Images via: M Hardy-Star-Gazette, WWE & AEW-Reddit
Matt Hardy has been in the business since 1992 and he and his brother, Jeff, are together, one of the greatest tag teams to ever wrestle in the business. They rose up to stardom in WWE and throughout the Attitude Era, but that fame sadly dwindled as the Ruthless Aggression Era was getting to its very own twilight.
The brothers each had a few lows amidst their soaring highs, but they certainly overcame adversity and they both had extremely successful runs in TNA/Impact and at other promotions along the way.
After many years away from WWE they did make their triumphant return to the company and although Matt was offered a contract to stay with the company, he in turn decided to join up with AEW instead after that company got started.
He has had quite the run in AEW thus far, and despite being 47, he is holding his own in some pretty physical matches. The AEW roster is top tier for sure…very physical and it takes great athletes to keep up with that kind of pace—athletes like Hardy himself and say, Billy Gunn.
It was actually on AEW Unrestricted that he spoke about the difference between the two companies and what role the audience plays when he’s out there, doing his thing in front of the audience.
He said:
“I realized after we did the thing with Sammy, I had stubbed my toe a couple of times in the program. The audience is being very hard on me, I see a thing here too; the demographic here in AEW is very different from a WWE. The demographic and the feedback I get from performing on AEW compared to WWE is very different…
It’s much younger; it’s much more trendy; cool pro wrestling fans. As opposed to WWE, you can tell the audience is older, and they are almost more welcoming of legends and veterans who have been around in the past. With AEW, it’s very tough. You have to go out and bust your ass like you’re 25 to 30 every night.”
A very honest statement on his part, he calling a spade a spade; the AEW audience knows what it wants and it is very different from the WWE audience, as is quite clear from week to week and in Hardy’s own statements above, and despite the fact that WWE is concentrating on their youthful superstars (as they should as well), they have an audience that is very open to supporting their older athletes too. Certainly food for thought, dear readers.
Domenic Marinelli is an author and freelance writer/journalist. His work has appeared in The Sportster, E-Wrestling News, Pro Wrestling News Hub, CFL News Hub, XFL News Hub, Ringside News, Daily DDT, USFL News Hub, Slam Wrestling, as well as other print and internet publications. He is the author of Generic V, Summer of the Great White Wolf, His Old Tapes (stories & poetry), Across a Dark River in Palermo and so many others. He lives in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. https://linktr.ee/AuthorDomenicMarinelli
