Rick Boogs wants to prove Chris Jericho wrong

Over the summer, during an appearance on Konnan’s Keepin’ It 100 podcast, rocker and wrestler Chris Jericho was asked about rocker and wrestler Rick Boogs. Jericho’s a fan, but he thinks WWE screwed up by not letting Boogs perform under his real name, Eric Bugenhagen.

“I hate the fact they changed his name from Bugenhagen, which is one of the coolest names... that’s a cool fucking name, man! Boogs? Sounds like a fucking booger. I think he’s super-entertaining, very hyper, and I think he would have a chance to really do something if they would have given him his name of Bugenhagen. I don’t think Boogs — I always equate it like, if you can say, ‘Your World champion, Chris Jericho,’ okay, that would work. Your World champion, Disco Inferno*’ doesn’t work. Same thing with Rick Boogs. There would never be a World champion called Rick Boogs.”

As someone who finds Bugenhagen incredibly fun to say (and not just because it annoyed my guy Kyle Decker back when we were covering NXT together during Boogs’ time there and I “screamed” it at him in the Cageside Slack), my first inclination was to agree with the Ayatollah of Rock ‘N’ Roll. But then I heard Boogs’ retort, from his conversation with Louis Dangoor last week:

“I accept that as a challenge. Because I don’t think so. I think Rick Boogs is gonna — it’s gonna get way more over in a sense, I think. I take that as, ‘Let’s see what we can do with this name Rick Boogs.’ As of right now. I mean, let’s look at the entrance [for] Shinsuke. Right? I’m ‘Rick... BOOGS!’ I’m saying like, what would we have done with Bugenhagen in that sense? ‘My name’s Eric... BOO-gen-HAA-gen!’ I mean, maybe that could have worked. But I think Rick Boogs is just — it works better in that sense. So, he [Jercicho] had a lot of praise, and I’m very grateful for that, and hopefully I can live up to that. I think that’s what I’m doing and I just want to prove him wrong on the Rick Boogs schtick.”

I’m sold. “The Rick Boogs schtick” is pretty great, and to Jericho’s point, I’m not holding my breath for World champion Eric Bugenhagen anyway.

What do you think, rock ‘n’ rollers?

* Disco Inferno is a co-host of Keepin’ It 100, so this wasn’t just a random diss. Not that we have a problem with anyone randomly disrespecting Disco Inferno.