Ric Flair may be back in the WWE opening signature video following a credible allegation of sexual assault but he is very much on the outs with former ROH owner, Cary Silkin.
The wounds began to be opened for Silkin last week when Dutch Mantell criticized Flair on his Story Time With Dutch Mantell podcast for not hanging up his boots and, in his mind, tarnishing his legacy with a poor Last Match performance. He also went out of his way to say Flair, “is full of shit and always has been.”
Flair was quick to respond to Mantell’s criticisms with back-to-back tweets insulting the “miserable old wrestler trying to make a buck,” before claiming that with his tweets he had made Mantell “more famous” than he would ever be.
Following those tweets, Flair, in a grammatically questionable message, seemed to change his tone and tried to de-escalate the situation following his escalation of it. “Dutch,” Flair began. “Let’s just agree to hopefully growing old reluctantly but gracefully! We as OLD VETERANS need to be united, not at odds.”
Mantell has finally responded to the jabs from Flair with a lengthy Facebook message. In it, he fires back at Flair before asking the sixteen-time world champion, “what does it feel like to literally steal $300,000 from wrestling fans on your LAST MATCH?”
The invocation of money is what brought former ROH owner Cary Silkin into the equation. After seeing Mantell’s response to Flair, Silkin took to social media to acknowledge his own experience of having money issues with Flair.
“Unfortunately, every word that Dutch Mantell is accusing Ric Flair of is true,” Silkin began. “Well, let me rephrase that from my own experience, I am personally owed 41K buy Flair for non-appearances back in 2009 where I was foolish enough to pay him upfront when I owned ROH.”
“It’s so sad that one of my wrestling heroes turned out to be such a lowlife,” he continued. “When I pursue trying to get the money and was referred to an excellent lawyer, in Charlotte, North Carolina, the lawyer told me “don’t bother I don’t want to take any money from you because you’re going to be 100th online to get nothing “‘
The money that Silkin is referencing is for five appearances Ric Flair agreed to make for ROH in 2009 and 2010. Silkin agreed to pay Flair $10,000 for each appearance. After not appearing for his first contracted appearance in Montreal, he failed to return the $10,000. In the fallout of that incident, Flair agreed to return to ROH as an authority figure and did act in that capacity for one set of tapings before showing up at the next to announce he was resigning from the role to return to WWE. In a subsequent lawsuit, ROH alleged that they paid Flair $35,000 and he only appeared once.
The lawsuit was never settled and, as a result, Silkin believes Flair still owes him.
Stay with Haus Of Wrestling for all the latest regarding Ric Flair and Cary Silkin’s dispute.