LI's John Silver and MJF return home for AEW event at UBS Arena
John Silver as he prepares to wrestle Bryan Danielson at AEW Dynamite on Dec. 8, 2021, at UBS Arena. Credit: AEW
All Elite Wrestling returns to Long Island on Wednesday night with an event that aims to showcase not only the most exciting wrestlers of the current generation, but also a fallen pioneer from a previous generation.
AEW’s Dynamite and Rampage televised events at the UBS Arena will feature the first matches in the inaugural Owen Hart Foundation tournaments. Eight men and eight women will compete in separate tournaments to capture the Owen Hart Cup — a tribute to the youngest member of the legendary Hart wrestling family. Hart died in 1999 after falling from the rafters of a Kansas City, Missouri, arena while being lowered to the ring in a WWE stunt gone wrong.
After largely avoiding the pro wrestling industry for more than 20 years, Hart’s widow, Martha, last year entered into a partnership with AEW to honor her late husband’s wrestling legacy.
“It’s so important to have her blessing. I mean, it's, it's frankly, essential, but also it's so cool because, for decades, it was long overdue to have Owen Hart recognized,” said AEW chief executive officer Tony Khan, who noted that Martha Hart will be in the arena for the tournament kickoff. “She thought it made sense for her to open the tournament here in a big stage with a big Dynamite and Rampage here in New York state, here on Long Island.”
AEW last played in the arena in December, with a show best remembered for the hero’s welcome given to the villainous MJF --Plainview’s Maxwell Jacob Friedman. Khan expects MJF will once again receive some of the loudest cheers of the night when he confronts his former henchman, Wardlow, in a segment that he expects could also have some ties to the Hart family’s hey days.
Despite being the top heels in WWE in the late 1990s, Owen and the rest of the “Hart Foundation” were revered by fans whenever they competed on Canadian soil.
“I think it’s a good comparison, being here in the territory as the top and seeing him embraced. You can plan for it,” Khan said. “I think it’s going to be really fascinating to see how the crowd reacts to MJF, and the person he’s kept under his thumb in one of our longest-running and most interesting stories.”
Another Long Islander will be prominently featured on the show, as Wantagh’s John Silver takes on top star CM Punk. It’s a position familiar to Silver, who challenged another high-profile performer, Bryan Danielson, the last time AEW was on Long Island.
“It’s pretty cool when you look in the crowd — especially when it’s that big of a crowd — and you can see some people that you know, some of your friends, some of your family,” Silver said. “Last time, I was definitely a little more nervous, because it was the first time at UBS and the first time, really, wrestling in front of all my friends and family, as well as everyone on TV. And that was the main event. Now, I feel like I’m a little more relaxed, a little more confident. So, hopefully, this time I win.”
Alfonso Castillo has been reporting for Newsday since 1999 and covering the transportation beat since 2008. He grew up in the Bronx and Queens and now lives in Valley Stream with his wife and two sons.
