Forever Heel: Matt Hardy V1.0 — The Path Toward Mattitude

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I stated earlier this week that I ‘am going to revoke Bully Ray’s heel card. Well I put in a complaint to the Federal Bureau of Heel Affairs in DC, and Chief Schyster said that he will look into it. In the mean time I’m questioning the blood relations of all these Dudley Boys. I’m starting to have doubts that Bully and D’von are real brothers?

Okay enough hilarity. Its time for The Sensei of Mattitude, Matthew Hardy V1.0.

In the summer of 2002, Matt Hardy had enough of his brother Jeff getting all the credit. While Jeff was having a match on Raw, Matt did a run in and gave his brother a chair shot, causing Jeff to lose his Intercontinental Championship shot. Matt Hardy was now a heel, and he left Raw for SmackDown. Upon debuting for SmackDown, Matt was given a hero’s welcome. He partnered up with faces like John Cena, and Rey Mysterio Jr. It looked like these three would be a sweet face team, but Cena and Hardy couldn’t help themselves, and each would turn heel. Hardy’s second heel turn of 2002 took place during a match with The Undertaker. During the match Brock did a run-in and beat the hell out of Taker, Hardy took advantage and scored the win. In their second match, Brock attacked Undertaker on his way to the ring. Undertaker couldn’t make to the match, and Matt Hardy was declared the winner by default. For the next few weeks Matt would tell everyone about the two wins he had under his belt against The Undertaker.

A month after his Undertaker wins, Matt Hardy declared himself Matt Hardy Version 1.o. Matt would also go on a quest to reach Nirvana with his own philosophy that he labeled Mattitude. His first Mattitude Follower (or MF’er), was Shaanon Moore. Hardy was then given a shot for the WWE Cruiserweight Championship, but he was over the maximum weight limit. Hardy began wearing garbage bags during his matches, and Taz informed us that Hardy’s plan to lose weight was to sit in the side car of a bicycle while Shannon peddled him around the city. Taz rules. Hardy finally made weight and faced Billy Kidman for the Cruiser Belt, and won. Hardy held this belt for about 4.5 months before having an awesome match with Rey Mysterio and losing his belt to Rey.

After losing the Cruiser Belt, Mattitude marched on. A new Monk of Mattitude had joined, Crash Holly. The funny thing about Crash joining was that Hardy was somewhat disgusted to have two lackeys, and decided Crash would be  a “Moore-on”, or Shannon Moore Follower. This didn’t mean that Matt didn’t appreciate Crash helping Hardy win matches with heavy doses of cheating. Shannon Moore and Crash would team up in several Heat matches. Hardy wouldn’t show up at these matches, instead he’d give Crash a copy of The Hardy Boy’s novel, and a copy of the WWE Magazine that featured Matt Hardy to inspire Shannon and Crash. So when Crash was in the ring, Shannon would be reading his Matt Hardy novel. When Moore was in the ring, Crash would study up on Matt by reading the magazine. This was when heels could be funny.

In real life Matt Hardy wanted to leave SD to spend time with Lita (his girlfriend at the time), on Raw. It was decided that before his return to Raw that Hardy would put over Zach Gowen, a wrestler with a missing leg. Hardy debuted on Raw and immediately turned on Lita, keeping his heel status. Matt was on his way to colliding with a face Christian, until he didn’t? Apparently Johnny Ace thought that Matt Hardy couldn’t be a heel because he had little girls screaming when he’d come to the ring. Ace also did this with Jeff Hardy when Jeff was teasing a heel turn, but that was stopped before he fully turned. WWE would begin implementing all these old school goofy heel rules that are still present today. This is why you don’t see heels shouting at fans on their way to the ring, or heels do lots of funny stuff, because they might get cheered. So basically Matt Hardy V1.0 was killed and Matt Hardy Face returned to floundering on Raw, and then jobbing to Edge so many times that he was sent back to SD. In SD he was constantly and purposely overlooked. He did briefly return to heelhood, but then was pushed back into mid-card face limbo. This is sad because fans loved Hardy, and instead WWE gave us Undertaker, or Batista.

 

CH Punk comes from Beverly Hills, California; but considers himself a citizen of the World. Punk also turned heel at age 5, after receiving a LJN Iron Sheik figure for Christmas. On that day he vowed he would stuff his Sheik figure up Hulk Hogan's nose, to ruin Hulkamania. By 1995 Hogan had already ruined it without CH's help.