Matt Hardy Opens Up About The Death Of WWE Hall Of Famer Terry Funk
AEW star Matt Hardy has opened up about the death of hardcore legend and WWE Hall of Famer Terry Funk.
On "The Extreme Life Of Matt Hardy" podcast, Hardy said Funk was a huge favorite of his, who he watched growing up.
"One of the first things that I loved that Terry Funk did is when he did the deal that he was the judge in the match with Flair and then it looked so realistic and looked so crazy when he grabbed Flair and he gave him the piledriver on the table and he broke his neck or whatever, and he just looked like an absolute mad man," Hardy said. "He would go out and he would create bedlam. I remember he did stuff with Muta, they had the cage that they were in, it was like electric at the time ... He seemed like he was just constantly creating bedlam and chaos and I loved that so, so much about him."
Hardy stated that while Funk was an agent of chaos when it came to his matches, in real life, he was "the biggest sweetheart you'd ever meet." He mentioned that Funk was genuinely kind to everyone, in addition to being one of the greatest and most innovative workers and personalities in the business, having accomplished numerous feats worldwide.
"Everybody who knew him loved him. Which was wild. And pretty unprecedented in that day and age, because there was a lot of people that would bicker or have an issue or heat with someone else, but everybody loved Terry Funk," revealed the AEW star.
Hardy: 'Huge Amount of Respect For Terry Funk'
Matt Hardy shared a story about Terry Funk recording a video to send to him. In the video, the late star showered praise on Hardy and his Broken Matt Hardy gimmick.
"[Funk] said, 'I want you to record a video to send to Matt Hardy....' And then Tony recorded a video and he said, 'Hey, Funker wanted me to send this to you.' And it was Terry Funk going 'Hey, Matt Hardy. I hope you're doing well. I haven't seen you in a little bit, but hope you're doing good, miss seeing you bud. I just wanted to tell you, I'm really proud of you for doing Broken Matt Hardy,'" Hardy said. "He said, 'You went out, did something different, you took chances ... It's crazy. I like doing crazy stuff, kind of out of the box.' He said, 'I just want you to know, it's real cool and I'm proud of you for doing it.'"
Hardy said it was a great compliment to receive from Funk, and his respect for the Hall of Famer grew after receiving the message.
"Him complimenting me for, like, thinking outside the box and trying something radically different was very, very cool. So ever since that moment, I've just had a huge amount of respect for Terry Funk," he said.