It’s one step forward and two steps back for Jeff Hardy.
Just as Hardy had begun training to return to the WWE ring from his most recent injury, he has received another set back. This one looks to have been his own doing.
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According to numerous media outlets, including PWInsider, Hardy was arrested on Saturday night in Concord, North Carolina for driving while impaired. Reports indicate he was arrested at 10:20 p.m. following a traffic crash. He was apparently released about an hour later and will need to appear in Cabbarus County Court on April 16. In the meantime, his driver’s license has been revoked as a pretrial measure.
Hardy last competed for WWE in September 2017 and has been recovering from surgery he underwent for a torn rotator cuff in October. He was recently medically cleared for his wrestling return by as was set to begin training at the WWE Performance Center later this month in order to gain WWE’s medical clearance. An appearance at WrestleMania was considered a possibility. He had reportedly begun in-ring training on his own accord.
The injury was a major professional disappointment for Hardy, and he made no secret of his feelings in a recent interview.
“It’s depressing,” Hardy told WWE.com. “More than any time in a career, it’s those times that make you go, ‘Wow, I love professional wrestling.’ It sucks that I can’t be involved in [a] match or can’t get in there and do what I normally do because I’m injured, but I just have to get over that, stop worrying about it and look forward and push myself to get repaired and healed and come back better than ever with a brand-new shoulder.”
Jeff’s brother Matt is in the midst of reincarnating his character, “Broken” Matt Hardy, and it was expected that Jeff would join him in the rejuvenation of the “Broken Universe” as his alter ego “Brother Nero.”
