Hardy speaks about how his AEW run played out.
From 2022-2024, Jeff Hardy was with All Elite Wrestling alongside his brother Matt Hardy. He spoke candidly about that run while guest appearing on Busted Open.
Jeff and Matt are currently working with TNA Wrestling and on the Slammiversary go-home edition of TNA iMPACT, they challenged for the World Tag Team Titles. Jeff said he will not break’s TNA’s trust. He feels guilt and shame for breaking that trust with AEW as a result of his personal issues. He stated that he wants to make it up to Matt.
Definitely (my goal in TNA) is to win the TNA Tag Team Titles, basically because I have so much guilt and shame within me still just from AEW giving me an opportunity and even Matt (Hardy) to me breaking trust with my personal issues in real life and so I just wanna make that up to Matt and I can say right here that I will not break TNA’s trust. That is in my past and it feels good to have somewhat of a clean slate with all that stuff and kind of start fresh instead of having that guilt and shame about what I did in a certain world of pro wrestling.
The main thing is sobriety and recovery. It’s a huge thing. Back in ‘09, which I got convicted of my first dealing in 2011 and I was completely sober for about two and a half years. But, 2012 was one of my best wrestling years ever in TNA in my opinion because I was straight-up stone-cold sober and I was scared a lot. I had a lot of fear within me but, having good matches and it’s obvious with me when I’m not in a good place. I look swollen and big. It’s pretty obvious if you go back and watch footage. At least I can see every minute of it. But yeah, sobriety and recovery and staying on that straight and narrow and it’s gonna guide me to such a beautiful place in human life and existence and I have two daughters and a wife that I still have their love and their support and that means everything to me and I’m even starting to get a little fearless with comedy stuff I used to do back in those two and a half years of sobriety with character stuff and comedy stuff and I’m trying to turn my music show more into a comedy act because I’m not a great singer but you know, I just give it my all. But, so many things have happened since my last run-in with the law that have been really beautiful, and it’s like an enlightenment connection I have with everything around me. Mainly nature, the force of nature is a huge drive with my eternal love.
Continuing on the topic of AEW, Hardy was ready to ask for his release from the company in January. It was on the day he was scheduled to wrestle Darby Allin at a Rampage taping.
Jeff was ready to go to the indies. He sent out a tweet about The Hardys only being on one show a week and added that he prefers Dynamite because Collision was designed for ‘punks.’ Jeff said he was trying to be a heel and ended up getting matches out of it. The match with Darby led to him finding his love for the craft of wrestling which he said he’d lost.
That happened actually the second time I wrestled Darby Allin. I went into work that day and I was ready to just ask for my release and go back on the indies and really start loving the craft again… But I was trying to be somewhat of a heel on social media and so I said something that wasn’t professional at all but I got a match out of that and a few more good matches. I didn’t win any of them but, I was out there on TV and I was finding that love for the craft again. But, after I wrestled Darby that night, again, it refilled my soul then, as a 46-year-old human being. I was like, ‘Oh my God. This is fun and this is why I love it.’ But I was in a real low place and I was ready to go back to the indies and just try to find the love for the craft again because I’d kind of lost it.
The opening match of the TNA Slammiversary main card saw Matt Hardy score a win over J.D.C. (Johnny Dango Curtis). At the post-Slammiversary TV taping, Matt teamed with newly crowned TNA World Tag Team Champions ABC (Chris Bey & Ace Austin).
If the quotes in this article are used, please credit Busted Open with an H/T to POST Wrestling for the transcriptions.
