Grappling With Tragedy: Oro

Brian Damage

Grappling with Tragedy is a series of articles that deal with unfortunate, tragic incidents that have occurred throughout the history of professional wrestling. It is unlike the ‘Wrestling with Sin’ series that deals more with the seedier side of wrestling like arrests, murders and suicides. Grappling looks more at particular tragic incidents that have in some instances altered pro wrestling in some way.

Oro

Jesús Javier Hernandez Silva was a second generation luchador who began his career at 18 years old. His father tried to talk him out of becoming a pro wrestler, but saw his son’s passion and persistence. His Dad started his training, but decided to send Jesus to Mexico City for advanced tutelage. Jesus Silva began his pro career on November 23rd, 1990 at the famous Arena Mexico.

After using a number of different aliases, Silva became famous under the mask and identity of ‘Oro’ which translates to English as Gold. As Oro, Silva teamed with his brother Plata and another wrestler named Platino (Platinum) to form the trios team called Los Metalicos. The trios team won a few titles along the way…but it was Oro who became the true stand out of the group. His speed and no fear aerial style made fans fall in love with him and he became a singles star.

Oro would become so popular that promoters were lining up to book him internationally. He did a couple of big tours of Japan and wrestled in other parts of the world, building his character. Oro was a work horse, that always wanted to be the highlight of any show he competed on. Friends say that Oro would always watch every match on the card to see who had the best fan reactions. Oro made sure to try to top the biggest spots performed by other luchadors on the show to be the talk of the show. He usually always accomplished that challenge.

Oro was a big student of the wrestling game…always watching tapes of stars from Mexico, Japan and beyond. Despite his growing popularity and being very much in demand worldwide….Oro was allegedly growing tired of the constant travelling. He would often request matches be close to his home in Guadalajara. Because of this, his push was somewhat diminished as promoters wanted to focus on talent that they could market better. Oro still gave 100% of himself in every match and was still very much beloved by most fans and promoters.

On October 26th, 1993, Oro was involved in a trios match that also involved luchadors La Fiera, Brazo de Plata, Kahoz, Dr. Wagner Jr. and Jaque Mate. Oro wanted to once again steal the show by taking a very dangerous bump on his head and neck. Oro looked to Japanese great Kenta Kobashi as the inspiration for such a move. As the match took place, Oro was clotheslined and dropped on his head as planned. The issue was Oro was seriously injured and couldn’t complete the match.

Emergency personnel rushed to the ring and stretchered Oro to an awaiting ambulance. Sadly, Oro died before he could be placed in the ambulance. The family of Silva requested that no autopsy be done and it has been speculated that Silva perhaps died of a brain aneurysm, but nothing was ever made official. Jesús Javier Hernandez Silva aka Oro was just 21 years old.