Again, from PWTorch, a short run revisited with history and video's. Original article here: http://pwtorch.com/artman2/publish/The_Specialists_34/article_33357.shtml Credit to PWTorch and the writer.

Quote :

ROH Classic Feuds: Matt Hardy vs. the ROH fans

One of the most memorable wrestling backstage news stories of 2005 was the Matt Hardy-Lita-Edge affair. WWE released Hardy in April 2005 - while he was off the road with an injury - shortly after word got out that WWE women's wrestler Lita, Hardy's long-time real-life girlfriend, had been involved in a real-life affair with Edge (himself married at the time). Hardy publicized the sordid situation on his website and in numerous interviews. This drew fan attention to the situation and, three months later, Hardy got his job back with WWE to return and feud with Edge.

Hardy the Pirate Broadcaster

Before it was apparent that Hardy would be returning to WWE, ROH booked him to work three dates in summer 2005. I have long wondered what then-ROH booker Gabe Sapolsky planned to do with Hardy had Hardy not returned to WWE. (Cant find any video's for this...)

In the DVDs for the shows leading up to Hardy's debut, ROH ran short clips of him that he was supposedly beaming into the shows against ROH's will with some kind of pirate broadcasting technology. This had "Wrestlecrap" written all over it since Sapolsky apparently expected fans to believe that Hardy was cutting live into DVD releases when ROH could obviously edit out anything unwanted. However, we never got to see where this was actually going because Hardy re-signed with WWE before his first ROH appearance and ROH dropped the angle.

WWE allowed Hardy to fulfill his outside bookings after re-signing, so ROH went ahead with Hardy's three scheduled matches that summer with no further elaboration on the pirate broadcasts.

Hardy Mentions ROH on RAW

Hardy re-debuted on RAW on July 11, 2005, a few days before his first ROH date. WWE tried to portray the angle as a shoot, as though Hardy was not a WWE performer and was trespassing at Raw to attack Edge, but the execution was so choreographed that it was obviously an angle.

Matt hardy attacks edge on raw 11th july 2005
Uploaded by dido67. -

On the July 11 Raw, Hardy came through the crowd and attacked Edge in the ring after a bad match with Kane. After the two were separated, Hardy grabbed the ringside mic and cut a promo on Edge and Lita. One of the many logic holes in WWE's portrayal of this angle as a shoot was why the WWE television producers broadcasted a close-up of Hardy and did not cut his microphone during the promo.

WWE officials conveniently caught up to Hardy just after he finished his promo and, as they were dragging him away, he yelled into the mic: "Come see me in Ring of Honor, ROH!" I suppose this was meant to reinforce that the angle was a shoot, but nothing was going to save it at this point.

Hardy's ROH Debut

The following weekend, Hardy faced Christopher Daniels at ROH's Fate of an Angel event in Woodbridge, Connecticut. The match was the semi-main event before C.M. Punk's World Title defense against James Gibson (this was the middle of the red hot Summer of Punk angle, which I covered in this column.

Hardy got a great babyface reaction from the crowd, which he solidified by cutting a good basic promo putting over ROH. Since he was facing another babyface (Daniels had recently turned face), the crowd reaction during the match was split. The match itself was good, but not a classic by ROH's extremely high standards for in-ring work. Nevertheless, it was a good performance from Hardy considering he was just returning after a long injury layoff.

Amazingly, Sapolsky on commentary went along with the ridiculous WWE storyline by saying that Hardy was not a member of the WWE roster when he jumped Edge on Raw. Hardy got the win over Daniels when C.M. Punk interfered and hit Daniels with a chain while Hardy and the referee were not looking. The fans were not happy with the tainted finish, but still gave Hardy a respectful ovation.

The Fans Turn on Hardy

A month would go by before Hardy's final two ROH appearances, a weekend swing through Dayton, Ohio, and Chicago for Redemption and Punk: The Final Chapter. During that month, WWE kept trying to sell the ridiculous notion that the Hardy-Edge angle was a shoot. Hardy ruined his credibility with many fans by continuing to work the angle through his personal website. When this did not get over, WWE shifted gears and brought Hardy into Raw as a normal member of the roster to set up a Summerslam match with Edge.

By the time Hardy arrived in Dayton for Redemption, most of the ROH fanbase had turned on him. Sapolsky tried to manipulate the Dayton fans into giving Hardy a babyface reaction by putting him against Homicide (a top ROH heel at the time), having Hardy save babyface Jay Lethal from a beat down by Homicide and Low Ki, and having Hardy cut a babyface promo before the match. This got Hardy a few cheers at first, but most of the crowd quickly got behind Homicide with chants for him to "F- up" Hardy.

RoH Matt Hardy vs. Homicide Teil 1/2 - MyVideo

Watch more My Video videos on AOL Video

Like the Daniels match, the Hardy-Homicide match was good but not great. Hardy got another tainted win when Low Ki tried to throw Homicide a chain, but Jay Lethal came to ringside and got into a tug-of-war with Homicide over the chain. This distraction allowed Hardy to roll-up Homicide from behind for the win. The fans hated the finish and booed Hardy out of the building.

Hardy Puts Over Roderick Strong

The next night at Punk: The Final Chapter in Chicago, the fans were overwhelmingly anti-Hardy and greeted him with an array of hostile and vulgar chants. To his credit, Hardy dealt with it like a pro and gave the fans an excellent 20-plus-minute match against Roderick Strong that put over Strong very well. Hardy played off the heat from the crowd very effectively and made Strong look like a million bucks.
(Cant find a stream but here's a download link http://www.megaupload.com/?d=BBIU5BWW)

I have seen a lot of Hardy's work in the WWF/WWE and I rate this match against Strong as the best real wrestling match I have ever seen Hardy have (his classic gimmick matches in the 1990s are another category). It is the one match of Hardy's ROH run that reaches the level of a great ROH match.

Analysis

Sapolsky used Hardy well to put over Roderick Strong as a rising star. Giving Hardy tainted wins over Daniels and Homicide in his first two matches protected his opponents while giving Hardy enough momentum and credibility to make Strong's win in the end meaningful. Strong was just coming off a breakout singles match against C.M. Punk, and Hardy putting him over was a great way to continue his rise to main event status. By the end of the year, Strong would be headlining ROH shows in feuds against The Embassy and "American Dragon" Bryan Danielson.

I am convinced it was mostly the insulting angle with Edge that turned the ROH fans against Hardy, and not his actual performances. Hardy did ROH a great service the way he put over Strong and gave the fans a classic match in the process.

Show Recommendations

The Hardy-Strong match at Punk: The Final Chapter was excellent and well-worth buying. Only buy Hardy's other two appearances, Fate of an Angel and Redemption, if you are a huge Matt Hardy fan and seeing him outside the WWE intrigues you.

Thought's? Was it the epic fail it appeared to be? ROH did do the best job that they could with what they had, and rightfully gave Hardy a decent run before putting Strong over with the maximum momentum. It also gave ROH some great exposure with the Edge/ Hardy story, but that is something for another time.

I remember Jeff's short spell in RoH, that lasted for a whole 1 match. he got booed out of the building, and they never booked him again. The fans even spent the match chanting 'we want Matt', and then a couple of years later, they got him.

I honestly think RoH did pretty well out of this. If WWE had stopped Matt from appearing, it craps over RoH with them having advertised him wrestling. They avoided the TNA route of having him squash their own established stars, used Matt to build their own star in Strong (and I've said before, matt is excellent at getting other guys over), and got a shedload of publicity.

Yeah ROH benefited greatly from this, arguably better than their orginal plan of a full time Hardy in ROH. 2 cheap win's over 2 established top star's gave him enough steam without hurting the other 2 (which is a main point here) to sucessfully put over a rising star, a great short term build up, having signed with WWE too gave them that little bit more exposure to the WWE and casual wrestling fan's alike.

I think I saw the Daniels match on TWC when that first popped up on Sky.

Haven't seen Jeffersons ROH stint yet, might have a look if it's worth watching, though I dont see Jeff fitting with the ROH style, where Matt is more adaptable to that rough shot style. The submition Hardy does on Daniels for the finish looked good too, not seen Matt do anything like that before. Daniels was well over too so it really gave him a good boost off the match.

I can see why the WWE part of the run was considered (by the writer) a failure, but written shoot's alway's come off like that, there's alway's some one to say it wasn't completely believable, but I consider the ROH build up a sucess with what they had and what they did with the angle. They made the best of a 3 appearance deal.

Jeff's RoH match is hilarious, just for the crowd reaction. I saw a shoot interview with him just after the match on TWC, and that was part of why he fell out of love with wrestling for a while - he walked in with a big attitude that all RoH fans should love him because he was Jeff Hardy, they booed him out fo the building and I think it was the first time young Jefferson got a really bad crowd reaction, when he was supposed to be the big face. Even debuted as his old Will' O' The Wisp persona from that backyard thing the Hardys did, got unmasked and then got the abuse.


http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...51632510&hl=en
http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...57301914&hl=en
http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...15545521&hl=en


Those video's basically include the match somewhere - it didn't help when Jeff gave an interview to RoH before, and said he'd lost all his passion for pro-wrestling....

Google video error Grecian lol, think ya copied a link that got shortened, does that on some forum's with long link's, hence the .... in the link.

Were they the full PPV link's Grec? Found 'em, downloading them lol.
http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=-4667862966751632510&ei=9H9SSqmrCsLH-Qab9szpBQ&q=jeff+hardy+roh&hl=en
http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=5636813626057301914&hl=en
http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=-5052504568915545521&hl=en
I think the Hardy match will be near the end of part 2, start of part 3? 8th match of the 11 on the card according to this ROH wiki page.

Indy fan's can be harsh as hell, especially if they think your all hype, and that's Jeff all over- hype. That sound's like the reaction he was waiting for, coming out mask and trench coat on, no one know's who he is, all mysterious like, then he whip's 'em off and.... the boo's ring out lmao. They were like that when Joey Mathews went back after WWE, chant's of 'You were fired!' doubt they were that hostile though lol.

Just watching the Jeff match now, they were booing before he even came out, then he come's bouncing round the outside loooking a cunt without anybody popping for him, going to slap hand's with the crowd, who aren't holding their hand's out, your right that is hillarious lol.

Bout 10 min's into part 3 of those link's.

He gets almost the Cena reaction, the girls and kids in the audience are screaming, the male fans fucking hate him!

I guess the crystal meth was still doing a number on him too...

And a slight aside, I'm pretty impressed with Krazy-K. Seems like a decen high-flyer... any ideas who / what's happened to him?

From what they were saying on commentary, he's a protege of Jeff, from OMEGA, his wiki say's he wrestle's for AWA and NWA Charlotte, small regional indie promotion's by sound's? He's been jobbed out in BOTH WWE and TNA, against Londrick and LAX respectively lol.

Him and his brother both trained by the Hardy's.

100% Cena reaction lol, Gabe and Prazac put it down to him saying he lost the passion for wrestling, and the ROH fan's taking exeption to that, probably has some thing to do with it, but Jeff just dont fit with the ROH style imo.

I've seen the shoot interview they refer to, and he does just bang on about how he's fallen out of love with wrestling, has other interests, etc.

However, I'd say RoH fans are the closet thing we have to the Original ECDub fans from the mid-late 90's for passion, appreciation of good wrestling and appreciation of people busting their arses every night to put on a hell of a show. With that in mind, publically announcing you don't want to wrestle then agreeing to have a match in front of those fans is a pretty dumb idea!

I'd be interested to know what kind of reaction he'd get these days...

The shoot's on here some where.

I think Jeff got the "why are you here if your done with wrestling?" reaction, which was very fair imo, if the ROH crowd boos some one, they normally pop for him once or twice in appreciation of something they did, it just wasn't there with Jeff.

ROH fan's, some of the best going, but it's like that in just about every promotion these day's, all started with ECW, but it's global now, the German wXw crowd are equally as rowdy with the 'fuck 'em up' chant's and such (dodgy accent given lol but still pretty good), even over here in the UK we get some decent crowd's going still, one of the best thing's about going to a wrestling show is participating in the crowd.

I think Jeff would get a worse reaction these day's, back 2003 he wasn't popping for the kid's as much as now, that's something that these fan's hate, doing it for the kiddie pop's, look at the reaction Cena had in '06 at ONS through to today he still references that.

And looking at Jeff's situation with WWE it seem's like he's back in the cant be arsed mood he was in back then, coming off 3 very good feud's with Matt, Edge and Punk, possibly the best run of his single's career, you'd think that he wouldn't be so bummed out?

There was a few botches in that match too, dont know if it was down to Hardy (which that DDT looked like it was him falling to early) or Krazy K being green, supose the fan's got to Jeff a little, looked like he was squaring up to one of 'em lol.

think JEFF is better

The ROH certainly didn't think Jeff was better