Chris Jericho and Kevin Owens was arguably the hottest feud in WWE coming into WrestleMania 33, highlighted by the Festival of Friendship segment.
The match ended up going on second as it lost a little steam when Owens lost the WWE Universal Championship to Goldberg, though Jericho had the United States Championship. After the bout, Vince McMahon told Kevin Owens that it was one of the worst matches in WrestleMania history.
Speaking to Alex McCarthy of TalkSport, Jericho gave his take on McMahon's reaction and the match.
“He told Kevin it was the ‘worst match in WrestleMania history’ [laughs]. I never heard anything about that. When I came through, Vince went [thumbs up], so I think he was on Kevin’s case at the time,” Jericho explained. "I think he was going through a phase where he thought maybe Kevin had some extra weight that he wanted him to lose or wasn’t happy with his work as a heel. Kevin is a very unique performer in that he’s amazing and he’s a bigger guy. Who cares? Mick Foley was a bigger guy, Vader was a bigger guy, Bam Bam Bigelow was a bigger guy. Didn’t affect their work, they were still great performers and Kevin is one of those guys. For whatever reason, Vince goes through phases where you just get stuck in his craw and he gets pissed off at anything you do and maybe that was one of his reasons. But yeah… the worst match in WrestleMania history?! I was like ‘have you not seen Giant Gonzalez vs The Undertaker!”
Speaking about the match itself, Jericho said, "It was great. And then the next match we had at the following pay-per-view was amazing as well. I wasn’t happy with that match because they had us on second at that WrestleMania which was the writing on the wall that they didn’t care about the feud. That was one of the best feuds that was originally meant to lead to the main event of WrestleMania and then it ends up on second. I just knew it was time for me to go. Little did I know I’d be gone forever, seemingly, but that’s how it goes.”
WrestleMania 33 ended up being Jericho's last WrestleMania bout as he did stints in Japan before signing with AEW at the start of 2019.
Kevin Owens remains part of WWE and was drafted to WWE Raw in the 2021 Draft.
