Undisputed_ How to Become the World Champion in 1,372 Easy Steps - Chris Jericho [18]
She didn’t like the crowd turning on her, and even though I was working my ass off to change that, the crowd wasn’t buying her as a babyface champion. It was out of my control.
But the match was in my control and I was fairly happy with it. I was able to carry her to a decent showing, and it was one of the better bouts on the show. We did the top-rope Pedigree as a finish, and while it wasn’t the prettiest thing, it got a great reaction and to my knowledge, it’s the only time it’s ever been done. So I had that going for me.
One of the other things that bothered me about Chyna was that while she trusted me and expected me to put together a good match, she never helped me by telling anybody else that. When we came through the Gorilla position, everybody congratulated her on the match. Even though she had worked hard and done a good job, she just stood there and accepted the praise solo, smiling as if she’d just wrestled herself.
We had a rematch at Armageddon, the next PPV from Fort Lauderdale. During the weeks building it up, I had the idea to smash her thumb with a hammer. I wanted to do something dastardly to try to get her more sympathy as a babyface and got the idea from the gloves she wore wherever she went. So I kidnapped her, tied her up in a dark room, and brought the hammer down on a sausage that had been stuffed into one of the thumbs on her gloves. Kind of Psycho psycho, I know, but Vince liked it.
Her thumb mutilated, she decided to exact her revenge by challenging me to a wrestling match instead of just having me arrested for assault. The next few weeks, I antagonized her and the fans by making a bunch of bad jokes about her smashed appendage. “Well, your dreams of being the next Fonz are over,” and “Will you be hitchhiking home after the show?” or “Thumbs up, Chyna, things are going to work out!”
Heath Ledger as the Joker had nothing on me.
At the PPV, Vince wanted me to do an impromptu promo before my match, so I went on about how I was going to become the Intercontinental Champion and ended it off by chanting the “Go Jericho Go” bit I’d used in my first promo with The Rock.
It was a big night for me because I was going to win the title from Chyna and become the Intercontinental Champion for the first time. Ever since I first saw Ricky the Dragon Steamboat holding that title when I was in high school, it was my biggest goal to one day be the champion just like him.
I spent the match using the unique modus operandi of torturing her injured thumb. I trapped her arms in the ropes and kicked and punched her exposed digit. I stepped and ground on it until she finally tapped out to the Rock and Roll Finisher. Just like that, despite all the shit I’d been through, my dream had become reality: Chris Jericho was the new Intercontinental Champion! More important, our match was better than the first one and ended up being the best on the show. I took great pride in the fact that I’d carried Chyna to one of the best performances of her career.
When it was over, I walked through the curtain but couldn’t find her anywhere. It was customary after a match to wait in Gorilla for your opponent so you could congratulate each other and thank each other for the match, but she was nowhere to be found. I looked up and down the halls, checked the dressing rooms, and finally found her in Vince’s office, conversing with HHH. They stopped talking as soon as I walked in and looked up guiltily as if I’d caught them doing something wrong.
I asked Chyna if everything was okay. She said, “Yeah, I’m fine.”
I said, “Good match! I thought it went really well, huh?”
“Yeah, it was good,” she said woodenly.
I could tell she was upset about something but I couldn’t figure out what, as we had just put on a hell of a performance. Was she mad she lost the title? Did she not like the way I put together the match? Had she run out of