Young Wrestlers Were Reprimanded for Protecting Themselves from Chair Shots During WWE’s Attitude Era

Matt Hardy isn’t sugarcoating how brutal WWE’s Attitude Era really was—especially for young talent trying to prove themselves.

During a conversation with Sam Roberts, Matt looked back on the now-iconic Royal Rumble 2000 Tables Match against the Dudley Boyz and admitted that protecting yourself during unprotected chair shots wasn’t just discouraged—it could get you reprimanded.

Matt explained that in that era, being seen as tough meant taking chair shots straight to the head without flinching. Putting your hands up? That was a one-way ticket to locker room insults and disrespect.

“I’ll never forget… back when we used to do that all the time, I can’t believe… I have to… that we used to hit each other that hard directly in the head. It’s nuts. But also, during that time, you have to keep in mind, you know, it was the Attitude Era. It was Wild Old Wild West. And us being young guys, if someone was coming at us with a chair shot to our head, if we would put up our hands, we would be reprimanded. We would be insulted. You know what I mean? That was the culture then. You had to like, be a man, right? You had to be a man and do it. And that’s just kind of how we were born and bred. That’s how you were taught then, especially then, especially from the vets in the locker room.”

Advertising

Advertising

Looking back, Matt can’t believe how normalized those dangerous chair shots were, especially considering the long-term risks. But at the time, protecting yourself wasn’t even an option if you wanted to earn respect.

Matt also revealed that their Royal Rumble 2000 match had so many unprotected shots, WWE management actually cut minutes from the bout to limit the violence. Instead of scrapping key spots, Matt, Jeff, and the Dudleys decided to sprint through the entire match to keep everything in, making the chaos look even more intense.

“And I even… the Royal Rumble right here in New York, Madison Square Garden, Royal Rumble 2000 where we had the tables match… they had to trim that match down because there were so many unprotected chair shots. They cut like three or four minutes of our time. And we had a little huddle in the back right before we’re going out through the curtain — ‘Guys, they’ve cut our time, the match is going to look different, like, what should we do? We need to like, take a vote and decide what we’re going to do, we gotta get a game plan together.’ Are we going to cut some of the cool stuff we have, or what? And we said… Bubba and I, we kind of looked at each other… we said, ‘Guys, you just want to burn through it? Like, let’s just make it happen, let’s burn through it.’ And we did.”

The Attitude Era created unforgettable moments—but as Matt’s story shows, it also came with dangerous locker room expectations that young wrestlers had no choice but to follow.

Please credit Ringside News if you use the above transcript in your publication.