10 Wrestlers Who Had To Deal With Major Pay Cuts

5. Chris Jericho

Chris Jericho in his autobiography A Lion's Tale: Around the World in Spandex revealed the WWF offered him a $450,000 3 year deal in 1999 to defect from WCW. The only point of concern though it was considerably less than what WCW were offering him to stay, which nearly reached seven figures.

Jericho was miserable in WCW towards the end, with the Goldberg angle he had been hyping and trying to make happen for months going nowhere. Realizing WCW were never going to consider him a headline attraction, Jericho took a chance on himself and signed with the WWF for less money.

Thankfully Jericho had the talent to get over so much in the WWF that he always earned more than double and sometimes triple his downside guarantee during his first run with the company, through attendance and PPV bonuses. He became one of the highlights of the Attitude Era (as well as every other era that followed) as soon as he debuted in that classic millennium countdown segment with The Rock on Raw Is War.

Jericho wrote of that time negotiating with the WWF:

“Even though the WWF was offering half the money I would’ve agreed to a bag of used hockey pucks to work for Vince. Or a bag of brownies. It wasn’t about the cash and it never had been. It was about finally achieving my elusive dream and enjoying my career again. All of the bull**** I’d experienced in WCW had drained my love of wrestling and I wanted it back.”