Time for another look at ROH’s Pure Championship tournament, as we check in on Fred Yehi’s first round match against Silas Young.
You can catch this episode for free through Fite TV – https://www.fite.tv/watch/roh-wrestling-episode-471
Quick Result
ROH Pure Championship Tournament – First Round – Fred Yehi pinned Silas Young in 13:00
If you saw our prior review, you know the format. It’s an empty arena show with Quinn McKay hosting. We’ve pre-match promos from Yehi, who was making his debut here, then Young, who boasted about being in the last Pure-rules match before this tournament.
Ian Riccaboni and Caprice Coleman are on commentary, as ever.
ROH Pure Championship Tournament – First Round: Silas Young vs. Fred Yehi
I feel like I’m saying this every time I review a Fred Yehi match, but this is a guy who really ought to be signed somewhere, having been strangely nomadic since leaving EVOLVE/WWN in 2018.
We start with Silas locking up into the corner with Yehi, throwing a slap on the break before Yehi responded by taking him into the ropes for a back elbow. A second lock-up led to Yehi having his arm wrung and yanked on, but Yehi sweeps out the leg to take down Young for a front facelock, but Silas escapes out and grabs a hammerlock. Again Yehi gets free though and Dragon screws Young’s knee into the mat. They restart with a knuckle lock, with Yehi pushing Young away as he worked into a wristlock, wrenching back on the fingers before Young rolled into the ropes… he doesn’t go for a break though, and instead tried to shove Yehi to the ropes. We get shoulder tackles and roll-throughs before another tie-up led to Silas taking Yehi into a seated surfboard.
Young switches out into a half crab, but Yehi grabs Silas’ leg as well… and manages to get free as he came back in with a deathlock, which ends in the ropes as Silas burned his first rope break as we cut to commercial. We get flash clips of Silas working over Yehi’s back during the break, but Yehi’s on top with stomps and chops as he took Young into the corner. Slingshot knees sandwich Young in to the corner, before Silas got caught with a back fist as Yehi took him to the mat for a Koji clutch. Young escapes, but gets caught with a crucifix before he pulled Yehi into the corner to buy himself some time. A series of running boots keeps Yehi in the corner as Young followed with a tornado DDT.
Young pulls up Yehi, but gets taken back down with a roll-up as Yehi fought back with chops and German suplexes. A cannonball takes Silas into the corner but he responded by countering a suplex with one of his own, before he took Yehi up top for a superplex. A running knee strike followed as Yehi ended up taking a swinging neckbreaker… but rolled up Young for a near-fall before he could get pinned. Feeling the tide against him, Yehi launches a flurry of shots ahead of a Shining Wizard, as things degenerated into a brief strike battle. A Finlay roll from Young led to a springboard moonsault attempt… but Yehi stomps away at Young before snatching the win with a small package. The ad break in the middle of the match kinda took me out of the match, but this was a really solid outing with Yehi showing that he was able to get himself out of tight spots – something that could be useful as he takes on either Tracy Williams or Rust Taylor in the next round. ***½