Silas Young Opens Up About Training His Son In Ring In Their Backyard, Talks ROH Pure Title
Silas Young of ROH bills himself as "The Last Real Man" in wrestling and is as old-school as you can get in today's era of pro wrestling. He's so old-school that he's shunned sophisticated wrestling schools and has erected a wrestling ring in his backyard.
He talked about what went into the decision to do that when he spoke with Wrestling Inc's Nick Hausman.
"I do have a wrestling ring in my backyard. I got a couple of guys that come over a couple of times a week and I'm trying to train them and polish them up. They are all guys that are currently wrestling but they could just use some help to get better. So, it's been cool," Young said before adding that none of the neighbors have said anything but he has had a couple walk over and just watch, which he's cool with.
"I've always wanted to buy a wrestling ring. I think every guy that's been wrestling for a while has wanted to get a ring. I just started looking for one and one came up with a good price."
Young said that with running his own shows with MKE, he bought the ring with the idea of not having to pay for ring rentals. Afterwards he just decided to set it up in his backyard.
Not only is Young working with current wrestlers but he is also training aspiring wrestlers including his 11-year-old son. He talked about teaching his son how to wrestle in their backyard.
"It's kind of weird. The funny thing is he always tells me that he doesn't wanna be a wrestler when he gets older. But the kid is in the ring more than I am," revealed Young.
He added that he mostly teaches his son how to do rolls and that he's still a little too young to be taking bumps.
"He watches it all the time so it's in his blood. But according to him he's not going to be a wrestler," said Young before being asked if his son has come up with a wrestling name yet.
"He's got some really lame names for wrestling characters like Good Knight whose finisher is The Sleeper. I'm not saying The Sleeper isn't effective but the Good Knight name is terrible."
Many people who have rings in their backyards then transition to hosting backyard wrestling shows. Young was asked if he had any plans to do that.
"If I can find a way to make money I probably would do it. But most likely not," said Young.
Young recently took on Jonathan Gresham in a Pure rules match which abides by traiditional, old-school rules. Young talked about competing in that type of match with Gresham.
"It's interesting for a guy that was so upset with the way that I do things, or the way more importantly that I win, he had a problem with. But at the end he realized he couldn't beat me and he ? I'm not gonna complain about it ? but he gave me a dose of my own medicine," stated Young.
"I'm okay with that. I'm okay that that's what he had to do to win but he just has to admit that's what he had to do to win."
Young was then asked if he would like to see the ROH Pure Championship brought back.
"Absolutely. That's one of the different match types that helped ROH separate itself from other wrestling companies. Having something like the Pure Title that's so different than what everybody else is doing, I think it's a really cool idea," said Young. "For me it was cool to do that because for a long part of my career that was the only type of wrestler I was. But you evolve and change and see what works for you. It's good to prove to the fans that I'm not just all talk and I can back it up too."
Young's full interview with Wrestling Inc. aired as part of last Thursday's episode of our WINCLY podcast. It can be heard via the embedded audio player at the bottom of this post.
You can check out past episodes of the WINCLY here. Subscribe to Wrestling Inc. Audio on iTunes or Google Play. Listen to the show via Spotify here or through TuneIn here.