Early Life
The Pugh brothers, Jamin (Jay) (born January 24, 1984) and Mark (born January 17, 1985) grew up in Laurel, Delaware. As high schoolers, both received honorable mention All-State honors their junior and senior years for football, Jay as a fullback and a linebacker and Mark as a tight end and a linebacker. At one point, both were signed to play for Wesley College (Delaware), a fact even used in wrestling storyline at one point, at ROH Beating the Odds, to explain an absence from which they were returning.
The brothers first became interested in wrestling in their youth by watching the World Wrestling Federation on one of the two channels their television could receive. Originally, they practiced wrestling moves with one another on a trampoline before the family built a wrestling ring in their backyard. From the beginning, the two of them worked on honing their craft, taping their moves and trying to improve them. Despite the fact that their dad was a coach for their high school's wrestling team, they did not participate in amateur wrestling in their high school years. Their first foray into professional wrestling came with the East Coast Wrestling Association (ECWA), while they were still in high school. While their mother, Jana, was in line to purchase tickets to attend a wrestling event, a promoter for the ECWA approached her and asked if her sons had a tape of themselves wrestling. This led to the brothers debuting for ECWA on May 20, 2000 under the ring names "Jay and Mark Briscoe".
Read more about this topic: Briscoe Brothers
Famous quotes related to early life:
“Many a woman shudders ... at the terrible eclipse of those intellectual powers which in early life seemed prophetic of usefulness and happiness, hence the army of martyrs among our married and unmarried women who, not having cultivated a taste for science, art or literature, form a corps of nervous patients who make fortunes for agreeable physicians ...”
—Sarah M. Grimke (1792–1873)