Matt Hardy Reflects On The Triple Threat Ladder Match At WrestleMania 2000

On the latest episode of Extreme Life Of Matt Hardy, the AEW star talked about the triple threat ladder match with The Hardys, Dudley Boyz, and Edge & Christian at WrestleMania 2000. You can check out some highlights below:

On the expectations for the match: “I think the expectations from the office and the people in the back. they didn’t want more than three people to die. I mean, there were they were a little freaked out about what we’re going to do, right? Because they gave us — you know, they really did. They were very open about allowing us to do we wanted to do. I remember whenever the super table that we built, and like, we put a little framing around it. We had the guy who did our stunts and whatnot. Richie, I think it was Richie at this time, if Richie was still there. [He] was able to build a little thing where we could set this on top of the ladders, and it would sit sturdy. The finish of the match where you see Edge and Christian standing or kneeling up on top of the structure that’s on top of two 10 feet ladders. That thing was like built so it wouldn’t fall. Because like if you just put a table up there on its own, it’s so wobbly that it would fall immediately. And it still was pretty unstable.

“So we had these ideas that we wanted to utilize and whatnot. And they were like, ‘Okay, we’ll just kind of give you total creative control in this. You guys do it and do whatever.’ And they know we’re doing some crazy stuff.

On what Michael Hayes told them before the match: “One thing that I’ll never forget, and this is something that stands out so crazy. Because now it is so hard to get television time property on a show like a Raw, or Smackdown or AEW Dynamite, Rampage, Collision, whatever it may be. NXT, Ring of Honor. And we went at WrestleMania, and I want to say we had like 24 minutes. And Bruce Prichard, who was running gorilla, who was timing the matches, who would give you the countdown. It’s like, ‘Where you’re at, you need to get ready to go home, finish up the match.’ Before we went out, he said, ‘Hey, we know you guys have a ton of crazy things planned tonight. So we don’t want any of you to rush.’

“This was all of our first WrestleMania, too. This was our first WrestleMania. It’s six guys who were making their WrestleMania PPV debut in like, the semi-main event. So he said, ‘We don’t want any of you guys to rush. We want to take your time, we want you to be safe. We don’t want anything to become reckless because you’re trying to hit that alotted 24 minutes.’ They said, ‘Take your time; time is not an issue. Take all the time you want, we’re okay on the show. It’s a little light; take all the time you want.’ Well, I wish they would have given us that after being in the business for 25 years. There wouldn’t even have been a main event. We would have went until we went off air! But they were really cool about that. And to be going out on the biggest PPV, the Showcase of the Immortals, and to be told, “Don’t worry about time, take all the time you need,” is unprecedented.”

On approaching the bout: “The first ever triangle ladder match — in essence, the TLC blueprint — was very much a group effort. Everybody worked together, we all brainstormed. We had a lot of other things that we wanted to do, and we knew, because roughly we’re gonna have 23 to 25 minutes — we knew there were only so many things we could put in. And we didn’t know if there was going to be another one. So we wanted to go all out, right? We wanted to really make our WrestleMania moment, and we wanted our legacy to be great. So we’re gonna go out there, and we’re gonna do all we could to steal the show; that was our goal, obviously. So it was a group effort. Everybody worked together.

“And I remember just figuring out the best way to do things was something, it was really a learning lesson. We’re kind of learning on the fly, about like, where should you set up a ladder in the ring to make it look like you are trying to actually win the match, as opposed to just doing a move on someone. And that’s something we learned through that match. And I say this over and over; the series of three — the triangle ladder match, TLC One and TLC Two. TLC Two was the best from a psychology standpoint and in my opinion, it just all made the most sense. Because we were still willing to do our stuff; like, I know Jeff and I were going to set the ladders, we’re gonna do the event omega. But then there’s someone who could make the claim, ‘Why did they had their opponents down, why didn’t they just put [the ladder] underneath the title and try and win. And you know, going forward past that, we always tried to be very mindful of that.”

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit Extreme Life Of Matt Hardy with an h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.