Matt Hardy says AEW matters to the wrestling business and should not be written off as the company faces questions tied to Paramount Skydance’s acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery.
Paramount agreed to acquire WBD for $31 per share in cash in February. On September 21, Paramount settled lawsuits brought by 12 state attorneys general and the Writers Guild, a move Bloomberg reported clears the way for the deal to close. Paramount CEO David Ellison told employees the company is looking to close in about two weeks. AEW’s weekly programming airs on WBD’s TBS and TNT, which has led to speculation about the promotion’s television future under new ownership. The merged company will also hold UFC’s media rights, which Paramount listed among its sports properties when the deal was announced. UFC, like WWE, is owned by TKO Group Holdings.
Speaking on the September 25 episode of The Extreme Life of Matt Hardy, Hardy said fans rooting for AEW to lose its media rights are missing the bigger picture.
“At the end of the day, what’s going to happen is what’s going to happen, and the people that are voicing these opinions, they really don’t have any control of it. They might say, ‘Oh, well, this is what I want, this is what I don’t want.’ But at the end of the day, in pro wrestling, if there’s a company that is doing well, and there’s guys that they are being able to provide a living, being able to provide a career for not only wrestlers in the ring, but production people and backstage people and whatever, the more wrestling, the better,” Hardy said. “Competition is a good thing, and I definitely want to see it stick around. AEW is important to the wrestling business.”
Hardy credited Tony Khan’s company with pushing WWE when it launched in 2019.
“Tony Khan, it was so important that he opened up another company, especially when WWE was kind of at a point where they were very stale. They were not focusing as strongly on creative as they should have. And AEW kind of kicked them in the a*** and made them up their game a little bit, and it was good for everything,” he said.
Hardy, who spent four years in AEW before returning to TNA in 2024, said on the same episode that he and his brother Jeff “had some frustrations in AEW.” He said that does not change how he views the company’s place in the industry, and that he has friends there whose careers depend on it.
“It’s not a bad thing, and especially I don’t want people that I am friends with, people that are having a chance to live out their dream and apply their craft in a company, to go out of business,” Hardy said. “So it’s crazy just to think so negative. At the end of the day, whatever’s going to happen is going to happen, and it is beyond our control, and it just is what it is, and that’s something in life I feel like people have to accept.”
Competition and Fan Behavior
Hardy said the same principle applies to the media companies themselves. After co-host Jon Alba noted that WBD’s financial position led it to pursue a sale, Hardy said fewer major companies means less pressure on the ones that remain.
“Whenever companies, especially big media companies like that, the more that there are that are thriving and doing well, then it keeps everybody else in check. And that competition is such a healthy thing,” Hardy said.
He also took issue with fans who spend their time attacking promotions they do not watch.
“If someone says I don’t like WWE, why do you go and start commenting on WWE posts and saying this negative s***? That’s just negative energy, and it’s not helping you. It’s bad for you at the end of the day,” Hardy said.
Hardy said he applies the same approach to criticism aimed at him and Jeff online.
“It could be really easy to hit back and score a layup, and people would jump on. I just don’t deal with that stuff anymore. I just let it go,” he said. “Usually, anytime you’re getting hate, if someone is ignorant enough to publicly send you hate on some forum where they don’t know you and they’re not personally familiar with you, then it is coming from beneath you, and you should never lower yourself to that level.”
