BENSON LEE
Canadian Press
Tuesday, September 18, 2001

TORONTO (CP) - As a professional wrestler, Chris Jericho has always had the sizzle as well as the steak. But through it all, the World Wrestling Federation star also had something else a lot of people might not expect - a college degree.

The 30-year-old native of Winnipeg, who was born Chris Irvine, attended Red River Community College in his home town and graduated with a degree in journalism. Jericho wants to break the wall down - to borrow one of his catchphrases - on the perception that pro wrestlers are as dumb as the stuffing in a turnbuckle.

"Nowadays, a lot of our guys have college degrees," Jericho says. "A couple of guys are accountants. (Fellow WWF wrestler) Kane has an English degree. We discuss Aldous Huxley books. ... It's not just a bunch of dumb muscle-head gronks who are just in this business to throw people around. Things have changed in the last 15 years."

As a teenager, Jericho worked for a while as a freelance writer for the Winnipeg Sun and Winnipeg Free Press covering - what else? - pro wrestling. Back then, he had to pay for his own ticket when the WWF came to town and got $50 per story. Now he's working for the WWF and doing a bit better as far as financial compensation goes.

Jericho says he went to college on the advice of former wrestler and current governor of Minnesota Jesse Ventura, whom Jericho met at a charity hockey game when he was a teenager.

"He said, 'If you want to be a wrestler, that's cool, but you should go get something to fall back on because it's not easy,' " Jericho recalls. "So I took his advice, went and got my degree in journalism, and then when that was all over I went to wrestling school."

A decade later, the five-foot-11, 225-pound Jericho is the most popular Canadian in sports entertainment today. With the recent retirement of Bret (Hitman) Hart, Jericho has become the country's most popular wrestling icon, although he remains modest about his ever-increasing profile, preferring to credit the WWF and his fellow wrestlers with helping him achieve such wild success.

Part of the reason for Jericho's popularity is his skill with the microphone. He's smart-alecky, witty or just plain vulgar depending on the situation, and the fans eat it up. It's common for thousands of fans in an arena - who he refers to as "Jerichoholics" - to chant his nickname, Y2J.

"They always say that the best characters are your real-life personas ... but I think the best characters are the ones that you really believe in and you really understand and know," Jericho says. "Sometimes I say the dumbest lines and I think that's not even funny, but people enjoy it - they laugh, they cheer."

Pro wrestling is probably the only job where someone can insult the boss - in Jericho's case, it's WWF head honcho Vince McMahon - as part of a day's work.

"I told the boss he had a toupee and a small penis," Jericho says. "So I mean, how often does that happen and you have to say that in front of 20,000 people?"

Jericho also gets paid to insult the boss's family. He often refers to McMahon's daughter Stephanie as a "filthy, dirty, disgusting, brutal, bottom-feeding, trash-bag ho." And the fans will chant along with him, adjective by adjective.

But Jericho isn't all talk and no action. He can flex his muscles as well as flap his gums. He's held his own in the ring with all of the WWF's top talent at one time or another - men such as The Rock, Stone Cold Steve Austin and Kurt Angle, to name a few.

Before joining the WWF, Jericho wrestled for the rival WCW and ECW as well as in Mexico and Japan. He joined the WWF in August 1999 amid much hype and has lived up to expectations, winning various championship belts since then.

Jericho comes from athletic stock. His father, Ted Irvine, was a left-winger in the NHL from 1967 to '77, playing for the Los Angeles Kings, New York Rangers and St. Louis Blues.

Jericho played hockey in high school, but after that he traded in bodychecks for bodyslams. It's proven to be a smart career move.

"It's the fulfilment of a dream," Jericho says of being in the WWF. "It's what I've always wanted to do. I always wanted to end up in this company and now that I'm here and had some measure of success, it's like the dream coming full circle."

© Copyright 2001 The Canadian Press