Matt Hardy Looks Back At The Real-Life WWE Storyline With Edge And Lita

One of the most talked-about feuds in WWE history was the one between Matt Hardy and Edge. There were real-life issues between the two centered around Lita and those issues were converted into an angle that at times seemed real as well.

Hardy talked about that being a real-life storyline when he joined the Cheap Heat podcast.

"For me, it's where I first started learning to separate personal life from professional life and now I am extremely comfortable in being able to differentiate the two. I mean, at first, it was a little intense, a little strange, knowing that we were all on the same page; everyone was okay. Everybody had to keep their emotions in check and as long as we did that, we knew that everything was going to be good," revealed Hardy. "As time went on it got a little easier and a little bit better. The most fascinating part about 2005 in my career was that you weren't able to tell the lines between what was real and what wasn't real and where that line lies. It's the most important thing about professional wrestling, especially this day and age in 2019 you need to blur the lines where you are not sure about what is real and what is scripted."

Hardy and Edge engaged in a brutal feud that included a steel cage match, a ladder match and a street fight. They also had to work a stiffer style to give off the appearance of their feud being real. Hardy discussed having to be stiff in the ring at Edge's expense.

"We were both aware that and were both down for it. I almost felt bad for him because he was on the road for a while and his body was battered and he was beaten up and injured while I was out for eight months and was healthy. So I almost felt bad for him in some capacity because I was in the better shape out of the two of us but yeah, we both knew that this had to have a certain look for people to buy into it," said Hardy.

The first match between the two took place at SummerSlam 2005 and it featured the ref stopping the match when Edge busted Hardy's head open against the ringpost. Edge was declared the victor due to Hardy being unable to continue but Hardy says that match just set the tone for the rest of the feud.

"The first match was just meant for us to carry us on to something else and it was kind of a fluke thing where he dropped me on the post, split my head open," stated Hardy. "The whole appearance of that wasn't meant to be that long, it was supposed to be short, almost like emulating a UFC fight by going all out, beating the hell out of each other and then having a fluke finish. That was the whole mindset behind that."

Edge ended up "winning" the feud as the final match between the two was a Loser Leaves Raw match in which Edge won with some help from Lita. Hardy was asked if he liked the way the feud ended.

"It was okay. There were things I would have probably done differently but it was okay. I think the whole blowoff having the cage match where I did the leg drop on the top of the cage and I beat him to finally have my come up, I thought that was a great blowoff, even though we had another match later which was a ladder match and that was just to put us on two separate brands. That is when they were trying to be serious about holding talents exclusively to two separate brands again," said Hardy.

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit Cheap Heat podcast with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.

Peter Bahi contributed to this article.