orange Cassidy and MJF.
With veterans that can still put on classic matches like PAC, CM Punk, Bryan Danielson and Adam Cole to young superstars like MJF, Sammy Guevara, Jungle Boy and Darby Allin, AEW is in safe hands and Chris Jericho can take a step back.
