Matt Hardy has lavished praise on Rhea Ripley after The Eradicator defeated Jade Cargill to win the Women’s World Championship at WrestleMania 42.
During a recent edition of his “Extreme Life” podcast, Matt declared that Rhea seems like the face, heart, and soul of WWE’s women’s division. He also identified Paige’s emotional return and Jade Cargill’s rapid growth on the important roster. Hardy said,
“Good for her, man. I used to be capable of interact along with her at any time when she got here to AEW some. And I like her so much. She’s also on this great journey in life as she’s clean and sober and really blissful with what she’s doing. Very, very blissful she got that moment to return back and return and just have such a high-profile return and moment on a WrestleMania, especially when she thought her profession was probably over. She gets another run.”
“I’ll be honest too. I mean, we signed so many autographs obviously at WrestleCon and even at WWE World. I feel like from WWE, I saw more Rhea Ripley T-shirts than anybody else. And that’s counting everyone.”
“I assumed they [Rhea vs. Jade] had a extremely good match. Considering I knew Jade where she was when she first began, her growth has been exponential as well. And I assumed they did good overall. And I believe putting the Women’s Title on Rhea was decision. She really does feel just like the face and form of the center and soul of the ladies’s division in WWE straight away.”
During a WrestleMania 42 weekend interview with The Schmo, Randy Orton revealed that JBL protected him early in his WWE profession.
Orton explained that veterans like JBL respected his father, Cowboy Bob Orton, and due to this fact looked out for him backstage, which helped him earn trust and settle into the locker room faster. He said,
“Guys like JBL, Arn Anderson, Dean Malenko, Jack Lanza, Tony Garea; they’re within the locker room once I debuted. They usually knew my father and revered my father and would say, you already know, he was a wrestler’s wrestler and and had all of the respect of the boys within the back. And the indisputable fact that they’d such high regard for my dad, that helped me much more because they made sure to handle me.”
“The horror stories you hear of JBL **** with the brand new guys; he didn’t mess with me like that due to my dad. JBL’s very first overseas tour of Japan on the indies was with my father, and my father took care of him for the three months they were over there. So when JBL was capable of handle me, he returned the favor. So, if anything, there wasn’t a shadow that I needed to to bust out of or live in. It was more prefer it it it helped me get my foot within the door, and it helped me earn the respect quicker from my peers, and the lads and and ladies that I used to be learning from.”