WWE Classic Match: Christian vs. Chris Jericho at WrestleMania XX

Aside from the epic CM Punk vs. Daniel Bryan match at Over the Limit, there are two big stories going on in the WWE this week. One is speculation that Chris Jericho could be leaving the WWE soon, while the other is the shocking return and baby face turn of Christian at Over the Limit. 

Since these two men are currently in the spotlight, I decided to highlight them in this week’s WWE Classic Match.

Throughout 2003 and into 2004, Jericho and Christian worked as a tag team, but their deterioration and eventual breakup centered around—what else—a woman, the woman in this case being Trish Stratus. 

Although Christian and Y2J were tag team partners and best friends on-screen, they became enemies when Christian put Stratus, whom Jericho had fallen for, in the Walls of Jericho during a match between Christian and Stratus, ultimately leading to a match between the two at WrestleMania XX. 

Both Captain Charisma and Y2J have had a number of stellar matches throughout their careers, but this is one of the most underrated bouts that both men have ever had—a match that doesn’t get talked about nearly as much as some of their other top matches. 

The story heading into the match was a simple one, yet one that was told extremely well: friends-turned-enemies fighting over a woman. 

While Jericho thought that he and Stratus were an item, he was “friend-zoned.” Christian was upset that Jericho’s obsession with Stratus was hurting their friendship, and he kept hinting that she was into someone else. 

We would later learn that that someone else was Christian, as it would ultimately be revealed at WrestleMania that Stratus was in cahoots with the man she was really dating, none other than Captain Charisma. 

It was a story of betrayal that started off with this fantastic match at WrestleMania XX, in which Christian and Stratus officially went bad by working together to help Christian get the victory. 

Jericho and Christian would go on to feud beyond WrestleMania. They faced off in a two-on-one handicap match (with Stratus working with Christian) at Backlash and then faced each other in a fantastic Ladder Match for the Intercontinental Championship at Unforgiven—a bout that was won by Jericho. 

This was a great feud between two of the WWE’s most compete performers, and their WrestleMania XX match was the peak of it.

Drake Oz is the WWE Lead Writer for Bleacher Report. You can follow him on Twitter and ask him any wrestling-related questions (to be answered in the B/R Mailbag) on Formspring.