Matt Hardy Talks Leaving WWE, Evander Holyfield Being Upset Backstage, WCW Guys Stealing Names, More

I had the opportunity to speak TNA Wrestling's Matt Hardy recently about several topics, including leaving WWE, working with Evander Holyfield, his early days as a WWE enhancement wrestler, and much more.

Also, check out part one of my interview with Matt, where he spoke about his TNA run.

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You worked the AAA World Cup, what was that like?

"That was a great event, man. I represented TNA, very proud to do so. There were 20,000 people down there, and I teamed with Ken Anderson and Johnny Mundo. We made it to the finals to compete against Alberto El Patron, Rey Mysterio Jr, and Myzteziz. It was a tough event. I had five matches over the course of four hours, the way it was set up. We were at high elevation in Mexico City. It's something that I can check off of my list of things to do in my career, and I'm looking forward to doing some more AAA in the future."

Do you think Americans, by-and-large are more open to different cultures of wrestling now? Both Lucha Underground and NJPW on AXS are great shows, AAA and NJPW have done PPVs in the states this year.

"Yes. I think a big part of that has been the access to information. People can go on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and see Mexican wrestling, Japanese wrestling and become familiar with it. You have guys like the Young Bucks, AJ Styles, who are working in New Japan, you have Rey Mysterio and El Patron back in AAA who are famous in the states and people want to follow. Stuff is just so much more accessible now, and I think there's more of a demand in the market for it. I think it's great that New Japan and AAA are capitalizing on that. I think it's smart, and I think American fans will like getting to see that."

I was kind of disappointed we didn't get to see you work much with MVP in TNA, as you guys had such a great feud in WWE. Were there ever any plans for that to happen?

"Thank you for that, first and foremost. It wasn't supposed to last that long, it lasted almost a year. We really got to put our heads together and put a lot of creative input into that, and we're really happy with how that ended up in totality. There actually was a point in TNA where we were close to me having a working alliance with the BDC. I don't think it worked out for either one of us creatively. There was talk of doing something, but it didn't work out for us. Who knows? Maybe down the road MVP comes back or something, but I think there's room to put another layer on the program with myself and MVP, another twist. We have a pretty good idea of how to do that, too."

You even worked with Evander Holyfield during that program. What was that like?

"It was amazing. What a shock when they brought him in. It was also intimidating. I'd talked with Evander Holyfield, and everything was cool and ready to go. Evander's manager was his wife, and apparently, JBL had said something backhanded about Evander being there, and Holyfield heard it because the locker room was wired into one of the earlier shows. He heard it and got upset. I went back to speak to him and he was mad. People were like, 'what are you going to do? Evander Holyfield's mad at you, he's not going to want to do any business.' I remember we went out and fought, and everyone was happy with it, and Vince told JBL 'You have to be careful about what you say, because we almost lost Evander Holyfield,' and JBL said to him 'Hell, we almost lost Matt!' One of the greatest boxers of all-time, and he's legitimately mad. If he wants to beat me up there's nothing I can do. It was intimidating, but it was an honor to be in the ring with him."

That's another case of people testing the 'Matt Hardy will not die' theory, right?

"Yeah, I swear, somebody wants to kill me."

You were probably the most over guy in the universe in 2005 after getting fired. Do you think that eventually help set the table for guys like Daniel Bryan who were cut or not given the right push, and let the fans know they could change things they didn't like?

"I don't want to take credit for that. If the fans have an opinion, the wrestling universe has to listen. The Daniel Bryan thing was so great because he's worked so hard, and he's at the point where he's went so long that the fans wanted him back after he was cut, and then he was brought back, but wasn't put in the title picture where he should have been, the fans turned on the people who were in the Royal Rumble when it wasn't Daniel Bryan. It was such a great statement, and they had to listen. And that's the right thing to do as far as business goes. It's kind of neat that I was involved in that first situation. I wouldn't have been so successful if I didn't have such a tremendous groundswell in support from my fans. It's absolutely amazing."

There are always people who want to see you back in the WWE. Did you leave them on good terms?

"I'll be honest, when I left I was mad, angry, bitter. I'm sure I pissed people off. I talk to a lot of people there now and I have a good relationship with those people. It's real easy to be in the WWE and let your passion, or your pain, or the schedule put you in a bad place. Guys like Alberto El Patron and CM Punk were so frustrated, they just wanted out of there by the end. There were so many guys. Even though that happens, it's almost a natural occurrence in some ways. People always ask if Jeff and I will go back, or go into the Hall of Fame, and I don't know man. One thing I try to live by is to not have an end game. Just kind of live for the moment. Anything I do in wrestling now is extra credit. I live day to day. Where I end up, I don't know. Right now I'm happy in TNA, happy with the schedule, happy with my place, and I want to become TNA Champion. The wrestling business and young wrestlers need TNA to get exposure. We do great business internationally, and now we just need to do that domestically. I wave the TNA flag proudly."

I think the TNA show over the past 10-11 months has been really good, and national exposure is always important. You've had that national exposure much longer than people realize. You wrestled in WWE in 1994, even.

"It's been almost 22 years since I started on WWE TV. We started with the Italian Stallion and George South, who would take extras up for WWE television. Myself and Jeff didn't train at their school, but we agreed we'd do their live event shows, and we'd make the drive and do their spot shows for free, but every few months we'd get to go to the WWE as extras. Eventually their guys, who were paying $2500-3000 to be trained got frustrated, because every time guys got chosen it'd be myself or Jeff or Joey Abs. It's funny because we were just younger and our goal was to make these big WWE Superstars. That's what led to us getting booked on our own, and led to our developmental deal."

That had to be a unique experience, working with guys like Razor Ramon, Triple H, Owen Hart, Steve Austin before you even had a developmental deal.

"It really was overwhelming. We just started in 1992 wrestling in our backyard. Within a year and a half, we're on WWF television. When I wrestled Nikolai Volkoff in 1994, I had no business being out there, and I was on live television! Jeff went out there and wrestled before me and wrestled Scott Hall and he was 16. Could you imagine? Jeff went out there still in high school and wrestled Scott Hall. We got it in our minds to do what we needed to do. You have to work against guys better than you. You have to make it a lifestyle if you want to make it a career."

So you started, really training yourself right?

"Yes, more than anything. There were two guys, John Adcock and Eddie Rainwater, and we trained ourselves on our trampoline, and there was a guy who had a ring that was mostly concrete, but had a trampoline in the center, and we started doing shows with this guy. We were independently trained professional wrestler. These guys started teaching us a little about the psychology and terminology. We just incorporated our athleticism, and things that eventually became the ROH style and the NXT style that is slowly becoming the WWE style. I feel like we were doing that in 1994 and 1995."

I'll never forget seeing you against Steve Austin in his first WWE match. You were in your High Voltage gear weren't you?

"I worked Steve Austin in my old High Voltage tights that said 'HV' and Kevin Nash joked with me and said 'Hey kid, the person who made your tights left the 'I' out of the middle.' and I was all nervous and just said 'Oh, okay, thanks man!' (laughs). Razor always liked Jeff because he'd bump around a lot, and they called him 'Ice' because he had the Vanilla Ice haircut. One night, one of them said they heard Jeff Hardy's theme out there, bump-bump-bump-bump-bump-bump-bump (to the beat of 'Ice Ice Baby'), because Scott just beat the sh-t out of him and Jeff took a bunch of bumps."

We need to see the Hardy Boys against Robbie Rage and Kenny Kaos for the rights to the High Voltage name on a TNA One Night Only show.

"Funny story about that, Chris Kanyon, who worked at the Power Plant, actually confirmed this to us. I sent in my demo tape, and they said 'Oh this guy's name is High Voltage, that'd be a great tag team name, let's use that for these two guys.' So that's where the name came from, my amateur challenge tapes."

If you guys would have been about 150 pounds heavier, you could have had that role.

"(Laughs) If we were five years older and pumped full of steroids, too."

I think you all ended up being okay without the High Voltage name.

"Once you do it on a national level, they have it. I actually just changed my name to Surge, but WWE loved that our name was Hardy, and the old Hardy Boys mystery novel."

What's your favorite singles match?

"That's always an interesting question. It's like someone asking you who your favorite kid is. The WrestleMania 25 match with Jeff stands out, because one of our dreams was to wrestle each other at a WrestleMania, and we made that happen. Then there was Matt Hardy against Edge in the steel cage. A couple of the matches I had with Mark Henry for the ECW title, I thought he was doing his best work then. And then the Full Metal Mayhem match with EC3."

Where can fans follow you on social media?

"That's pretty simple, MattHardyBrand across the board. You can also go to ShopMattHardy.com and check out some cool shirts and other stuff."

Also be sure to check out part one, where Matt talks about his TNA career, his family, and continuing to wrestle at age 40.