Matt Hardy Discusses Relationship With AEW's Private Party, Young Bucks, & Gunns

There's little doubt Matt Hardy will go down as one of the greatest tag team wrestlers in history, but his placement on the card in AEW is no longer about his own personal success. Along with his enigmatic younger brother Jeff, the pair have won championships with WWE, TNA, and Ring of Honor throughout their 30-year in-ring careers. But they're now giving back to the next generation of performers in AEW.

In an interview with Sports Illustrated, Matt Hardy reminisced about working against Austin and Colten Gunn – the sons of WWE Hall of Famer, Billy – and how his desire to help the younger stars in AEW is fuelling him to continue working.

"I remember the Gunns as kids from when they were the ages of my own children," Hardy said. "Now we're wrestling them. How crazy is that? I love giving back. When we were younger, I remember that being much bigger of an issue with the older talent. Myself and Jeff, we promised we'd never be those guys. It's part of the responsibility to give younger guys a rub. Father Time holds back for no one. As you get older, things change, but you have to make the most of it.

"Without people giving back, the business withers away. Someone made the older talent. Then comes the time to make someone new. The business has definitely gotten a lot more selfless over the past 30 years."

Hardy has also helped mentor the young duo of Isiah Kassidy and Marq Quen over the past 18 months, featuring a litany of multi-man matches alongside the tandem known as Private Party and playing a major role in their continued evolution in AEW.

In the history of tag team wrestling, The Hardy Boyz can only be rivaled by a short list of competitors, but one of them is undoubtedly a fellow pair of brothers: The Young Bucks. After working together in ROH back in 2017, both the Jacksons and Hardys now find themselves working for Tony Khan and Matt believes passing the torch to them six years ago helped lay the platform for AEW's inception in 2019.

"The Bucks, we've loved those guys for over a decade," Hardy said. "I remember the night before we returned to WWE at WrestleMania 33, we wrestled the Bucks in a ladder match at Supercard of Honor. I told Matt and Nick that we were going to WrestleMania the next day and I can still hear myself saying, 'Tell everyone you beat the Hardys for the Ring of Honor World Tag Team Titles. Use that, man. Use that.' That's how pro wrestling works in the grand scheme of things."

Recently, Hardy urged fans to 'give these guys their flowers' in relation to The Young Bucks and "Hangman" Adam Page, leading to an ugly back-and-forth exchange with Jim Cornette and Brian Last.