Hardie's parents divorced when he was a child and he spent time between the two households, living a "sheltered" life and developing his imagination by reading comic books and watching cartoons.[1] Hardie's father is a San AntonioDJ.[1] He has two sisters, who are both around ten years older than him.[1] At the age of ten, Hardie first saw professional wrestling, when he was invited to a friend's house, where World Championship Wrestling (WCW) was on the television.[1] Hardie was immediately fascinated by professional wrestling, particularly the high-flying luchadores.[1] After high school, he decided to pursue a career in professional wrestling.[1]
Professional wrestling career
Independent circuit (2007–2019)
Hardie was trained by Jerry Reyes and Scot Summers and made his professional wrestling debut in February 2007.[2][3][10] After two years of working for small promotions on the independent circuit under the ring name ACH, Hardie began considering retiring from professional wrestling, before getting an offer to work for Anarchy Championship Wrestling (ACW), based in his hometown of Austin, Texas.[2][3]
ACH made his debut for Anarchy Championship Wrestling on August 23, 2009, starting a storyline rivalry with Robert Evans.[3] He won his first title in the promotion on August 22, 2010, when he defeated Evans for the ACW U-30 Young Gun Championship.[3] He lost the title to Akira Tozawa on May 15, 2011.[13] On November 12, ACH first defeated Bolt Brady and Colt Cabana in the first round, then Gary Jay in the semifinals and finally JT LaMotta in the finals to win the 2011 Lone Star Classic and become the ACW Heavyweight Champion.[3] ACH held the title until July 22, 2012, when he was defeated by Jaykus Plisken.[14] On June 10, 2011, ACH defeated Bolt Brady to win the NWA Lone Star Junior Heavyweight Championship.[15] However, just a month later he was stripped of the title.[15] On April 14, 2012, ACH made his debut for Combat Zone Wrestling (CZW), entering the Best of the Best 11 tournament and losing to A. R. Fox in a three-way first round match, which also included Lince Dorado.[16][17] On June 2, ACH defeated Dan Walsh and Neil Diamond Cutter in the finals of an eight-man tournament held by Metro Pro Wrestling (MPW) to become the new NWA Central States Heavyweight Champion.[18] He was stripped of the title on November 1, when MPW withdrew from the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA), however, the promotion recognized him as the first MPW Central States Champion.[18] On November 2, ACH made his debut for Dragon Gate USA, teaming with Cima and Rich Swann in a six-man captain's fall tag team match, where they defeated the Gentleman's Club (Chuck Taylor, Drew Gulak and Orange Cassidy).[19]
ACH during the National Pro Wrestling Day.
On July 29, 2012, ACH made his debut for the Chikara promotion, entering the Young Lions Cup X tournament and defeating Aaron Epic, J. T. Dunn and Vinny Marseglia in his first round four-way match.[20] He followed that up by defeating Jakob Hammermeier in the semifinals on August 17.[21] The finals of the tournament took place the following day and saw ACH lose to Mark Angelosetti.[22] ACH returned to the promotion on December 2 at the Under the Hoodpay-per-view, where he unsuccessfully challenged Angelosetti for the Young Lions Cup.[23]
On January 25, 2013, ACH entered Berwyn, Illinois based AAW: Professional Wrestling Redefined's Heritage Championship tournament, defeating Prince Mustafa Ali, Mat Fitchett and Juntai Miller to advance to the tournament finals, where he defeated Samuray del Sol in the finals to win the tournament and become the new AAW Heritage Champion.[24][25] On February 2, 2013, ACH took part in the National Pro Wrestling Day in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, entering the Rey de Voladores tournament. After defeating Bolt Brady, Lukas Sharp and Mitch Thompson in his first round match during the afternoon show,[26] ACH was defeated in the finals of the tournament by 2 Cold Scorpio during the evening show.[27] On August 30, ACH made his debut for Pro Wrestling Guerrilla (PWG), when he entered the 2013 Battle of Los Angeles and defeated Anthony Nese in his first round match.[28] The following day, ACH was eliminated from the tournament in the second round by eventual tournament winner Kyle O'Reilly.[29] In March 2014, it was reported that ACH would be taking part in a WWE tryout camp later in the month.[30] He took part in the same camp as Kevin Steen and Roderick Strong.[1] At the conclusion of the camp, he was not offered a contract.[31]
On December 30, 2016, ACH defeated AR Fox to win the AAW Heritage Championship for the second time.[32]
On January 27, 2017, ACH made his debut for Evolve, losing to Matt Riddle.[33] In August 2017, ACH returned to Evolve as one half of the tag team The Troll Boyz with Ethan Page.[34] The two won the Evolve Tag Team Championship on September 22.[35]
ACH substituted for an injured Flip Gordon at PWG's Hand of Doom in January 2019. ACH wrestled in a losing effort against Bandido. It was his first appearance for PWG since Mystery Vortex IV on December 16, 2016, and also his last appearance for PWG due to his WWE signing.[36]
Ring of Honor (2012–2016)
On September 15, 2012, ACH made his debut for Ring of Honor (ROH), facing Kyle O'Reilly in a losing effort at the Death Before Dishonor X: State of Emergency internet pay-per-view.[37] He returned to the promotion on January 5, 2013, losing to Matt Taven in the first round of the Top Prospect Tournament.[38] On February 21, ROH announced that the promotion had signed ACH to a long-term contract.[4][39] This was followed by ACH picking up his first win in ROH on March 2 at the 11th Anniversary Show, where he defeated Adam Page, Mike Sydal, Q.T. Marshall, Silas Young and TaDarius Thomas in a six-way match.[40] Afterwards, ACH began teaming regularly with TaDarius Thomas,[41][42][43][44] with the two forming a tag team named Adrenaline Rush and also having one six mix person tag team match with Athena Reese as their partner but with the tag team stable consisted of ACH and TaDarius only.[45][46] On July 27, ACH entered a tournament to determine the new ROH World Champion, but was eliminated in his first round match by Karl Anderson.[47] On February 8, 2014, Adrenaline Rush earned a future shot at the ROH World Tag Team Championship by defeating the reigning champions, reDRagon (Bobby Fish and Kyle O'Reilly), in a non-title Proving Ground match.[48] Adrenaline Rush received their title shot on February 21 at the 12th Anniversary Show, but were defeated by reDRagon.[49] Adrenaline Rush broke up two months later with TaDarius Thomas joining The Decade.[50]
On June 6, 2014, ACH received his first shot at the ROH World Championship, after winning a six-way match, but was defeated by the defending champion, Adam Cole.[51] On June 22 at Best in the World 2014, ACH won another six-way match to earn a shot at the ROH World Television Championship.[52] ACH received his title shot at the August 9 Ring of Honor Wrestling tapings, but his match with Jay Lethal ended in a thirty-minute time limit draw.[53] On November 15 at Glory By Honor XIII, ACH received a shot at the ROH World Championship in his home state of Texas, but was defeated by Jay Briscoe.[54] On March 12, 2016, ACH unsuccessfully challenged New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW) representative Kushida for the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship.[55] On October 8, ACH made comments at an AAW event talking about his "wife" who did not appreciate him and about how he was planning on getting a divorce. The comments were interpreted as ACH talking about his situation with ROH.[56][57] On November 1, Pro Wrestling Insider reported that it had confirmed from multiple sources that ACH was finishing up with ROH.[58] On November 8, it was reported that ACH had started taking independent bookings, seemingly indicating his departure from ROH.[59]
During the Impact Wrestling tapings on July 3, 2017, ACH was announced as a participant in the 2017 Super X Cup, representing AAW.[61] Later in the tapings, he defeated Andrew Everett in his first round match.[62] Three days later, he was eliminated from the tournament in the semifinals by Taiji Ishimori.[63]
It was announced on February 11, 2019, that ACH signed a contract with WWE and begun working at the WWE Performance Center.[80] On March 7, ACH made his debut at a NXThouse show, in a losing effort to Raul Mendoza.[81] From then on he wrestled at various NXT live events in the Florida area, losing to other NXT talents such as, Raul Mendoza, Kassius Ohno, Marcel Barthel, Dan Matha and Shane Thorne.[82][83][84] During WrestleMania Axxess before WrestleMania 35 in April 2019, he faced Gran Metalik and Ligero in a triple threat match during a WWE Worlds Collide event.[85][86] His first win on NXT occurred on April 12, when he defeated Kona Reeves at a NXT live event.[87][84] Throughout May and June, he continued wrestling on the Florida house show circuit, winning most of his matches.[84] On June 10, 2019, he started going by the new ring name Jordan Myles.[12]
In June, it was announced that Myles would compete in the NXT Breakout Tournament,[88] where the winner would get an opportunity to challenge for any title in NXT. Myles made his television debut in the tournament on the July 10 episode of NXT, defeating Boa in the first round,[89] and Angel Garza in the second round.[90] In the finals, Myles defeated Cameron Grimes to win the tournament[91] and chose to challenge Adam Cole for the NXT Championship,[92] but was defeated on the September 4 episode of NXT.[93]
In October 2019, Hardie was involved in a controversy after WWE launched a Jordan Myles t-shirt, which depicted his name surrounded by the shape of a mouth, said to be inspired by The Rolling Stones logo. However, the design received accusations, including from Hardie, that it resembled blackface.[94] WWE changed the t-shirt and published a note stating Hardie gave his approval to the design.[95] After that, Hardie published a series of tweets accusing WWE of racism. Hardie would also accuse his former employer Ring of Honor (ROH) of racism, calling former ROH World ChampionJay Lethal (who is also African-American) an "Uncle Tom".[96] Hardie's comments towards Lethal received criticism from wrestling legends like Booker T, who noted that Hardie over-reacted with his aggressive comments, specifically targeting Lethal, Triple H and Vince McMahon.[97] WWE wrestler Titus O'Neil said he agreed with Hardie about the t-shirt, but not how he brought others into his frustrations.[98] Hardie subsequently apologized for his overreaction, but nonetheless claimed he would not take back his comments.[99] On November 13, Hardie posted a profanity-laden video, exclaiming that he quit WWE, and stated that he "refused to work for racists", and that Jordan Myles was his "slave name".[100] On November 21, WWE officially announced that Hardie was released from his contract, as Hardie subsequently announced several indie dates.[101]
Return to independent circuit (2019–2021)
Hardie returned to the independent circuit after he was released by WWE.[102] On December 6, 2019 Major League Wrestling (MLW) announced that Hardie, once again using his ACH ring name, had signed with the company.[103] ACH wrestled on the Opera Cup set of TV tapings, teaming with former MMA fighter King Mo.[104] The very next day Hardie announced on Twitter that he was quitting professional wrestling, prompting MLW to release the statement "We respect ACH's decision and want him to be happy."[105] However, Hardie made his return on December 29, 2019, during an Atlanta Wrestling Entertainment event.[106] He also participated on some events of Game Changer Wrestling (GCW), where he won the DDT's Ironman Heavymetalweight Championship from Joey Janela.[107][108][109]
Return to NJPW (2020–2021)
On August 10, 2020, it was announced that ACH would be returning to New Japan Pro-Wrestling as a part of their new weekly series NJPW Strong on August 14 where he teamed with Alex Zayne and TJP to take on Blake Christian, Misterioso and PJ Black.[110]
On November 2, 2020, ACH was announced for NJPW's Super J-Cup tournament.[111]
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