10 Biggest Wrestling Controversies Of 2016

3. BROKEN Matt Hardy

matt hardy final deletion
Impact Wrestling

Matt Hardy is one of wrestling's quiet revolutionaries, within WWE and, more impressively, outside of it.

It must be tempting, for an ex-WWE performer, to simply trade on the name value they cultivated on national television. It's easy money. To Hardy's credit, however, he has consistently reinvented himself. When he arrived in ROH, he was summarily rejected by fans who rather myopically perceived him as an unfashionable castoff. The enterprising Hardy surfed the zeitgeist and produced a hilarious, retaliatory anti-bullying video to channel and intensify their ire.

Hardy's latest reincarnation saw him become BROKEN - into a bizarrely-accented vessel possessed by the "seven deities". The character was the most controversial of 2016. Was he expanding an increasingly homogenised and stale wrestling narrative, or destroying the business outright?

It started inauspiciously. The Final Deletion hype was met with widespread derision. In retrospect, it was just bad soap opera - not quite ridiculous enough to convey that tongue was planted firmly in cheek. Hardy soon corrected that error by presenting the most ludicrous matches and promos this side of DDT.

Speaking personally, I would hate to see this become the norm, but Hardy's BROKEN brilliance is inimitable. There is no danger of that.

Contributor
Contributor

Michael Sidgwick (Creative Writing BA Hons) is an editor, writer and podcaster for WhatCulture Wrestling. With over a decade of experience in wrestling analysis, Michael was published in the influential UK institution that was Power Slam magazine, and specialises in providing insights into All Elite Wrestling - so much so that he wrote a book about the subject. You can order Becoming All Elite: The Rise Of AEW on Amazon. Possessing a deep knowledge also of WWE, WCW, ECW and New Japan Pro Wrestling, Michael’s work has been publicly praised by AEW World Champions Kenny Omega and MJF, and Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes. When he isn’t putting your finger on why things are the way they are in the endlessly fascinating world of professional wrestling, Michael wraps his own around a hand grinder to explore the world of specialty coffee. Follow Michael on X (formerly known as Twitter) @MSidgwick for more!