Exclusive interview with The Hardys

25:28I'll just contact you. I'll contact you, and I'll just book you and your guys from now since these guys are screwing you. And on top of that, we would get 150 a night, right? At this time, we were doing Raw on Monday, wrestling superstars on Tuesday. Wednesday would be wrestling challenge and we'd make one 50 a night. So in theory, you grow like, Oh, three days, 450 bucks. Pretty good at that time in 1994. So we would get in the van. The very first night we got in the van, we drove, there were 14 guys in there being extras for WWE underneath stallion. And he drove like seven, eight miles away.

26:00It was a very wooded area, like in the middle of nowhere. And he said, all right, guys, if you want to go to the next town, brother, I'm gonna need my booking fee right now. That's a hundred dollars of that one 50. And every single day he would take a hundred bucks. of the 150 and it is what it is and like it was cool we're making that money but we we almost didn't care because we're getting the opportunity and it got our foot in the door wdb yeah we get 150 a piece or is that combined you would get 150 a piece okay all right and someone taking that whole yard of your 150 a 60 66 uh booking fee yeah it's like the whole character the whole character of big money matt that i did at aw was based off stallion okay because that was the question i had later we'll get to that later okay that makes sense guys i'm just taking a we fee

26:4766 wow man that's you're ready to fight somebody for real after that and i i had this question

26:53O'Shea:later on but you guys just brought up one of them jeff you know you're you're you're well known for jumping off stuff man it's just it just is what it is you are you know the wrestling jump man logo is probably jeff hardy and uh you know part of that is that trust of being caught you know guys down there that'll catch you can you think of because you just told us the the you know the harley story but are there any other famous times where you're like i wish you would have caught me a little bit better that you can think of uh there's been a few times but i'm i never uh I complained, but there was a few times that I felt like the Triple H could have caught me a little better.

27:37Maybe. One of the times back during those when we were doing the jobs, man, it was a furnace in the front. Yeah, yeah, Doug Furness. I tried to springboard, and this was back at WWE. You know, the ropes were legit ropes. He was going to springboard to the floor on both of those guys. This is when they said, this is when they told us, they said, hey, we're interested in doing something with you guys. Jake the Snake, he stooged it off from a production meeting saying that they planned to sign us. And we're like, oh, come on, man. Are you kidding? But he ended up being right. And we had a match. And they gave us like 10 or 12 minutes with Furnace and LaFont for like an extra match, which is kind of meant to be like more of a competitive match.

28:14And Jeff had this cool spot. They were going to sell for us. And it was going to be like a 50-50 match. And Jeff was going to springboard from the apron to the outside of the ring on both of them, man. I would do it all the time on the indies. and I would like get some, you know, height on it, man. But I totally slipped off like crazy and went flat to my back. But it was a terrible botch. But, yeah, that one was rough, man. You can see, I think I've seen that like time and time again, like in botch rails naturally. But it was nasty, man. So that was the last time I attempted a springboard moonsault in a WWE ring.

28:48Yeah, pretty much, man. Abyss has always been great, man, catching me. And, yeah, I don't have many complaints about catchers. Funny little side note to go with that. Jay Riso, Christian Cage, he was watching that match. He's like, man, these Hardy boys are getting too much for WWE. I've been working too hard. They're going to get signed, and I'm not. He said, I'm glad he slipped. I'm glad he slipped. Oh, my God. He confessed that to us whenever he was doing it out of professional jealousy. We were with them on that. We just finished the dojo and getting ready to go to TV for the first time. But we were working some shows and I wanted to do that same springboard moonsault to Christian.

29:30He said, no, we don't need to do that, man. You know, it's a show we're about to debut on TV. We don't need to do that. You might get hurt. I said, oh, no, I'm not. I'm not going to get hurt. But then he said, I know, but I might get hurt. I'm trying to catch you. I might get hurt. That's really what he's concerned about. I believe. I'm like, you know, so, you know, my first kind of memories of you guys were back in a day when you were quote unquote against the enhancement talent, right? You guys had the checkered pants, if I'm not mistaken, and wore the headbands. And then, so I'd see, what was that?

30:05The plaids. Yes. So I would see you guys in matches, you know, and you were, you know, you were the enhancement talent. And then it just seemed like over a period of all of a sudden over a few weeks, and all of a sudden you're coming to the ring with Michael Hayes and, in your winning matches and i'm like yo what's up with these what's going on here so can you can you explain like what was that that that turn like for you guys to kind of be the guys putting guys over to like now you're getting one of the best tag team workers of all time and michael p.s hayes and now you guys are winning matches that that's another guy i would have added in there like our career we he changed our trajectory like we wouldn't be who we are or where we are without Michael Hayes.

30:45He had taken interest in us. And Jim Ross, who was doing house shows at that time, he was giving back these great reports. The Hardys would wrestle too cool. The Hardys would wrestle Edge and Christian. And we had all these great matches on house shows. And they're like, you know, we really need to do something with these guys. That was the feedback. He was getting the crowd likes them. They're very good as baby faces. And then they ended up pitching like Michael Hayes had been like trying to get back in to be a manager or like a mentor or whatever. And they said, Hey, we're going to pair you with Michael Hayes and, you know, put you guys together.

31:15And we just want to change your looks and totally reinvent you. Have you guys do something different, have a new look and kind of restart you. And, uh, Michael was great at that. You know, like whenever he was there, he said, look guys, we got to be a team. He said, we got to, we're like the new birds. He said, we, we go everywhere together. Remember he said that at the time he said, he said like, uh, he said, we break bread together. He said, if we go to a hotel, He said, we share a room. He said, you guys can end up switching. Who gets the cut every single night? I get a bed every night. He said, we're a team, guys.

31:44He said, that's the deal. He said, we're going to work together. And he really was. He showed us ways of doing things. Like, for instance, he said, when you're a wrestler, he said, if you can do all these great moves and you guys can do everything. He said, that's awesome. But people in the front few rows need to be able to look at you and think like you can whip somebody's ass. That you can kick ass. and like when you're punching somebody when you're beat you need to be able to look violent and feel like i get this a show but like i don't want to fight this guy because they might beat my ass and that's kind of changed things for us i remember he would say after you do that poetry in motion when it's a real pretty thing he jumps off your back and there's a beautiful kick into the corner have the guy feed that matt you take his head off with the clothesline then mount and like beat the shit out of him stuff like that is what really helped us turn the corner and really really get the grasp of what pro wrestling is essentially and those three or four years of when we were the enhancement guys like doc hendrix man we always i'm sure you kind of felt too but it's almost like we've we knew him in a previous life or something we have that connection or that energy between us to where we knew you know we would be close and and eventually ended up with him which was strange but like when he was doc hendrix we we hit it off with him right away and

32:50O'Shea:had that special connection that's dope absolutely now with all the things that you guys have this this long lustrous career and highlight after highlight just huge breathtaking moments i need to know i'm sure you know as it happens with all of us we might look at things that we did back in the day and think i'd never do that again was there anything in the moment that you thought like on that night yeah i'm never doing that again like is it do you guys have a list of yeah I'll never jump off that or I'll never go that high again in the moment. As you know, managing maintenance, repair, and operations is never easy.

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34:08Right now, save$10 on a pair of Rain-X Latitude wiper blades. They feature beam blade technology to improve windshield contact for maximum visibility. The professional parts people will even install your new wiper blades for free. Choose Rain-X Latitude Wiper Blades at your local O 'Reilly Auto Parts store or online at OReillyAuto.com. I don't think so. I don't think I have any regrets. I've got two, like with RVD, I went through a table vertically instead of like horizontal the way you normally go through it. And I went through it just vertically. For some reason, I wanted to do it. And RVD moved.

34:44And I just, it was like a 12 or 14-foot ladder. And the table exploded. And I hit the ground so hard. that was one for sure i'm never doing that again and the only other one was in my second run at tna we were at the dudleys and we had a full metal mayhem match and i just wanted to go through a table that was upside down so there was a a regular table set up but then there was an upside down table on top of that table and like bully's head was and i went through a table upside down it the original idea was like do a cannonball through it and i went through the framing of the table was nuts man but that's definitely when i hit the ground i was okay i've done that never doing that this upside down table he was adamant like he wanted to get this back i was like i don't know man that's probably not gonna work out the best like i i don't know if i do it but he was adamant and he made it happen so i guess it was a one and done let me get that done i never never want to do

35:36O'Shea:that again yeah man there's there's plenty of stuff that i look at around the house i'm like yeah if i was a kid i'd jump off that now i'm like knees shoot into my chest so you know and we kind of touched on this earlier about you guys like Jeff and Matt, what's it like to know that you're probably responsible for, you know, a couple dozen, at least broken arms and legs of kids who decided not even in wrestling, just like, yo, I'm going to jump off of this. We're, we're, we are, we are guilty and guilty as charged for thousands of ass whippings. I mean, we hear this all the time. He's doing swan tons and leg drops on the couches and broken beds, emulating the Hardy Boys.

36:22You know, we hear that so, so much. And, you know, I think the whole reason that don't try this thing at home was because people saw our home videos. And all these guys, they were on a trampoline and they were able to make it. I should do that, too. You know, so I had to cover their ass a little bit as far as that. It is something that is really amazing. And we always say, hey, sorry if we got you in trouble in your childhood. in your childhood. We hope you at least enjoyed your childhood. Solid childhood. Business just picked up because Gothic Baby's in the building. Right. Hey, Gothic Baby, I'll find you back.

36:56All right. Any chance she's thinking about what her adult life might entail maybe in the ring? Are you going to let that happen? One thing that is so funny is that I think her mom thinks it would be a nightmare for her to be a pro wrestler, but now she's like super into wrestling and she's like that pro wrestler so she's like kind of people know who i am i kind of have like a character already that is true she could be like the wednesday adams yeah exactly it's true yeah she is legit and she's very good she is so performative like the way she's expressive like my wife will be shooting videos with she'll go okay all right

37:35O'Shea:evie do mad face she goes yeah and like looks through her breath you know what i mean she's like on it she's on it man she's very charismatic too you guys you know have gone the the path of fatherhood have has there been a lot of sitting down and looking at the old stuff which uh with your kids there there's been some my my older kids are starting to get into it a little more and i think i think for them it was weird so we love the hardy compound which is like a big character you know in tna as it is anyway you know we live on 90 plus acres of land it's family land you know we're born and raised here and jeff and i we split off different ends of the property and build our houses and grew up and i feel like my kids for the longest time they're like oh yeah that's cool my dad's a wrestler he's on tv oh yeah our uncle he's at he's at wrestling on tv and they get recognized all the time i think they just thought that was kind of normal like everybody's like that you know but now i i i think they're like oh wow this is kind of this is kind of cool with what they do and whatnot.

38:37But we do. There are times where I look back at that, and I said, the one thing about it, if you guys end up being the Hardy Boys, Gen 2, I said, at least I am there to lead the way, and I can tell you what not to do and what you should do to maximize and optimize everything. Don't let 360-pound biker tag teams not catch you off a job. And then tagging the older one. Yeah. Always tagging the older one. I mean, King Maxwell has to go out there and start to get busy. Anyway, yeah. Maxwell better be ready to throw hands. No, you know, he's been in the ring. He may have been, I think, the youngest wrestler I ever saw get a three count.

39:15Right. If I'm not mistaken. Is this something he's still like heavily into? Because I thought at that point when I saw him, I was like, that kid's going to be world champion in 26 years. Without a doubt. Well, he's right now seven and a half years away. so uh he's a 10 and a half but i'll tell you man he is kind of right now he's kind of like living as a kid and he's kind of in that stage where he's changing a little bit and he still likes wrestling he'll still ask questions and stuff my middle my middle son wolfie he's funny he said daddy said i don't know if i want to get beat up like you do you get beat up a lot oh my they already said but let me ask you this dad he said can i like be a part of wrestling and just like insult people and like talk trash and like make money and i go actually you can he said that's awesome that's what i want to do my youngest son barty he is just he's gonna be a monster he's just gonna mow every he's because he's always ready to fight his older brothers anyway and he loves pro wrestling he is going to be the standout of those three i think no no question about it the party party is

40:21O'Shea:coming bro that's gotta that's gotta be crazy because like you know the risks as a wrestler You know, everything that you went through was like, when you get bit by the bug, you get bit by the bug. Yeah, right. Now, you guys have been fans. You know, we love to get this perspective when people are actual fans of the business because it's always great to see this side of people who live behind the curtain. But one of our favorite questions here is, do you remember at a time when you were just a fan, when did wrestling break your heart? An example I use all the time is watching Hulk Hogan run over the rock while he was in an ambulance crushed my entire spirit.

41:04O'Shea:I was done for. Like, it ruined me. So is there a time that you guys remember watching as fans when wrestling broke your heart? This is the best moment that I can compare that to. Macho Man was my guy, right? And I loved Macho Man. Whenever they had the mega powers together, I thought that was cool. But when the mega powers broke up, I was like, damn it. Hulk Hogan is going to do what he does to everybody. He's going to go and take their finisher like once or twice. And he's going to kick out and he's going to lose the title. I hate you, Hulk Hogan. I hate you. And that was, I was emotionally invested.

41:38Yeah. Like with that match. And I knew like, man, there's no way at WrestleMania five, he's going to retain the title. I said, he's going to lose it. I know he is. And I really did. That's probably my moment like that. I was older at this point, maybe even still a teenager. but uh when sean michaels the heartbreak kid lost his smile and left for a while oh yeah yeah that was both of us i was like oh my god this is he's he might be done that was actually that was done so well where he did the thing where he was posing and passed out you know his way ahead of way way right right was that after he had gotten jumped by the marines yeah i think so yeah yeah that was after he got into the fight in the bar whatever and sean michaels being sean michaels right but they made it into a really compelling story.

42:22That thing with Owen and his reaction and the way like he passed out, like he was really, that's another great example too. I felt that also. Yeah. Because you legitimately was like, he kind of stood there and he held his head and he kind of bounced around a little and then boom. And it was like, oh, this gotta be real. Right. You know, cause you know, we talk about this a lot, you know, growing up and you're in school and you have your little group. Right. Because to me, you become friends with somebody, at least me personally, when someone goes, hey, I heard you like wrestling. Yeah. And then all of a sudden, the next thing you know for 20 years, time to argue, your best friends, all because you answered yes to that question.

43:00So, you know, we get to school and it's just like, no, man, I know that other stuff might not be, but that was like, that's real. Like that. Yeah, exactly. I mean, that's also, that's one of the great things. Sean, Sean was like that too. Sean was way ahead of his time. No doubt about it. even in the way he did that, the way he sold, he was very realistic. He was very good at what he did. And Sean really, in, in, in all honesty, he opened up for a lot of doors for the way wrestling would become and, and new smaller guys to get in and be able to be featured as top, top acts and whatnot.

43:34O'Shea:Now, I don't know where you were going to go with it, but I need to know about that. The first time they went in belts, man. I need to know from everything that you guys knew that you went through, or to get to where you were, to finally get to the WWF at the time. That first time winning the tag team titles, what is going through you guys' head to have climbed all the way to the top promotion, the top of the mountain, and to be holding the two straps? I mean, it was the realization of the dream. Our dream when we first went on this journey together and we're going to be a tag team, uh was to win you know uh the wwf or wcw at the time world tag team championships at least once and if we won them once and we could call it a career we were like we're successful we're successful in life obviously we've exceeded that many times over but uh you know dude dude it's uh it it was crazy that that night i remember so well and it was such a big deal for us it was so cool because michael hayes told us about it like a week out that he had heard we were going to do that and they didn't tell ron and john that being uh ron simmons and jbl until the the night before i think oh okay i think they were worried they might but you know they were great man we worked with them they they they put us over and they did that we worked with them for a month afterwards and they beat the shit out of us every single night because we were saying the titles until we lost them a dude they're great and still uh ron is ron is one of of the funniest human beings you'll ever meet we see him all the time at comic cons and stuff and we see jbl pretty often too but like uh it was great uh the fact that they were willing to put us over and the fact that vince believed in us enough to do that it was cool because we were we were not the best tag team in the world at that time and the titles really put put equity in us it made us as a team and helped develop develop us into a superstar and i think after we had the tag team ladder match with edge and christian no mercy 99 that's where we went to the next level and people looked at us as stars.

45:38And the next time we won the tag team titles against Edge and Christian and Cage at Unforgiven 2000, that's where I feel like we were the best tag team in the world at that time. You guys are always paired mentally with –

45:53O'Shea:when you think about the Hardys, you think about the Dudleys, you think about Edge and Christian. Who are some other of your guys' favorite tag teams to be in the ring with where you guys know these guys are going to take care of us and we're going to put on a banger. I think 2 Cool is probably the first one. You know, we never had a major program with them, but we worked them so, so much, especially in the beginning. You know, you were talking about when we wore tights. They introduced us. We started in 1998. We had a match against Kanta where we beat them with the Event Omega, the leg drop splash, boom, one, two, three, pinfall win.

46:29The next night on TV, we got a no DQ win over 2 Cool. Then we lost about 10 matches straight. And then we beat another random tag team, and then we lost about five matches straight. Then we beat like LOD 2000. It was Animal and Draws, which was crazy. And then Owen Hart, Jeff Jarrett, at one point they pitched for us when we were wearing the tights to win the tag titles from them. And they would drop them back or whatever. So we could tell at that point people saw that we had potential, and they saw talent in us. We were just waiting for the right break and the right opportunity to break through.

47:04And ultimately that ended up happening with Michael P.S. Hayes when Mitch Faredes all together. Yeah, the Headbangers were great, too. We traveled with them a lot and worked with them a lot early on, man. So, yeah, they were great as well to work in those early days, man. We learned quite a bit from them and spent a lot of time with them, man. So it was interesting. We also worked with TNA a lot, which was Tess and Albert during that whole period. And it's great. Like, Andrew Martin, whose Tess was really, really good. He was so talented, so athletic for a big guy, too. and we had a lot of great matches with TNA also You brought up the match with Edge and Christian No Mercy 1999 Yep The next day, I think it was a Raw when the four of you stood in the ring together, was that the time when the crowd gave you guys a standing O?

47:51Yeah Because I remember watching that 24 hours later I had never seen that before because you guys put on such a banger match and then you both came out and you kind of gave each other flowers the four of you and i just remember the crowd giving you guys a standing no and the looks on your faces were like you were amazed can we talk about that that next day yeah no and and i remember i even like i got a little chills when you said that even thinking about that moment it was i know there's one time where they catch my face and it was pretty unprecedented at that time you know that's where we're just kind of going through that period where the internet's getting strong and a lot more people know are learning about you know there's there's dirt sheets there's people who report their inside wrestling news and they're learning all that stuff and now people that are learning about these things have like this newfound respect for pro wrestling and uh they showed it i mean we were in that tag team ladder match at no mercy and we got to that point where jeff was in the corner christian runs up the ladder and drop kicks him in the corner in the crowd like does a little standing O and then the standing O's get longer and longer and higher and higher from that point on through the end of the match and then it was so cool we came out we kind of gave each other flowers we showed respect for one another and then we got another standing O and it it really was like everything changed from that point no mercy 99 we people ask us like what is your favorite match what was the the biggest deal for you and it's hard not to reflect on that point because that really that turned us from WWE wrestlers and the WWE superstars every night would go out our reaction was totally different people viewed us as like legitimate stories then what about you jeff what are your recollections of that time oh i say that i say it all the time i didn't really ever even think about it until the last few years man like uh because we were we studied that match with uh sean michaels and razor ramon so much the ladder match and reinvented it so many times on the indies and added stuff to it and we did that match so many times and just to see what it went from from that match to what we did at that No Mercy 1999 is pretty amazing.

49:59The transformation that took place with what you could do with a ladder and a match. It was so cool to be a part of that because it was on such a different level. That match is the match that made us who we are. It changed the game for us.

50:14O'Shea:Now, TJ, my favorite WrestleMania is X7. it doesn't even end the way that I want it to there was another time where wrestling broke my heart and we'll get into the match but I need to know about a spot what's it like knowing you about to get speared off the roof what is going through your mind I'm just like okay Edge I need you to hit this I need you to catch me I need you to do everything correct what's going through your mind while you're hanging there waiting for that And even more than that, Jeff, how does that get brought up? How do you guys decide, hey, you know what? Was that a thing where one of you went, you know what would be cool?

50:57Right. If I'm not mistaken, I think in the no mercy ladder match, you asked about hanging, didn't you? I think I did. Yeah, I was curious about that. I think you did. He said, could I hang up there? And then somebody knocked me off. And they said, oh, no, no. It wasn't strong enough. It's not strong enough. It's just strong enough to hold the titles. But they had strengthened it over time. So he had that in his back pocket for the longest time and eventually want to do it. I mean, he's a psychopath. He is anyway, so of course he wants to do it. And early on, too, even that Fear Factor ladder that we used last year at Slammiversary, I'd been wanting to do that for the longest time.

51:27That was so cool to bring to life, thanks to Tommy Dreamer and TNA. But yeah, fear is part of the fun. I say that all the time in situations like that. But evidently, Rhino had something to do with it. I just remember when we were kind of going through ideas and I was hanging on it. And I grabbed the ladder with my legs and I was able to like pick it up and move around. And it was like I was crawling with these big legs or something. But I guess it must have been Rhino's idea that maybe said, what if Bully pulled it back? Because we needed momentum to get into the sphere. And it's creepy too. Like the scariest thing is if I wasn't going to like hit him face on, like it was kind of, I got around just in time, but it couldn't have went any better.

52:10But yeah, fear is part of the fun. And naturally it's scary. and the biggest thought is, oh, my God, am I going to break my neck doing this? You know, will I be okay after? But, yeah, I just – oh, man, and now for that to be immortalized in professional wrestling history, it's just such a cool spot for me to be in and to have been a part of. But, yeah, I love those things, man. Something that's just so larger than life, and you can make it happen, man. I live for those moments. that that spear with him and edge is one of the most iconic wrestlemania clips of all time i mean you see it all the time and i'll never forget i was selling something i was about to go through the four tables with baba and i i just talked about this a couple days ago when we were doing media in dallas like i remember being so nervous because we're so worried like what if jeff totally tumbles over and lands on his neck or whatever he's falling from so high it's outrageously high i remember like selling and i was leaning up and i remember i just had eyes like over my head.

53:07I was like, oh, I got to see it. Please land perfectly. Please land good. He did. He landed absolutely perfectly. Couldn't have done any more perfect. It was amazing. Yeah. You guys had those iconic. The first one, the tag teams were talking about. Hardy Boys, the Dudleys, Edge and Christian. You guys had the hat trick of TLC matches that really changed everything. You guys changed the game with those. Let's talk about, we talked a little bit about 17, but you also had WrestleMania 2000 and SummerSlam 2000 and when you guys went at it, just let us know what kind of respect, I guess, right? You guys left those matches differently than you walked in.

53:45So what was it like for the six of you to know that you created something historic? And did you know at the moment that years from now, people would still be talking about these matches? I don't think we had any idea that we were going to be the forefathers of the TLC match, which would become a staple in pro wrestling forever, ever even in other companies they just call it by different names and not not tlc not tables letters and chairs we just know we were given a huge opportunity at wrestlemania 2000 at wrestlemania 16 i'll never forget we were going out and they knew we had a bunch of crazy stuff planned my well hayes was a lot of times he was our producer he kind of stuck with us as a tag team and our our matches and our crew he was always with us when it came to us and the dudleys and edging Christian.

54:31And I'll never forget when we were going out. They said, look, guys, the show's a little light. We're told this on a WrestleMania major paper, which you would never hear this in this day and age. They said, look, take all the time you need. We just want you guys to be safe. We don't want you to get hurt. Just take all the time you need. Dude, would that happen today? Oh, God. No, not at all. They're like, if you need six, seven extra minutes, don't rush it. Just take all the time you need. And they said, we're okay. And that was a pretty amazing feeling and that that was all of our wrestlemania debuts which is crazy you had six guys going out on their first wrestlemania on the main card we'd done stuff on the pre-show the year before but we were out on the main card we were in uh one of the marquee matches and and we went out there and like you were able to tear the house down we were given an amazing opportunity and i feel like there was kind of a pressure on us we want to continue to to keep raising the bar whenever we're doing these.

55:27And I felt like we did do that. And I think the secret now more than ever, as far as raising the bar is just find ways to do things differently, be more creative because I mean, so much has been done because we're all human beings, all mortals, and you can't actually fall off the roof and hit the ground or whatever. But you know, you have to just come up with different creative, innovative ways, things people haven't seen that gets them like, oh my God, that was so cool. And just get people emotionally invested in whatever you're doing. Yeah, for sure. I was really blown away. What was it? SummerSlam we went to when we watched the TLC match.

56:00Was that SummerSlam or a different thing for you? SummerSlam. Oh, yeah, yeah. You're talking about this last year. SummerSlam 2025. We showed up with the Dudleys to promote Bound for Glory at SummerSlam. but uh god what's his name the guy that pulled his legs up and avoided the spear he didn't spot uh it was johnny gorgana or it was champa oh champa it's a muscle champa when he pulled his legs up man i oh my god that i never expected that that was such a genius uh idea that he came up with that man so yeah there's always little things you can find but yeah so much has been done it's really cool to see something like that and just to inspire you okay, you just got to figure things out.

56:41But, yeah, so much has been done. I remember it did get a little overwhelmed. Oh, my God, how are we going to continue to raise the bar? We've done so many crazy cool things. But, yeah, when I saw that, I was like, okay, there's something I never saw coming. Even, you know, I want to fast forward real quick with what you said about Slammiversary. Slammiversary 2025, which we had in New York, and it was a huge turnout for us. We had the match where it was us versus First Class versus the Nemets, who were the champs at the time they'd stole the titles from us. And we had the Rascals in there. But we had this match.

57:13And at the very end, we knew Jeff was going to release that ladder that was going to come down, that cable ladder. And we were going to do some cool stuff with it. And eventually, that's how we were going to win the titles. And that's something he's been wanting to do ever since TLC2. I mean, almost 20 years. And then finally, we made that happen. And we knew that was just so different and so new and so innovative. And the way we did it was like all the ladders were broken in the match. oh shit he grabbed a controller for someone ringside and like and uh dropped it down it was like the building's ladder you know and then he went up and got it but that's that's kind of what i'm even talking about i think there's there's cool ways to be creative and different and think out of the box and just do things that have never been done before even in big 2026 and that is our goal this year to really create a bunch of magical moments similar to that and my i had another idea which was way better as far as how to get that camel ladder down which is kind of cool we didn't use it because it's a it's a nutty crazy cool idea to get the cable ladder down also i've got two other like i think extremely cool like finishers for for ladder matches so hopefully in the future we'll get to bring those to life as well all right that's something to definitely

58:20O'Shea:look out for jeff hardy's thinking away is pretty dangerous right tj you know what i've never said what's that uh the fun is in the fear i've never i've never you know definitely it's never not not one time have i ever put fear and fun so close together like jeff right i mean that that was like a life motto right oh there's you know the hardy boys don't grow on trees you know so now in this in you know you guys are still doing You guys have been with TNA and you guys had Justin AEW. And now even with the TNA and NXT partnership have found your ways back into WWE rings. But you've seen a lot of friends from the past.

59:13O'Shea:And you've been around a lot of new talent. Has there been any of the new talent you've gotten to wrestle with that really stands out to the Hardys? I really like all the dark state, you know, we got to work with those guys and they're like, you know, they're four studs, you know, they're all half our age. It's so funny. Whenever we ended up having that match at Halloween habit, where it was broken rules and we're out there in a ladder match. It was basically four on two. It was fun. It was very enjoyable. I, I, I think there's a lot of potentials in those guys for sure. Especially they're all really just starting, you know, they're kind of learning.

59:47This is all a new journey to them. And I do like the way the NXT system is working now with being a developmental system. And you put someone new that doesn't have a lot of wrestling experience on that show and kind of teach them, you know, on the fly, let them learn on the job. And they also get to learn how to properly do, you know, what WWE looks at as WWE TV, you know, the way they produce things. So it's been really fun going back and doing that. Man, we love working with Fraxium. Those guys are both so talented, just fast as hell. It's crazy. like two of the faster guys we'd ever been in the ring with.

1:00:20Someone I just want to shout out as a younger talent that we love, that is going to be a major player in pro wrestling for years to come. He can stay healthy as our boy, Leon Slater. Oh, man. He's waiting. Yeah, call him Leon Slater Hardy, man. But he is great, man. It's so great that he does that 450 swan time. When Jeff first showed up at Against All Odds, when I wrestled Moose and he came out at the very end and made the save, Leon was going nuts. He had no idea he was there because obviously that, 450 Swanton was inspired by his Swanton. And once I came to TNA, he was like super excited to like meet me and hang and talk, whatever.

1:00:55And then when Jeff was back, it was amazing. I'm so glad we got a team with him and work with him. His future is limitless, man. Yeah, it's cool working with Joe Henry, too, just to see what he's done the last few years and how he's used social media brilliantly and musically, all that stuff. He's just got what it takes, man, to be huge. And to see him at the Royal Rumble, is that what he showed up in? Yeah, he can throw that right there. At the Rumble and Mania. He did Rumble and Mania. Yeah, it's crazy cool. And now that he's going to be at Jensen's as well, I hear. So he's coming back. Yes, he is there Saturday.

1:01:27AJ Styles back on Thursday. Plus, there's some surprises that haven't been announced on Thursday. AJ's coming back? Yeah, AJ's going to be there on Thursday at the Impact debut, Eric.

1:01:38O'Shea:You know what I noticed about all those names, TJ, except for Leon? They've all been guests on the No Contest Wrestling podcast. We haven't had Dark State yet. Oh, yeah. We said we had Dark State as well. We got to get there. We got to get there. You know, I want to talk, like I said, we're going back and forth here. But you mentioned something, Jeff, about how Joe Hendry uses the Internet. Matt, you were, in my opinion, the first wrestler who really embraced what the Internet could do. I want to talk about you guys when you initially broke up. But since we're here right now, you know, Matt Hardy version one, when you would come out and you'd have the Matt facts with the, like the, the mockup laptop or the markup computer when you were doing your own thing.

1:02:21I wouldn't know about this because I would literally, there were times where I would like write some of these Matt facts down and I would post them on Facebook as like, they were TJ facts. Like, you know, TJ loves TJ hates. Here's one. TJ hates onion rings. TJ hates onions, but loves Burger King onion rings. Like I would do stuff like that. Sometimes I would get, You know, like TJ can't balance his checkbook. I would like just write these things on Facebook. It might have been MySpace even before Facebook. That's how far back it was. I think it was MySpace, but yeah, all because of the stuff you were doing.

1:02:59You know, it's so funny how I pushed WWE on that in the beginning. I said like, look, I want to be, I initially, I pitched this idea to creative after we had our tag team ladder match where I said, hey, how about if myself, Jeff, Edge, and Christian form a faction and maybe we can do a battle with DX at the time, which they were running pretty strong. There was Hunter and X-Pac and the New Age Outlaws, right? And I said, maybe we could do something with them and we could have a pretty cool rivalry. And I said, I think the name of our group with Matt Hardy, Jeff Hardy, Edge, Christian, I think the name of our group could be Version 1 because we are like the Version 1 of what tag team wrestling or what wrestlers are going to look going forward or what tag teams are going to look like going forward with a version one.

1:03:46And they ended up shooting that down. I don't think DX wanted to work with us at that time, whatever they had, other things they wanted to do. But I kept that name in my back pocket. And then whenever we split up, I said, hey, I'm thinking about, you know, the internet is becoming more and more prevalent. I'm thinking about doing like Matt Hardy version one. And what if my entrance is like a Windows media player, you know, and we have all this stuff and like you see the computer and we talked about the whole thing. And actually, Debbie, they were very, they were open to it and they did it. And I remember they popped up the thing and they said, well, if we put a little like a factoid in here every single week, oh, my God, I love that.

1:04:19And I would give them a couple of things. All of those Matt facts until our book came out were written by me. I would like submit three or four every day. Then Kevin Dunn, it's a blast from the past, that name, would pick a couple and he would put them on the on the Matt fact screen. And then whenever our book came out, a Matt fact popped up and said, have you read Matt's book? And I was like, you can't do that, Kevin. Like, that's blasphemy. It has to start with Matt or Mattitude. That's the only way every Matt fact starts. That's blasphemy, man. Don't ever do that again. And then I'll never forget there was a point where some of the people in WWE said, like, I don't know, Matt.

1:04:50You're playing very heavy into the internet and, like, you know, like kind of the social media thing. Like, I don't think this is ever going to affect wrestling or do anything that is going to be positive for wrestling. You know, I just I just I don't think they mix. I just think you're you're you're too into it right now. I said, I'm telling you, this is going to be a big deal when it's all said and done. And looky, looky, looky. You know, in this day and age, there was a point where, you know, the Internet, everything that is pro wrestling is on the Internet immediately. After it happens on a TV show, you're going to see clips.

1:05:22You're going to see whatever. You're going to see this. Even this, you know, like us doing the, you know, the no contest podcast, man. Dude, everything is on the Internet and it keeps moving pro wrestling forward. and it has done more to move it forward. It's done things to move it backwards too in some ways. One thing I've always said about social media, the best thing about social media is it gives everyone a voice. The worst thing about social media, it gives everyone a voice. You know, but it is a very, very powerful tool. We're leaving today and entering a world of Mickey Mouse waving, princess meeting and greeting, lightsaber clashing, the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror dropping, Banshee flying!

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1:06:28O'Shea:And they're up to 60 % off. Stock up and save on Rag & Bone, Madewell, Vince, all scenes, and more of your favorites. How did I not know Rack has Adidas? Why do we Rack? For the hottest deals. There's so many good brands. Join the Nordic Club to unlock exclusive discounts, shop new arrivals first, and more. Plus, buy online and pick up at your favorite Rack store for free. Great brands, great prices. That's why you Rack. Now, you guys have both had, obviously your success is a tag team, but you guys have also had singles success as well. But I know what it's like. We saw it a little bit with, you know, main event Jey Uso and not being around Jimmy.

1:07:12O'Shea:Is it hard, you know, to have that transition of you're always around your brother, you come up with your brother, your brother's by your side, and then now, you know, you're going the singles route. Were there harder days on that singles road than there were as a tag team? no i think we all are very uh we were always very comfortable you know going our singles ways uh and felt confident in what we could do um i know especially in tna back in around 2012 was when i really felt like i like kind of became a singles wrestler i kind of knew what i was doing it was when i started painting eyes on my eyelids i was like okay this is what this is what i've been trying to become this whole time and this is my my solo career that's a good marker man yeah yeah so yeah i think we've always been confident in each other you know tag or singles and i i definitely think so whenever we work together uh you know building up to wrestlemania 25 whenever i betrayed him and turned him we were really excited for that because i think we were both very confident in our singles abilities you know like i had had a real good run as u.s champion i had the angle with mbp that was jeff was doing all kinds of amazing things with the intercontinental title umaga you know rest rest in peace brother uh so so many great things we had going on i was the ecw champion and we were excited to really shine and do what we're doing and then when we heard it was going to lead to a match against one another wrestlemania 25 that was that was another big dream of ours like uh winning the wv tag team titles for one time at least and then wrestling each other at wrestlemania we were huge fans of the brett and owen match at wrestlemania 10 and and we were very uh we felt very grateful we were given the opportunity to do that where you guys living out some some living room flashbacks you know you set up a match as kids where you know like what was that finally going one-on-one what is that feeling of all of that culminating you know the being in the backyard being on the trampoline to doing it on you know the grandest stage of them all mac probably man thinking back to it uh the only fight i really remember he could have probably created this match called tables ladders and recliners the last fight i remember i said he threw a recliner on me he had his stripper superhuman strength he had punched me and knocked me down but then he threw a recliner on top of him i ran out in the woods it was just bawling my brother tried to kill me tables ladders and recliners and it's a true story it's crazy i mean thank god because he Once he grew to that point where you're both on the same playing field, he probably whipped my ass.

1:09:55Threw a recliner. I did. He made me so mad. When something he'd done, I picked up a recliner and slammed it on. Damn, man. I still feel bad. No, you guys split up. You're going your own way. And for as incredibly, insanely popular as the Hardy Boys were and still are, Jeff, your popularity just kind of went, I mean, you're a cultural icon. I've watched videos of people saying, like, who are your three favorite people? And this one thing was like, you were the second person that he named. It was like Obama, Jeff Hardy, and somebody else, man. It's just like, you, Pete, and I'll say this all the time.

1:10:40And this is no offense, Matt. You were also there. but there was something that I think is because Jeff was taking more of the, the death defying stuff. Maybe it was no, no doubt. Like, you know, also I'll say this whenever you think about what the Hardy boys represent in theory, like these adrenaline junkies, these daredevils who will do anything, you know, have no fear, you know, the, the, the, the fear is part of the fun is he says Jeff, Jeff, Jeff epitomizes that more than I do. I feel like I'm at my best performative when I'm doing something that's over the top. Maybe even half-assed delusional like Matt Hardy version one or broken Matt Hardy.

1:11:16I feel like those are my strengths, but Jeff's strengths are incredible. Just the risk he would do and the moves he would do and he was always better with that, so I would be more of the solid meat and potatoes guy in the matches and I got it. But yeah, man, he is beloved across every single culture and we both are to a degree, which is super cool because we did Kai Sinat's. I had no idea how big Kai's uh stream was and we had someone ask us about said hey you really want you on the stream you know uh in in it was in september i think it was september in september we're like okay well we're pretty busy but we'll let you know whatever and he he buzzed back like well we let her say hey do you guys have a time he says you really want you on like you're his favorite wrestlers you were really influential to him when he was growing up and we're like okay i'll get into it and said yeah last week we had kim kardashian we had the jonas brothers and i was like whoa it's like god we you better get to it we finally we finally worked out a date and his guy that was a producer said hey i asked how like who who are your dream guests in september and he said huh let me think about it um oprah winfrey obama the hardy boys lebron jane kevin he said he said me that lord i was like we're number three yeah he was great man and and we had a great time doing it he was so cool man uh it was it was wild man and just stuff like that just kind of reminds you like man you've touched so many people and we feel blessed about that man like we hear people from across cultures man talk about like man my parents with my ass because i did the swanton or you know because i did a leg drop or did this did that man it's it's it's cool looking back in hindsight it's really cool that we've been able to inspire people and i think we are good we're a good example of if these two kids from the wilderness in Canberra, North Carolina with no connections can make it and achieve their dream, then you can too.

1:13:11You know, we talked about, we had Kalani Jordan on last week, and I brought that up. You know, people like to say, oh, well, if somebody did it, you can do it. And lately, I've taken a little bit of umbrage to that, because it's like, that would take away from the fact that, like, you guys are special. Like, just not everyone can become the Hardys, but I think the better messages if they did it then at least if you have a dream then pursue it but i think it takes away sometimes when someone goes oh well if you do it anyone can do it that door is open that is not the case that door is open but it's gonna take a lot of work to get to that door a lot of work to get through it so and and so jeff when getting back to that split you being the the culture icon when you finally became the world i mean the wwe world heavyweight champion brother like what was that like like what what went through your mind as though she likes to ask what happened that night when you went to bed and you had that that belt sitting on uh i'm assuming because i would have it on the pillow next what was that like when you know it was you edge and triple h in the in the triple threat match and you reached the ultimate goal yeah i wasn't snuggled up with it but it was right beside me you know beside me under the covers naturally but uh yeah it was just a childhood a dream that came true, man.

1:14:30I was, it was very surreal. And, uh, but yeah, after all the years of such hard work and just belief and faith in myself was so such a big part of that, man. And I still hold true to that, man. It's just being, being authentic and being myself. I just gotta be me, man. I can't live no other way. Uh, so yeah, it was just, it was just meant to be. And, uh, and I always knew that I had what it took to, to become that. And, and looking back on it, I mean, I've had such even with the ups and downs, I've had such a incredible career, man. I've burned it down, you know, to have to rebuild a few times.

1:15:03And and that hasn't been easy at all. It's been tough. And I don't have any comebacks, any more comebacks in me. This last time I burned it down, I've rebuilt to be here to not burn it down again. And I'm so blessed to be on the other side of of all my issues with drugs and alcohol. So, but yeah, being that WWE world champion, man, that was just, it was meant to be. And it's a childhood dream became true. And, and yeah, I finally fulfilled, hey, I fulfilled what I, what I, what I dreamt of for so long. And you say that things burn down. The fact of the matter is we never left you, dog. Yeah, no, never.

1:15:40That was one thing that, you know, a lot of people that happens and people kind of forget them and they, they want to act like, you know, we're, we're through with them. and the thing about Jeff Hardy is we never left and people would never leave the Hardys, you know, especially because I think the connection you had with people made anything that you two were going through, like we were still rocking with you no matter what.

1:16:02O'Shea:We're always happy to see you guys. And, you know, especially I heard Cody Rhodes say this saying, but the saying is Hogan must pose. So even while Matt is getting beat up, we still need to see Jeff on the stage. taking his time it's funny you meant that because i think it was one of the first times you came back i think it might have been aw matt was getting beat up by yes and jeff's music hit and before you ran down you did your dance and on your wife's matt on reby put that on her tiktok story and i made a i made a comment and i said i put like jeff let me hit my pose real quick I gotta get this off.

1:16:43I think my comment got like 1 ,400 times by... You know, what's so funny, it was kind of the chaos of AEW at that time. In that segment, we had talked about how Jeff was going to debut and show up. And I said, like, Jeff's a big star. And we knew he had the Hardy Boys music we had loaded. And I said, I think he should come out and hit his juke, do whatever. I said, like, they should start whipping my ass. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. all of a sudden that music hits there's going to be a big pop and then everybody stops kicking my ass they turn and they look at the ramp jeff comes out and he does the dance for a second he's like all right here we go and then runs in and uh and ends up making the save but what happened is the music hits and they're kicking my ass and they didn't stop they just kept getting mad so then jeff comes out he's like oh shit i guess i don't get the interest i gotta stop kicking my ass do it so that's how that happened i tried to i just i am nutty so i try to juke and run at the same time it did not work great at all so many people wouldn't have hopped on that so quickly but like you know in in the 2020s that's going to become a meme instantly you know and it is what it

1:17:53O'Shea:is absolutely yeah now me and tj talk about because we we you know we met you guys uh backstage at TNA. Yeah. We, I've been to a lot of wrestling. That was dope. We were talking about like, we marked out as soon as you guys went away. By the way. I was like, oh my God. But yeah, thanks for looking out for us. I just want to say that you were very cool. Like, I think Jeff, you were doing your face paint most of the time when we were hanging out with Matt in the beginning of the night, but man, it was just like, we were, we were tripping. Yeah. Yeah. And, um, you know, we, we say that the most fun that we've had, um, as, as wrestling fans was being backstage at that TNA.

1:18:30O'Shea:event i've been to a lot of wwe events tommy dreamers taking care uh of us with tna i haven't been to an aw event yet but tony that doesn't mean anything i would love to go you're missing and uh so with guys with you guys have been you know been to all three is there any major difference between or is it just mostly the talent and and people that you're around i i think right now you know w2b they do sports entertainment i think aw which i get it they're trying to create their own niche and have something different and and they're more focused on having five star matches or bangers and you know that's kind of what tony would prefer to see but i still feel like at the end of the day like the the be all end all in pro wrestling isn't the match you know it's more about the stories and the characters and the moments that you create and and and i get that uh and and i feel like matches mean so much more when there's a a strong story behind them and i say this like on my podcast a lot on the extreme life of matt hardy uh with john alba i just go like dude there are there are casual fans people who like you know just kind of get hooked on the characters you know that those people still exist i mean there are people that are on the internet they follow everything on social media and they want to know all the behind scenes the behind the scenes stuff they want to know the scoops and whatnot but there are casual fans who just like oh i like wrestling i grew up watching you know hulk hogan or i grew up watching stone cold or i grew up watching john cena i'd like to tune in and see a great wrestling match maybe what what's the stories nowadays it's kind of like a soap opera in some ways yeah you know those people those people care and at tna i want us going forward to have great matches and have great promos and whatnot but i also want us to to welcome everyone into the tna tent i i want everyone to come into the tna tent and like have something for everyone you know those hardcore fans and also those casual fans because we want to try and bring as many eyeballs to AMC as we possibly can.

1:20:27And I feel like sometimes if you're not too, I feel like you have to be careful in some ways because you don't want to offend parents and kids because you need kids to come and watch your product because if kids want to come to your shows and buy tickets, that means their parents have to come with them. So that's important. So sometimes I think you don't become too violent. I think you do cool stuff. You do entertaining stuff. You do different, but I I don't think you want to be too violent, too gory, too bloody. I think you can do that stuff here and there, and it's okay. But I think at TNA, we are going to work on doing that.

1:20:58We're going to welcome everyone into the TNA tent. I want to kind of make it like a variety show to some degree, have great wrestling, but great storytelling as well. Maybe have a little bit more of a cinematic effect on some of the vignettes and whatnot to kind of match up and run parallel with AMC since that's our new home and whatnot. But I'm really excited about the future going forward for TNA. yeah i've never paid any attention to like uh politics or anything like that and around until i get and it had a lot to do with just getting sober this final time like uh going back to work at aw it was tonight i came out with the painted chair yeah then my youngest daughter helped me paint and i came out uh but i just i would that whole day i was oh my god people are actually they are fighting for these spots on the show and they're like what's going to be better who deserves this who deserves that i've never really noticed until i came back to aw and i was going oh oh my God, there's a lot going on here as far as people fighting for these positions.

1:21:50And even the times that we were trying to get a match or whatever, it was just like, I've never noticed that until this last time getting sober. But I'm just glad everything worked out the way it did with TNA. Because man, back in that 2012 area, I had so many good moments and memories and matches in TNA. And the merchandise they had back in those days were killer, man, for me. Get your custom belt that you had. My custom belt, all that cool. stuff I did, man. I had like six songs, uh, six years in a row. I did a new theme song every year for glory. And to me, I love stuff like that. Nobody does that, but I, but I was doing that.

1:22:28And so definitely I want to move into that. Hopefully this year, I want to, uh, do a killer version of my original theme, uh, named modest, uh, in, in TNA for when I do have singles matches or something to break that out. But, um, but yeah, I've never really noticed any of that until this last time but um definitely uh the tna is the perfect spot for me today here in 2026 and i hate dodging questions as far as it goes but i was just going to say kind of the initial question you asked what's the difference between all the promotions i would say wv is wv they have a system it is what it is you work hard you try and climb up the ladder you try and do better a lot of stuff is very managed wv is very controlled uh aw uh they have tony con has a direction he wants to take the company in and he's the owner it's his money obviously he can do that and it is what it is he's looking for a niche audience but i the sometimes with aw i just fear there they they there's more people if they expanded some things in their product they could put more eyeballs on the product uh tna i think we're gonna try and be like a traditional wrestling company and in so many ways with how we do things we're gonna want kids to come to the show we're gonna want parents we're and I was trying to have great matches for people who love great matches.

1:23:39But also the great thing about TNA is it's not micromanage. You know, the match that we have with the Dudleys, we couldn't have done that match anywhere else besides TNA and Bound for Glory because, like, we specifically had a vision of what we wanted to do. We wanted to have, like, emotional moments. We wanted – Jeff and I, we felt great. We were able to do stuff. We were worried about Devon. We wanted him to get through the match, good and safe. That was our most important condition on that night, and we were able to do it. and they were able to retire on good terms. And one of the great matches were one of their career rivals.

1:24:11So that was very important. That could have only happened in TNA because TNA is the only place that could, like, we could have the creative freedom to do that match the way we did the match. And that's one thing that is great. You see people come from NXT over to TNA, and they go like, oh, well, who do we need to talk to about what we can do here? I said, I don't know. Just figure out what you want to do. Tell me what you want to do. That's one of the magics here. It's like old school wrestling. Like back in the day where you kind of come up with what you want to do. You decide the story of your match and what's going to happen, you know?

1:24:41And that's, that, that creative freedom is something that I love about TNA. It's what led me to being able to do Broken Matt Hardy, which totally rejuvenated our careers, you know, and totally made us fresh as the Broken Hardys. I wanted to try something different and out of the box and they let me roll with it. And fortunately, and, and thank goodness it worked. I wanted to talk to you about that, man. And how did, you know, we spoke earlier about the big money Matt Hardy gimmick, but then your whole broken character, man, that not only flipped TNA upside down, you had the entire wrestling world in a chokehold with that gimmick, man.

1:25:16Just how did that start? Where did that come from? And where did the leak come from? It started, my wife and I, we had started watching True Blood. Like, after I had some time away and I was with WWE 14 years in the beginning, you know. and then once I was doing Ring of Honor and then I was doing TNA and I would do some indie shots or signings and whatnot but I had some time off we were like watching True Blood like binging True Blood and I was going man like vampires are really cool like the way they live for a thousand years and you know depending on what the era is they dress differently or their hair's different whatever just being I said it'd be great to be able to do like some sort of immortal character like a vampire I said obviously none of us are immortal I said but what if I could be aware of where my soul has been in this body which i would call the essence is broken mat and then i kind of like workshopped an idea like that i know every body every single human vessel every human body that my soul has been in and that's how i could claim to be 2 000 years old and that's where that initially came from and then i pulled stuff from like true detective with matthew mcconaughey in his rest and call and stuff from dexter and then even some silly cartoons like salad fingers so this wild cartoon.

1:26:27I pulled stuff out of all those things. And then I just started kind of like making up as I was going. And I tried to create this universe, which stayed real, had great continuity where it was all the same. And like Jeff ended up being all in with the brother Nero thing. And without him being all in, it wouldn't have worked as good as it did. So that was great, man. That was the funnest year of my career. Starting Broken Matt Hardy in 2016, all the way to returning to WrestleMania. The stuff we did with the K was great. They were our perfect, you know, the perfect enemy for us to battle against and whatnot.

1:26:57And it was just an absolute blast. Jeremy Borash, I have to give him a big shout out to JB, who works at WWE now. He was such a great mind in all this as well. But it really was. It was so different. And it was crazy that Broken Matt became such a great meme or gif or jif or whatever. You know, there was so much of that. And just people were sending it to each other, you know, just on the daily. It was wild, man. And the word delete specifically came from whenever I was, I didn't get it from anywhere specifically. A lot of people would say like, Hey, did you get it from Death Note? Or did you get it from the Cybermen?

1:27:32And a couple of places that abused it. We were doing the final deletion and I was shooting fireworks at Jeff through the ring here on our property. And I was like, I want a word to say, I want to scream something out, but not kill or like die or cease or, you know, some, what is cool. And I was like, maybe I'll say delete because it's kind of like a trendy word in pop culture. like you know people like you know that's the shitty tweet delete or whatever and i was like i'll try delete and i did it right there i was going delete delete delete delete and then that became one of the more catchy points of the video and a lot of people started saying it so then i started i started saying delete and i said maybe i'll do a gesture where you know like when you're on your phone and you're just sliding something slide it over to delete it i said you know i'll just do this like i'm sliding it over nice talking from that's a genius genius man And that character was amazing, man.

1:28:24And it had people tuning in to TNA without question.

1:28:27O'Shea:All right, guys. You know, you guys have given us a lot of time, so we want to make sure we get our last three. There were some heavy questions. Our number one question that we ask on no contest comes first. You guys are in a bar, all right? Now, we usually do 50 when it's a singles wrestler. So since you guys are a tag team, it has to be 100. So there's 100 dudes in this bar who don't like the Hardys. All right? They're looking for you guys. They're trying to kick you guys' ass. We need you guys to pick a team of yourselves and four other tag teams to make sure that the Hardys are getting out of this bar and making it to the house.

1:29:11And it could be four tag teams of any era.

1:29:13O'Shea:Yeah, any era. I think the four tag teams I would pick, I would say Haku and whatever partner he's with This is a Haku question I would say Brad Shaw Brad Shaw and Ron Simmons APA I would I would say Brock Glessner and Kurt Angle a couple times 18 get a couple shooters in there and then maybe for the final ones just for intimidation factors at a minimum, the Road Warriors, the LOD. That makes sense. Prime Peak Warriors. So we got Haku and we'll say the Barbarian. There we go, yeah. Haku and Barbarian. Haku and Barbarian. APA, Brock and Angle and the Road Warriors. How about you, Jeff? I totally feel the same way.

1:30:04Road Warriors, Simmons and the Acolytes, Haku and, would you say, Barbarian? Yeah. Barbarian for sure. I'm just going to add Michael Hayes and Jimmy Garvin in there too just because I would love to see them I would love to be in a fight with those guys they would just walk in and they'd start getting their asses kicked but then while they were distracted all the big guys jump everybody else and Brock and Kurt yeah for sure at one point we spoke about Pops before we let you guys go and I'd like be mad at myself if I didn't talk to you about Wrestlemania 33 um there were slight rumblings there were slight rumors that the hardys might be coming back but you guys man being the the geniuses that you are you sent everybody off you off your trail you went to the to the airport you took pictures in the departure section everybody thought oh no they're leaving town because you had a you had a show i think it was a show maybe the day before so you guys played it perfectly you made it sure that everyone thought that the hardys were out of town and they weren't coming.

1:31:12And then, you know, we have a tag team championship match. The belts are, you know, up in the air. New Day's introducing and they're letting us know there's another team and you're just assuming, okay, it's going to be the New Day. This is dope. And then that music hit. And I still remember to this day the hair on my arms shot up. I can see where I was sitting in my apartment. My buddy Luke was over and I was just like, no! Instant curse words. that pop was literally if they were to take the 10 greatest pops in the history of professional wrestling you guys are in the top 10 and you ain't number 10 and you ain't number nine or eight or seven or six it's got to be top five i've seen a little bit of a documentary about what went on but like man what did that feel like because i'm that guys o'Shea's an actor he'll probably have a chance maybe when he wins an award one day to get that feeling I'll never know this feeling.

1:32:09What is it like as a human being to hear that? What goes through your minds and your bodies as your music hits and the world erupted? It was the best. I was so nervous. Michael Hayes just reminded me to breathe. And it was just so perfect. And just I still like the Expedition of Gold, this thing that Matt came up with is Broken Matt. It still blows my mind that that's pretty much the way it ended to win the most iconic, the most epic world tag team championships on planet Earth. It still blows my mind the way that all ended. But yeah, I was just so glad the lying was over. I was so tired of lying leading up to it.

1:32:53But it was well worth it, and it was done so well. And we got through that match with the Young Bucks the night before. I think I only took like 24 super kicks and went through three tables. And I was still able to perform the next night. And just to be back in WWE was incredible. The place where it all kind of started for us. And a lot of people don't even realize this, but on Friday night, we main evented the WrestleCon Super Show against the Lucha Bros. We had a hell of a match against Pinson Phoenix that night. So we wrestled those guys on Saturday night. We had a 30-minute ladder war with Young Bucks, and then we had the WrestleMania 4-way ladder match on that Sunday.

1:33:32One thing that's very funny, Once we ended up leaving TNA at this time, there was a point where someone had told me from WWE, Vince said, I've got a question. This was in a meeting with people. He said, I've got a question. Why is the WWE Universe going, delete, delete, delete, delete? What does this mean? What does it mean? And they said, oh, well, boss, that's something the Hardys are doing. He said, they're real hot right now. I said, they're like white hot over in TNA. They have this old new character, Broken Matt, Brother Nero. He says, damn it, bring them home. Bring them home. Bring them home.

1:34:06Vince wants it. He'll try to make it happen. Looking too shiny over there. The timing kind of worked out. We would have probably started there earlier, but they'd let us know, hey, we want to debut you guys at WrestleMania. We have an idea. Then I had been talking with the Young Bucks. Still love the Young Bucks. The Bucks of Youth? We had been negotiating doing a TNA because we were going to be talking with TNA initially. and then we're going to do a TNA versus Ring of Honor like cross promotional deal where they would come to TNA we go to ring ROH this and the other thing because we showed up at Ring of Honor final battle in 2016 if you remember that like Broken Matt and Brother Nero popped up but Broken Matt did just me Jeff wasn't there and I shot the video and and told the Bucks we were going to come for them and their tag titles and then I said what if I said I asked the man with three H's Triple H I said I said what if we did Ring of Honor like during this month before we start at WrestleMania.

1:35:01I said, because we talked with him about even winning the Toss and whatnot. And we spoke with Ring of Honor and we were able to do it. And we convinced people that we were going to be signing with Ring of Honor because we were the champs. And that's why Jeff was doing interviews. They said, so you're signing with Ring of Honor. How long are you here for? Jeff said, ah, Matt signed the contract. I don't know. It's a pretty good while, man. You know, I don't know, man. We're just here for a while. And then he was just like, man, I'm just tired of lying, man. I just wanted it over with. But dude, it was so magical.

1:35:29And it was one of those things, like you said, there had been some rumblings but no one really thought we're going to be there we did a six hour autograph signing earlier that day for evolve and it was myself jeff my wife queen rebecca senior benjamin my father-in-law king king maxwell uh and vanguard one and we were there we signed for six hours it was non-stop crazy and then like we we took those pictures whenever we came into the airport we took pictures like we were leaving before and then i posted up those pictures and And then we were like just hiding out at the hotel until about our match was 30 minutes up.

1:36:01They put us in a car, drove us over. We got dressed, talked to the guys in the match. The other three tag teams for like five minutes and then went straight to the ring, dude. It was like it was the ultimate adrenaline rush when Jeff was talking about that. Usually you're in the venue, you're in the building all day long. And like we hadn't seen the building. We had no idea how it looked, how the setup was. That stage was massive. You almost fell off the stage. Yeah, man. Up the ramp. Yeah, it's crazy. and and then just to come out and see that sea of people right tna was like at the point the broken universe heated things up got people talking about again and then we got a new owner which is anthem our current owner now and we kind of bridged the gap to get you know to move from the carter family to to anthem which was pretty amazing and and we're very proud that that happened but the fact was people were saying yeah tna it's gonna die it's going out of business we came in And there were 40 ,000 people, 50 ,000 people going, delete, delete, delete, delete in the crowd.

1:36:57You know what I mean? And just the love and the admiration, man. The reverence when we came out. I get goosebumps even thinking about it because it really was. It is the most.

1:37:07O'Shea:It's amazing. The energy and the emotion was palpable that night, man. We keep saying this. It keeps moving up higher and higher. That might end up being the number one moment in our career when it's all said and done at the end of the day. because it was that magical, man. Yeah. All right, I got, this is my last question for you guys. You know, we respect you guys' opinion on the business and everything moving forward. And you are one of the lucky people that you're going out the way that you want to, and that doesn't happen a lot in wrestling. It's a beautiful thing to have careers as long as you guys have had.

1:37:44O'Shea:now what what is missing from today's wrestling and what are you glad is gone my first thought as far as what's missing is managers i i think managers uh were a big part of wrestling back in the day and and i kind of missed that uh you got anything uh i i just think what what i'm glad is gone i was gonna say first and foremost is the culture they used to be in wrestling i think that has changed for a very positive way because when we first came in like everybody was hazed it was kind of like the old school territory way they would make you earn the respect show that you belong there and we saw dude when we were around wb especially once we signed in a nice seven game of 98 we saw some uh we saw some up things you know what i mean and it was crazy and and they kind of put us through and they made us earn our spot and prove that we belong there so i'm glad that has changed it has kind of mirrored society in a lot other ways you know because even you look back like what society was producing it was kind of the wild wild west back in the 90s right you know things have changed a lot and like people are a little more thoughtful i feel like you know what i mean so i'm glad that has changed the culture has changed for sure in pro wrestling stuff that stuff that i think is missing is just uh it's it's still it's still in there some i just think too i i think like uh having these larger than than life characters i still think we can we need a few of those i think those are important in pro wrestling because pro wrestling at the end of the day is entertainment yeah i think some larger than life characters once you come in if you get something over to a certain degree like when i was broken matt hardy i would never break character you know what i mean i kept telling orange cassidy i was so i loved working with him and i loved how he had the bit and he never broke character he stayed in the character and that is the secret to maintaining you know that persona if you're going to do it.

1:39:38I still feel like there's a lot of authenticity and people want guys and acts that are real too. I think that is very important. I think it's very important to have that. But I also think at the end of the day, wrestling is a little bit of a variety show. I think we need a few of those larger than life characters that feel like old characters that maybe are magical to a degree or maybe are supernatural to a degree, whatever it may be. And I think if you can integrate those into your roster, I think it leads to interesting stories and rivalries with people. Love that. Love that.

1:40:09O'Shea:Man. This was amazing, man. This was amazing, guys. It's really sick to be able to talk to you guys. I've got four more pages of notes that we're going to have to get to the next time we have the Hardy Boys. I don't even get to ask what's scarier, a leg drop from the top or a twist of fate from the top? Yeah, well, you know. What's scarier for you, Matt? my ass still hates me with that left off on the top of the cage, no doubt about it that's kind of like a one and done man, give me a table where I can break my fall at least a little bit it's all scary and serious part of the fun exactly we're going to have to make a shirt now he's been saying that a lot recently, but that's not that would be a shirt, yeah I got music rehearsal in like 10 minutes so that was good timing, man, I really appreciate it y 'all appreciate you Jeff, appreciate you Matt Thank you guys so much and continued success, man.

1:41:02O'Shea:Yeah, absolutely, man. So TNA, January 15th on AMC. Woo!

1:41:13So I'm seeing the writing on the wall. There's so much we couldn't get to. Man, like literally, I have, I don't even know where I put my notes. I tossed them in the air when the interview was done. But yeah, we could go for two more hours with those cats. I didn't even get to bring up the Mick Foley. didn't bring up Mick Foley I wanted to talk about Bray Wyatt I wanted to talk about I wanted to talk about Big Money Matt Hardy a lot of people weren't you know really watching TNA missed out on that old thing glad we got to talk about Broken Matt glad we got to talk about the latter incident you know it was dope man because like I said I've been watching these guys since I guess now that I figured out Jeff was probably 17 years old the first time I saw him in a match in the Civic Arena in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania so from that moment to come full circle and see him sitting in front of us right now, man oh man, wrestling man it takes you places.

1:42:09O'Shea:You gotta figure out the next time they're in LA man we gotta do our part 2 in studio, in person man thank you guys so much TNA on AMC, that's great man, look for them. On the 15th Thursday, make sure you guys tune in to TNA on AMC, on their new home. Always treated us well, so we will always make sure that we treat anybody from TNA. I want to come talk to the boys that will treat you guys well as well. The 15th, Thursday, AMC TNA. I'll be there. I'm watching. In spirit, because I'm going to be watching it. You know what I'm saying. I mean, they might ask us to go. I don't know where it's at. Yeah.

1:42:50O'Shea:I mean, we don't know where we're going to be, but TJ could tell you where to find us. I tell you where you can find us, like you said. on all of our socials, right? So peep this. On Instagram, we are at No Contest Wrestling Podcast. On Twitter, we're There's No Contest. On TikTok, No Contest Wrestling Pod. And then, of course, we're on Spotify. You can download, subscribe, listen to us there. Apple Music, Amazon Music, and, of course, our home at ESPN on the ESPN app. Basically. And then, you know, when you want to look at his smiling face, you know, when you want to look at what Jordan's I got on today or what LeBron's he's wearing, then you go to the Rich Eyes and Show YouTube page or you just type in No Contest Wrestling.

1:43:34That's right. You can find all of our videos from episode one with CM Punk to now episode 68 with Matt and Jeff, the Hardy Boys, man. Doing it, man. 68 episodes, dog. Yes. What a time to be alive.

1:43:46O'Shea:Kind of crazy. What a time to be alive. Thank you guys for tuning in once again. Thank you to the Hardys for giving us the time of day. Yes, sir. make sure you guys have a good day oh and also shout out to gothic baby cause we don't want right I'm gonna stay on gothic baby's good side just so you know cause she's about that life she'll flip she's about that life yes so make sure you guys have a good day but not too good cause who the hell do you think you are and I hear soon Miss Parker coming back to TV yeah about time but in the meantime in between time bye Miss Parker

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