Yesterday, WWE legend, best-selling author, and Fozzy lead singer Chris Jericho chatted with Rodolfo Roman of The Roman Show about his real-life fight with Goldberg in the locker room back in 2003.
Throughout the years, Jericho has always told the story of his fight with Goldberg in a way that made himself look vastly superior to Goldberg. However, this time, Jericho told the story in a less cocky way.
For those who don’t know, Chris Jericho and Goldberg had heat dating back to their days in WCW in the late 90s, when Goldberg showed very little interest in working with Jericho because, in Goldberg’s opinion, Jericho was too small and, in real life, Goldberg would crush him within two minutes and the fans wouldn’t buy it if Jericho and Goldberg had a ten or fifteen minute match. But, according to Jericho’s story, Goldberg couldn’t crush him in two minutes, or even at all.
“It was a different world then. Things happen all the time. When everybody is holding on to their position like I got to do this, I got to do that, Goldberg and I saw wrestling from both sides of a different coin. But both of us were very successful. There wasn’t a lot of interest on his end to work with me in WCW. There was a little animosity between us that transferred to the WWE. We had a scuffle — it wasn’t what everyone says — where Jericho took him down and tied him in a knot. I stood up for myself and held my ground. It was what it was. It was unfortunate for Bill, it was on his first day, so he kind of got labeled right off the bat.”
“If you want to score it, Jericho – 1, Goldberg – 0. There will never be a rematch, ever. If it ever happens, I’ll run away screaming because I’m not going to say I got lucky, but I’m glad the outcome was the way it was because I thought he was going to tear my head off. Bill [Goldberg] is a good guy, man, I have nothing but love for him, nothing but respect.”
This version of the story is far different from the version that Jericho told on the Bubba The Love Sponge Show several years ago. In that version , Jericho talks about trash-talking Goldberg while he’s winning the fight, and adds some pretty funny comments from fellow WWE legend Booker T. But, at that time, Jericho probably still had some heat with Goldberg, and, at this point, Jericho has probably realized that there’s no point in continuing to have animosity towards Goldberg.
Below is a transcript of what Jericho said about the fight several years ago on the Bubba The Love Sponge Show .
“I can’t beat the s**t out of Big Show, but I can beat the s**t out of Goldberg. [Goldberg and I] got into an argument because we had a lot of problems in WCW because he thought his s**t didn’t stink, and he basically put his hand on my throat and screamed in my face. I’m not a tough guy, but when you put your hand on someone’s throat you better be ready to go. He apparently wasn’t and I was, so we just got into a little bit of an altercation, I took him to the ground and I put him in a front face lock, and my plan was to hold on as long as I could until he got up and killed me, but he never got up, and I just kept squeezing, and I know if you push someone’s chin into their chest you can make them pass out, so that’s what I was doing. And I had just seen a Japanese wrestling magazine that had like a Gracie body scissoring a guy with his legs, so I scissor legged him just to see what would happen, and then I was like ‘Come on mister mixed martial arts, come on tough guy!’ Then he stood up, and then I took him down and rolled him over again, and I was like ‘That’s two times! I got you down twice!’
“They eventually pulled us apart, and it’s one of those deals where my friends were holding my hands behind my back, and Goldberg got free, and he’s coming towards me, and I thought he was going to punch me right in the face, but then he just came over and grabbed me by the hair, and started pulling my hair. So, then I pie-faced him back, and then I said ‘You’re being an a**hole!’ Then Goldberg said ‘Your mother is a f***in a**hole,’ and Booker T said ‘Did he just say your mother is an a**hole? That’s the worst insult that I’ve ever heard.’ [sic]”
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