Controversial star was "mentally burnt out" and became enhancement talent before getting WWE release; says Matt Hardy
AEW star Matt Hardy has given his thoughts on how he thinks a former WWE Superstar felt during their most recent run with the company.
The star in question is Matt's brother Jeff Hardy, who stayed with WWE despite seeing his older brother leave the company in 2020 and join AEW. However, Jeff did achieve a fair bit of success after Matt left, with many feeling he was on course for one final main event run.
But that wasn't to be, as Jeff infamously walked out of a WWE house show in December 2021 before being released by the company. It was reported that Hardy refused to go to rehab as the company was worried he had fallen back into old habits. However, the drug test results that came out months later proved he was sober at the time.
Jeff Hardy was sent home following his #WWE house show match.
After the HOT TAG Hardy randomly wanders into the crowd. 🤷‍♂️
https://t.co/gvqQa4Q8fh
Speaking on his podcast, "The Extreme Life of Matt Hardy," the AEW star shed some light on how he thinks Jeff felt during his final months with the company, and it didn't sound good.
“I think physically he was in a pretty good space, he was pretty healthy at that time. I think mentally and emotionally he was—he felt very underutilized, very undervalued at WWE, especially coming off that—he had that little Survivor Series push where he did the deal with Seth Rollins and he ended up being the last person on the team and got a great ovation. I feel like mentally, he felt like he was just kind of being used to put other guys over at that time, and not necessarily—just like jobs that didn’t make sense.”
Matt Hardy elaborated by stating that Jeff may have thought his image and legacy would be damaged if he kept putting people over and losing all the time, which led to him being "mentally burnt out."
“I feel like, Jeff felt like he was just doing some meaningless jobs that didn’t make sense. It wasn’t where he was his character and his legacy and his status as an iconic performer wasn’t being valued as much as it should be. Then at the point with the schedule of still working house shows, I think he was just done, mentally burnt out.” [30:38-31:51]
Matt Hardy's reunion with Jeff in AEW was short-lived
As expected by many, Jeff eventually signed with AEW in March 2022 to reunite with his brother Matt Hardy so they could go on one last run at the top and perhaps win the Tag Team Championships in All Elite Wrestling.
Things started off well as The Hardys remained undefeated during their run in AEW which even saw them pick up a huge win over The Young Bucks at the Double or Nothing pay-per-view in May 2022.
One year ago on Dynamite, Jeff Hardy made his AEW debut to an insane pop. https://t.co/ZtQ3aXktYj
However, Jeff was eventually suspended indefinitely from AEW following his arrest in June 2022 for driving under the influence. There has been no word at the time of writing as to whether the former WWE Champion will return to the ring.
Do you want to see Jeff and Matt Hardy team up again in AEW? Let us know in the comments section down below!
Please credit "The Extreme Life of Matt Hardy" and give a H/T to Sportskeeda Wrestling when using quotes from this article.