The wrestling world is still reeling from the sudden death of Jay Briscoe. Many have taken to social media to express their feelings and memories. AEW paid tribute to Briscoe on Dynamite and filmed a special that will air on Honor Club and ROH’s YouTube.
In the latest episode of The Extreme Life of Matt Hardy, Matt Hardy and Jon Alba had a tribute show to Jay Briscoe. Hardy reflected on Briscoe as a man, friend, and opponent. He shared many stories, including the first time the Hardy Boyz faced The Briscoes.
Matt Hardy and Jay Briscoe Nearly Come To Blows
Hardy first met the Briscoes in 2005 when he was wrestling for ROH. He got to know them more in 2011 when he was wrestling for both ROH and TNA. He spoke about how he was an ass kicker in the ring, but very soft spoken and humble outside of it.
During that time, Hardy was also working with OMEGA. Shane “Hurricane” Helms was putting the shows together. Hardy spoke with ROH to get the Briscoes for an OMEGA show. Jeff Hardy was in IMPACT at the time and didn’t really take indie dates, but he wanted to have a match with the Briscoes.
“They drove down from Delaware to come to North Carolina for the show, right? We were able to get them a pretty good payday. I knew them both from Ring of Honor and had been working with them for a couple of years at that point. I’ll never forget when they got there, I took them to Pik N Pig, a barbecue place. (…) I’ll never forget, I said, ‘you guys are going to love this place, especially if you’re barbecue fans.’
“We went and had a great meal. I almost had to fight Jay because I wanted to pay for their lunch and dinner. But, he like wanted to pay for it so badly. He was like, ‘nah, man. I’m down here. We’re working with your guys and you’re taking good care of us.’ I told him, ‘you drove down. This is mine and Jeff’s high school that we went to. It’s important to us. We wanted to have this match with you for a long time. Thank you.'”
Hardy had to sneak and pay the bill.
The Hardy Boyz vs. The Briscoes for the first time
For the match, The Briscoes are heels. Jeff is hurt on the outside and Matt is taking all the heat. While Jeff leaves ringside, Willow the Wisp shows up with an umbrella to the Briscoes. Willow disappears and Jeff returns.
“We had been feuding in ROH and had established a hatred. We were in Union Pines and it swapped. I was now the babyface and he was the heel. So, we still had that. It had been built really strong that we didn’t like each other. We wanted to parlay that by switching the roles in the match. They did their job well.”
“This was one of Jeff’s first times meeting them and spending time with them. I remember he had the idea of doing the Willow thing because we had done that a little bit and he had done it in TNA a few times. He was like, ‘Man, I know you guys are pretty serious whenever you wrestle. Pretty straight forward. Are you cool if we do this where I’m hurt and come back as Willow?’ And I remember they said, ‘HELL YEAH!’ That’s great. Let’s do that! Whatever you want to do, we are down.’ And Jeff said, ‘are you okay if I hit you with an umbrella?’ Jay said, ‘Beat the shit out me, man! It’s just an umbrella. Beat the fuck out of me, man.’ He said, ‘nail me.’ He was so great. Just a great attitude.”
Hardy revealed towards the end of the episode that they were supposed to face The Briscoes in AEW or ROH. They had been approached by an indie promotion about the match. Hardy went to Tony Khan to ask if they could or if he’d rather they not. Khan said he rather they didn’t take an indie date, but they discussed doing it at some point in either AEW or ROH. Hardy lamented the fact that it will never happen now, but is glad for the other times they got to wrestle.
