What’s the story?
Cary Silkin, the former owner and current ambassador of professional wrestling promotion Ring of Honor, attended the 15th May edition of Raw at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey, and met several WWE Superstars backstage including Seth Rollins, Austin Aries, Sheamus and Cesaro.
Silkin posted the pictures of him meeting up with the Superstars on his Twitter account and clarified that he wasn’t leaving Ring of Honor for the WWE.
In case you didn’t know...
Cary Silkin, who purchased Ring of Honor in 2004 and remained the de-facto owner of the promotion till 2011, has been oft-hailed as the man responsible for having kept Ring of Honor relevant over the period of his ownership and for signing some of the best independent wrestling talents to the promotion.
Several present day WWE Superstars such as Cesaro, Kevin Owens, Austin Aries and Seth Rollins started their careers off in Ring of Honor and owe much of their initial success to the promotion and Silkin himself.
Ring of Honor today is one of the top independent wrestling promotions in the USA and has talent exchange deals with several other independent promotions as well as with New Japan Pro Wrestling (NJPW).
Silkin sold his stake in the company in 2011 to Sinclair Broadcast Group (SBG) and has been instated as the promotion’s official ambassador ever since.
The heart of the matter
Silkin attended WWE’s New Jersey Raw event and met up with various WWE Superstars, several of whom have previously worked for Ring of Honor.
Silkin attending the event and posting the pictures of him with WWE Superstars prompted speculation about whether he was about to leave ROH for the WWE, but Silkin swiftly shut any such rumblings down by clarifying that his attendance at the event carried no ulterior motives.
Also read: ROH News: Adam Cole gives his Ring of Honor farewell speech
The pictures and tweets posted by Silkin can be seen below:
Ring of Honor recently wrapped up their “War of the Worlds” tour, with the New York date being on the 14th of May, 2017. It appears that Silkin decided to go over to New Jersey after ROH’s New York event was over, to attend Raw.
What’s next?
As far as an association between Ring of Honor and the WWE is concerned, Silkin’s attendance during Raw gives no actual indication of it. Silkin still maintains good relations with all of his former ROH talent and this might just be him blowing some steam off after ROH’s recent tour.
Despite ROH being in talks with the WWE for putting their content on the WWE Network, the two promotions are still operating separately with no official association between them as of yet.
Author’s take
It is nice to see Silkin attend a WWE event. Silkin has been very critical of WWE’s ways in the past, but it’s always heartening to see Superstars being reunited with their former promoters. It must have been a welcome surprise for the Superstars to have met with their former boss, and I’m sure that Silkin too had a good time on Raw!
Here’s hoping that Ring of Honor do end up working something out with the WWE for putting their content on the network so that wrestling fans can be treated to their immaculate library of high-quality professional wrestling!
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