COVID-19 has changed so much in everyone’s life and for Jeff Hardy, the lack of an audience has taken away his greatest source of adrenaline, the WWE Universe.
Speaking with Sport360, Jeff Hardy opened up about returning in front of an empty WWE Performance Center in Orlando, Florida, as opposed to the thunderous response he was supposed to receive in Detroit, Michigan.
“It is very different,” he explains. “There is no natural adrenaline rush because the people provide you with that. It has been my thing [throughout] my whole career having a great connection with the WWE Universe. They provide me with the energy and adrenaline to do some nutty stuff and without that it is different, but that’s the way it is with what’s going on in the world.
“I was supposed to return from my knee surgery in Detroit in front of 20,000 people, but that ended up being the first show we did in the Performance Centre in front of no crowd. It was the first time for me working with King Corbin and it was very bizarre – almost dream-like.”
This led to “The Charismatic Enigma” discussing some of the more thunderous reactions he has received throughout his 20-year journey in WWE, most of which, to no surprise, involve ladders.
“My first real experience of that was the tag-team ladder match with Edge and Christian. We had a seesaw spot with the two ladders and I just remember being so excited to pull that off. I remember jumping off the top rope and my butt hit that ladder and it seesawed and hit my brother and Christian if felt like it wouldn’t get any better than that. All those people just reacted to this one idea I had in my mind and was able to pull it off.
“Naturally, the 33-foot Swantom I did to Randy Orton was a big one, with the slow climb, it is one of the immortal moments that will always be cool.”
Hardy continued, “The other is when Edge speared me off the thing that was holding the tag titles. It makes you feel somewhat super-human when you pull off something like that, and then hear 80,000 people just love it – it’s the best and I live for those moments.”
Currently, Jeff Hardy is in the middle of his fifth reign as WWE Intercontinental Champion and is exclusive to the Friday Night SmackDown brand.
