WWE released Jeff Hardy in early December after he walked out during a house show match in Texas. WWE had wanted to keep him, but only if he attended rehab, and since he insisted he was clean, he refused. Subsequently, it would come out he was telling the truth thanks to a negative drug test, meaning WWE effectively had handed one of their most popular babyfaces to AEW.

Now speaking on his brother’s The Extreme Life of Matt Hardy podcast, Jeff has opened up about that infamous match in Texas for the first time. Calling his mid-match exit one of the smartest things he’d done, however, he would add he wasn’t trying to get released, with walking out just feeling right at the time.

The Hardy’s have since wrestled their first match as a team on television since 2019 when they defeated Private Party on AEW’s St. Patrick’s Day Slam-themed episode. Now it is anticipated they will face The Young Bucks in a series of matches that if they live up to their contests in Ring of Honor, they have the potential to steal any show.

In December, Toni Storm walked out on WWE, apparently choosing to fly home rather than fulfill her next booking due to being burnt out. Subsequently, WWE released/fired her, and she has since been out of the spotlight. However, she has now joined fellow former WWE stars like Scarlett Bordeaux and Sunny and opened up an OnlyFans account and is promoting herself as a “phat @ss Aussie.“

Currently, a monthly subscription costs fans $19.99 per month. And in a sign, Storm has made a sound financial decision, Ryan Satin, formally of Pro Wrestling Sheet, has been keeping an eye on her stats and revealed in the first hour she made over $10,000.

Suppose Storm can continue recruiting subscribers at the rate she currently is and can retain them. Then, her earnings could easily surpass what a low-paid (by WWE standards) main roster performer earns, which is typically between $20,000 and $40,000 a month. It should, though, be noted that she is still accepting wrestling bookings for when her WWE non-compete expires later this month, so she fully intends to continue her in-ring career. Although if the report is accurate and she quit and left without telling anyone, some promotions may not feel comfortable working with her in the future. That said, Storm is a very talented performer and has been considered a future star for years, so should still end up with plenty of work.

Two weeks ago, during her match with Deonna Purrazzo at Impact Wrestling’s Sacrifice event, Chelsea Green would seemingly suffer an injury when the referee would throw up the X signal. Subsequently, Green shared a photo on Twitter of herself with her wrist in a cast, and later, Impact Wrestling confirmed she’d suffered a fracture but revealed that she would not be undergoing surgery, unlike with her previous wrist injuries. This led to an outpouring of support from her fans concerned for her; however, she has now revealed on Twitter following Impact’s latest event it was a work and declared she’d fooled the marks and “proved the internet is f*cking useless.“

The injury seemed genuine as Green has missed out on significant opportunities in the past due to getting injured at inopportune times, so it was believable she was hurt again, especially after Impact Wrestling themselves confirmed it. Now though, it turns out, it was done just for storyline reasons, and Green seems incredibly proud of herself. Nevertheless, deceiving and insulting your own fans over something as serious as an injury does seem a somewhat risky strategy when social media is such a big part of your brand. 

Cody Rhodes departed AEW in February when he and his wife didn’t agree to renew their contracts. Since then, there has been non-stop speculation on whether he’d sign with WWE or look to make a career in television and movies. Now though, it has been confirmed by Mike Johnson of PWInsider that Rhodes signed with WWE up to two weeks ago and is set to make his return at WrestleMania and work on Raw. This matches up with previous reports that WWE planned to have Rhodes wrestle Seth Rollins of their Raw brand at WrestleMania if they secured his signature.

This will be Rhodes’ second run with WWE, having initially worked for their development territory OVW in 2006 before debuting on Raw in a backstage segment with his legendary father, Dusty Rhodes, in 2007. During this time, he would hold the Intercontinental Championship on two occasions and had various tag title runs with a mixture of partners, including Hardcore Holly, Drew McIntyre, and his brother Goldust. However, despite so much success at the mid-card level, he felt he could achieve more, and on May 21st, 2016 announced on Twitter he had requested his release, with it officially being granted the following day. Later revealing he had pleaded with writers to end his Stardust gimmick and proposed various other ideas, but all were ignored.

Cesaro left WWE on 24 February 2022 after 11 years with the promotion. It’s understood the company wanted him to stay, but he opted to depart when his contract expired. It has been documented that he has filed a trademark application for “CSRO” under multiple classes that cover usage in pro wrestling, merchandise, and selling coffee. It isn’t clear whether he intends to use this as his ring name going forward, but with “Cesaro” being WWE’s intellectual property, the 41-year old whose real name is Claudio Castagnoli wouldn’t legally be able to use it.

As Cesaro’s WWE contract expired, he doesn’t have a non-compete, meaning he is free to wrestle anywhere else immediately. While it would seem inevitable that given his talent, he’d end up in AEW, Tony Khan’s promotion does have a full roster at present, and with Jeff Hardy just debuting, another former WWE star could bee is seen as overkill. That would seemingly open up both Impact Wrestling and New Japan as suitable alternatives, and it wouldn’t be a surprise to see him turn up for either of them in the coming weeks.

Ricardo Rodriguez, who is best known for his time working alongside Alberto Del Rio in WWE, has shared on Twitter that he is canceling bookings to attend rehab. While the 36-year-old didn’t go into detail, it is known he previously received treatment for alcohol addiction in 2020, and based on the wording of the tweet, it appears to be the same issue. Whether WWE will be covering the cost isn’t clear, but he would qualify for their scheme after working for four years for McMahon’s company.

Rodriguez briefly worked for AEW in October 2021 after Tony Khan let go of then Spanish language commentator Willie Urbina after he made inappropriate remarks about Hikaru Shida. However, he wouldn’t be signed and has remained active as a pro wrestler himself, wrestling on independent shows in Europe and Texas.

Pat Kenney, who is best known to wrestling fans as Simon Diamond and is currently Director of Talent Relations for Billy Corgan’s NWA, was hospitalized last Friday. Full details haven’t been disclosed; however, PWInsider has reported he suffered a mild stroke. Thankfully it’s understood he is home now convalescing but is suffering from impaired vision and will have a long recovery ahead of him. While he hasn’t publicly commented on his health situation, he would take to Twitter to remind his followers not to take life for granted.

53-year-old Kenney gave up being a marketing executive for Pepsi to pursue a wrestling career in 1991 and received his big break in 1998 when joining ECW. He would form a tag team with Johnny Swinger in the hardcore promotion, and after the company folded, they’d continue to team on the indies before joining TNA in 2003. Then in 2006, he would begin working in a backstage position for them as a road agent, which effectively led to his retirement. However, he did return to the ring for one final match at TNA’s Hardcore Justice pay-per-view in 2010 as part of a six-man tag.

The wrestling world is currently mourning the tragic passing of Scott Hall after his life support was discontinued on Monday. The two-time WWE Hall of Famer had fallen at his home and broken his hip, and then following the subsequent hip replacement surgery, suffered three heart attacks due to complications. Now, Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter has provided more details surrounding the sad events. Reporting that 63-year-old Hall had begun drinking again, and when he fell, he was left alone and unable to move until Diamond Dallas Page found him a few days later.

While Hall had relapsed previously, it was thought he was doing better after working with DDP to turn his life around. Nevertheless, unfortunately, alcoholism is a terrible addiction that waits for people at their lowest and got to Hall again. The fact that he was left suffering in pain before being found is incredibly depressing and makes his passing even sadder.

During an interview with Denise Salcedo, Joey Janela revealed that he wasn’t interested in re-signing with AEW as he wanted to return to wrestling on the indies. And while this is possible, it should be noted that Tony Khan did previously allow Big Swole to claim they were leaving on their own terms when it was his decision. Now it seems that could be what is going on here as PWInsider has reported that Janela had backstage heat on him after injuring Eddie Kingston and delaying his program with Chris Jericho.

With Janela appearing on national and international television during the early days of Dynamite, his diary will likely be incredibly full with indie promotions wanting to capitalize on his television exposure. The more significant issue for him will be maintaining that long-term. However, considering the cult following he has achieved through working with Game Changer Wrestling simultaneously with AEW, it’s doubtful he’ll have to return to his pre-AEW job of delivering pizzas anytime soon.

Last year it appeared to be a foregone conclusion that Ric Flair was AEW bound and would likely be managing Andrade after he appeared alongside him in AAA. Nevertheless, if any plans had been made, they would end up discarded when Flair began trending on Twitter after past allegations about his behavior would resurface on Dark Side of the Ring.

Seemingly though, Flair hasn’t given up hope on working for AEW in the future. This was evident during a recent episode of his Wooooo Nation Uncensored podcast, where he admitted he’d love to manage former WWE star Cesaro and fantasy booked how he’d book his first appearance.

Cesaro chose to leave WWE, so there is no non-compete preventing him from debuting for AEW or any other promotion at any time. However, it seems highly unlikely AEW would pair him with Flair, given the backlash the promotion would likely receive for hiring Flair. But, of course, stranger things have happened in wrestling. Still, it would be more likely to see Flair return to WWE eventually to work alongside Charlotte again, considering Vince McMahon has shown in the past to have minimal regard for fan-outrage unless it impacts his bottom line.

It had been thought that after they were spotted backstage at a Dynamite taping late last year, Jay and Mark Briscoe were headed to AEW. However, since then, things have gone quiet, and a recent report by Fightful Select has stated past homophobic tweets by Jay have meant an influential person WarnerMedia doesn’t want the brothers signed. While it isn’t known if Tony Khan actually intended to sign them, seemingly, it is out of his hands anyway. Now with the offensive tweets back in the news, Jay has appeared on the Battleground podcast and apologized, saying he thought he was saying it for religious reasons.

Jay certainly seems sincere in his apology; however, whether that will affect anyone at WarnerMedia remains to be seen. The Briscoes are booked to defend their ROH World Tag Team Championships at Supercard of Honor XV on April 1st against a mystery team, and with new ROH owner Khan reportedly booking the show himself, it will be interesting to see what he decides to do. He could potentially have the brothers drop the titles and then distance himself from them going forward. Alternatively, he could have them retain and keep them strictly on ROH television, which currently isn’t involved with WarnerMedia.

Last Wednesday, Jeff Hardy debuted for All Elite Wrestling at the earliest possible opportunity, with his WWE non-compete having expired earlier in the week. He would immediately align with his brother Matt, saving him and Sting and Darby Allin from A.H.F.O., who Andrade now leads. Clearly, this showed the brothers are set to team again in AEW, and now during a virtual signing with Signed By Superstars, the former WWE Champion would reveal his debut was nerve-wracking and also confirm this run with Matt will be the final one of the Hardy Boyz.

The Hardy Boyz are one of the most influential tag teams in wrestling history, and any conversation about the greatest combinations needs to include them. Since 1995 they have wrestled over 700 matches together and held too many titles even to list. How long precisely the Hardy Boyz will continue as a team remains to be seen, as Jeff can unquestionably have a highly successful singles career in AEW. However, it seems inevitable they will become AEW tag champions shortly and work with The Young Bucks. Which if it ends up being their final program as a team, will certainly be a fitting finale for a tag team that changed wrestling.