Undisputed_ How to Become the World Champion in 1,372 Easy Steps - Chris Jericho [33]
The next night we were in Philadelphia for Smackdown! —the first time I’d been back since my ECW days. For the second night in a row I was in the main event, this time against The Rock in a Lumberjack match that I won due to HHH’s interference. But even though I beat The Rock, Hunter’s music began playing. As far as I’d gotten, I still had a long way to go. But still, for those keeping score (and I am), I had beaten Hunter for the title on Monday and then pinned The Rock in the Lumberjack match on Tuesday. It was a hell of a lot better than losing to Bull Buchanan and Stevie Richards.
Once again it was my night, and after the show ended I stayed in the ring to address the great crowd. It was customary in the Attitude Era for the babyface to give the fans something extra at the end of the night: Austin drank beer, Rocky did improv comedy, Funaki did a jeet kune do demonstration. The crowd seemed like they wanted more, and since I was the last man standing for the evening, I decided to give them a little more Jericho. These were my people and this was my night, dammit!
I picked up the microphone and said in my best Paul Stanley voice, “Did everybody have a good time tonight?”
Twenty thousand Philadelphians roared their approval.
“Well, I did too!”
The crowd cheered wildly for my shameless pandering.
“I’ve spent a lot of time here over the years, and I can honestly say that Philadelphia is one of the best fucking crowds in the world …”
The crowd popped even bigger that time.
“And I …”
Wait a minute. What did I just say?
I stopped midsentence as I flipped through my mental Rolodex and asked myself if I had just called Philadelphia one of the best “fucking” crowds in the world. There’s no way I let an F-bomb slip in the middle of a WWE ring, was there?
I looked over at Jerry Lawler, and the look on his face told me all I needed to know.
I had just told them they were a great fucking crowd—adults, kids, grandparents, all of them.
To their credit, in another city the crowd would have gasped, children would have run to the door, schoolmarms would have barfed. But this was Philly, baby!
Swearing here just made me a bigger star.
I walked through the curtain and saw Vince standing there with a big smile on his face, waiting to give me a handshake and congratulate me on my two-day WWE coming-out party.
Even though he was smiling, he had to have heard the F-bomb I dropped on the crowd, right? I had to acknowledge it.
“I’m sorry for what I said out there.”
The smile wavered on his face and he said, “What do you mean?”
“You didn’t hear me say that Philadelphia was the best fucking crowd in the world?”
His smile turned to a look of apprehension. He put his hand down, shook his head, and mumbled that I should keep an eye on my language. Then he walked out of Gorilla, leaving me there with my mouth open and my hand still extended.
Classic Jericho. Even in my finest hour I had still managed to put my foot directly into my mouth. But the taste of my own toe jam didn’t change the fact that I had just beaten The Rock and HHH in successive nights. I didn’t think I could outdo myself on that one—but I did.
After my Raw mitzvah, Vince started relying on me more. I started working in the main events on house shows and getting more important matches on TV. This was never more evident than the night I worked three matches on Raw as the top babyface on the show.
We had a PPV in England, and as was the way at the time, we flew out on a Friday night for the show on Saturday and took off directly afterwards, landing in the United States again on Sunday.
But Rocky stayed in the UK to film his first feature film, The Scorpion King, and since Austin was out with an injury, I was the top babyface on Raw by proxy. Not that it was unwarranted. If you look at the merchandise from 2000 and 2001, the top sellers were Austin,