Jeff Hardy has topped himself.

Last night, at TNA's Victory Road PPV, the main event was his rematch against Sting to try to win back the TNA World Title he lost on TV a week and a half ago when Sting returned. Hardy was in slow motion getting to the ring, almost fell down walking up the ring steps, and looked vacant when there was a close-up of his eyes. Before the match started, Eric Bischoff came out to announce that the match would be no DQ. He talked to Sting off-mic, and it's not clear if they were just pantomiming a dispute as planned or doing so while talking over Hardy's condition. When the match started, he stalled by teasing throwing his shirt to the crowd before dropping it to the floor, then finally engaged with a visably pissed off Sting, who hit him a few times and then manuvered him into position for the Scorpion Death Drop, which he then hit for the win in just under 90 seconds. The pin looked as if it may have been forceful and Hardy popped up right after. The crowd and announcers weren't sure what to make of it. As Sting walked up the ramp, a fan said something (presumably a complaint about the match's length/lameness) to him and he clearly replied "I agree. I agree."

At first, in his live PPV report, Dave Meltzer at F4WOnline.com wrote that he thought it was a sign that Sting is more broken down than he was letting on, but this wasn't the case, as he corrected himself with this short post:

The 1:28 main event was more due to them being concerned about Jeff Hardy wrestling than Sting wrestling.

Yup, once again (and that was far from the only time) Jeff Hardy was "in no condition to perform" (wink wink, nudge nudge) in a PPV main event. This time, instead of working a regular match, his opponent clearly wanted nothing to do with someone he couldn't trust his body with and called an audible to end the match immediately without having to risk his safety.

Today, Meltzer posted that Hardy was pulled from the Impact tapings tonight and tomorrow "stemming from whatever it was that happened at last night's PPV" (WINKING! NUDGING!). He does think it's possible that given the booking history of Vince Russo et al, there COULD be an attempt at a worked shoot mixed in to everything, but I doubt it, though given the timing (Hardy's next hearing on his drug charges is this Wednesday after many continuances) it makes a certain kind of sense.

While it's good that TNA finally did something, they acted way too late. Let's take a look at some of the warning signs:

After the jump, you can see a video of last night's match via YouTube.



