10/18 Mexico Results, Perros del Mal

I’m going to save most things for tomorrow, but the two necessary things:

CMLL (SUN) 10/18 Arena Mexico [Cesar, DJ Spectro]
1) Pequeño Damian 666, Pequeño Nitro, Pequeño Universo 2000 b Bam Bam, Máscara Dorada, Pequeño Olímpico
2) Heavy Metal, Naito, Terrible b Metro, Toscano, Volador Jr.
3) Strong Man DQ Último Guerrero
4) Tigre Blanco L Pólvora, Ángel de Oro, Arkangel de la Muerte, Flash, Skándalo, Rey Cometa, Dr. X, Pegasso, Tiger Kid, Hooligan, Astro Boy [cage, mask]

The cage match is listed in reverse order of escape (so Astro Boy was out first, Hooligan, etc.) When it got down to the final for, Arkangel helped Polvora, then snuck out on him. Angel de Oro did something similar to Tigre Blanco. Blanco/Polvora had a four minute match, with Polvora hitting (I think) the wheelbarrow powerbomb for the win.

Tigre Blanco is Sergio Guzman Silva, 35 years, 15 years a wrestler, from Mexico City. He hid his face from the cameras and hurried to the back; I’d guess that means someone specific was supposed to get the first shot. A quick search on Google doesn’t turn up anything interesting for that name. As this was a Sunday show, and all the mags (and magazine shows) go to print on Saturday, it might be a bit before we get the picture and What’s Next interview.

Edit: SuperLuchas has Tiger Blanco unmasked.

Strong Man won in straight falls. He won the first fall clean, then hit his Strong Bomb in the second. Ultimo Guerrero threw his mask at him in desperation and Strong Man caught it, but referee Pompin saw UG throwing the mask and called for the correct disqualification. The story is Strong Man might not have gotten the pinfall win, but he otherwise dominated him. They’re getting behind him. Cesar says this was Strong Man’s best match since coming in.

DJ Spectro is low on this show, saying it came in under 2 hours and there was very little good wrestling. He also wonders if Heavy Metal was drunk in his match. I’d question the sobriety of who booked the match; why not get behind Volador 1/8th as much as they’ve gotten behind Strong Man, and have him win a couple matches leading up his big matches on Friday? It’s as if whomever is booking Sunday and Tuesday go out of their way to even out the results from the main show.

DJ Spectro estimates the crowd at 4,000, and that’s a pretty believable number given the crowd. Now, this same show in Arena Coliseo, with the 12 in the cage instead in trios matches, would’ve drawn 1/3rd to 1/4th that number, so maybe someone can claim it as a success. It certainly doesn’t look that way when they’re playing to 25% full buildings, while the WWE was around 95% for their shows here.

The other important news is the Perros del Mal show aired, with no commercials, at the announced 10:30 time. Alan mentions in the comments that it was 5th (Cassandro) and 8th (main) matches from the 10/11 taping, with teases for the 6th and 7th next week. No commercials means they’re buying the time, and there’s no a good history of buying TV time working out; their only shot is they impress Televisa with a strong ratings number for this spot. That’s going to be tough, given the promotion they did for the show.

Stuff which will have more detail tomorrow
– Pierroth II lost his mask in the big “2nd Generation” mask match; he’s the ex-Anticristo, of no relation to Pierroth
– IWRG has booked a completely pointless Flor Metalica vs one of the Joshi girls mask match for Thursday. I don’t think I’m running a poll.

12 Mask Match Preview

No point in doing a person by person why/why not preview. There’s zero story reason why one person should be the winner or one person should be the loser. It’s not even especially clear why these 12 men were picked for the cage match – why Flash and not Stuka? why Puma King and not Tiger Kid? why Tigre Blanco and not Metalico? why every masked Tuareg member but not Nitro? That last would’ve actually been an interesting idea – after months and months of Tuareg trios taking on tecnico trios, a cage match as the big blow off would’ve made a lot of sense. Unfortunately, this match isn’t about making sense – it’s about running competition against a show that had already almost sold out by the time they announced this match – so you really can’t expect much sense in the finish either. We can only base it on the reasons outside the ring, and we know very little of that.

Tiger Blanco is the obvious loser. Since his head injury (in 2004? – if only I remembered to write things on the wiki), he’s had long stretches of being out of the ring, and has openly talked about not being able to continue. Most of the wrestlers from his ‘generation’ have either made it to a significant level by now or are being phased out, and he’s definitely in the later group. In a year or two, Tigre Blanco might not be a big enough name to be in these sort of cage matches (he’s arguable the lowest ranked guy in the match) – this isn’t the best way to end a stage of your career, but it might be the best spot Tigre Blanco gets.

[poll id=”47″]However, CMLL has been pretty consistent in NOT having the most likely guy losing these cage matches. The last 4 cage match losers in Arena Mexico were Shockercito, Toscano, Heavy Metal, and Hijo del Lizmark, and none of those guys stuck out as the most likely going in. If they continue on with that booking, who else is possible?

The Tuareg: For what their roles are (experienced rudos helping younger tecnicos thru early matches), they really don’t have to be masked. If you take the long view, and there’s no reason you actually should here, it’d be better for them to be unmasked, so they could lose their hair every so often to a guy on the way up. Better than just having Loco Max do it.

Individually, it doesn’t work out as well. Hard to believe Dr. X was going to lose his mask in a match he didn’t even know was going to happen. Arkangel does enough stuff with Ultimo Dragon where being a masked rudo luchador probably means more than average for him. Skandalo is too young and probably on his way to more important things. Of the four in the match, Hooligan seems most likely to lose – he’s not around as much as the others – but there’s the unfortunate business of this not being his first mask.

Flash, Angel de Oro, Pesgaso, and Rey Cometa all make much more sense as masked. With Astro Boy, you could make the same case of being passed by as with Tigre Blanco – enough to make him the second most likely tecnico, but doesn’t seem like a strong bet with who he’s related to. Likewise, Tiger Kid losing his mask wouldn’t make any sense, unless we immediately found out he was actually Negro Casas Jr. or something like that.

Which leaves, unless I’ve skipped someone here, Polvora. He would actually make some sense. Polvora’s lost his old tag partner and could use an image overhaul. Unlike Tigre Blanco, Polvora losing could be the start of something new. I’m picking him, but I wouldn’t actually wager on it.

Picking a winner is even more random. If they were consistent from show day to show day, Angel de Oro would be the strong pick, but they’ve been doing the opposite; Volador’s feud with Ultimo Guerrero on Sundays is completely forgotten for Volador’s feud with Averno on Friday’s. This is pick a name out of the hat reasoning, so I’ll pick…Astro Boy. Hey, he’s got a movie out, it’s a good time.

A short note about Arena Mexico closing time

Mostly because I think we have this wrong. Or confused.

Yujiro & Warrior finished at 11:16
Ultimo Guerrero & Jushin Liger ended at 11:42
Mistico & Negro ended at 11:30, and they were still chatting in the ring as late as 11:36
Naito beat Toscano at 11:30
Villano V name was revealed at 11:14

Got these times off my twitter updates, so they’re probably a minute or two late. And I had to convert hourts a little bit. But the takeaway points are

– Yujiro and Warrior going short was a choice by someone, not a result of the rest of the show going long
– you could probably say the same about many other show main events
– I’m totally lost as to when the cut off time is (and so I may still be wrong about the first two points)

10/17 AAA TV Results (Cuernavaca)

AAA TV (SAT) 10/17 Auditoio Teopanzolco, Cuernavaca [luchalibreaaa]
1) Billy Boy & Sexy Star b El Brazo & La Hechicera
2) Cinthia Moreno, Fabi Apache, Mari Apache b Goddess, Jennifer Blake, Rain
3) Joe Lider & Nicho el Millionario b Laredo Kid & Súper Fly
4) Marco Corleone DQ Chessman
5) El Elegido, La Parka Jr., Pimpinela Escarlata b Cuervo, Escoria, Ozz
6) Monster Clown, Murder Clown, Psycho Clown b Dr. Wagner Jr., Electroshock, Silver King

<A href=”http://www.thecubsfan.com/cmll/?page_id=4156″>2009 AAA TV Chart</a>
Projected Air Date (#910)
Mexico: 10/25
US: 11/07

2009 AAA TV Chart
Projected Air Date (#910)
Mexico: 10/25
US: 11/07

The episode of TV where they do all the angles for the next cycle. They got it out of the way quick.

To begin the show, Konnan offered to return Dorian – if Roldan reinstated Alex Koslov. I don’t know about you, but if that was my son, that would’ve taken .00001 seconds to decide. Of course, it goes on for the show.

Billy Boy & Sexi Star managed to win the battle of the couples.

No Nikki Roxx – Goddess was introduced as a member of the Legion instead. Fabi pinned Goddess clean with a German suplex, Blake and Rain turned on her, and the tecnicas made the save. This explains why she’s a tecnica, at least.

3rd match wasn’t on the lineup. Hijo de Tirantes is back to being a rudo. Roldan is supposed to fire him if he was a rudo again, but I bet this leads to Hijo de Tirantes joining the Legion again. Air Force got destroyed, no sense of any Super Fly rudo turn, except if he wants to be angry about taking the pin when Laredo was too busy being dead.

Right here, in turned into open mic night. First, it was Cibernetico responding to Konnan. Cibernetico brought up Konnan leaving in 1996 and trying to destroy the company, but Cibernetico stayed because he had principles, the same principles that caused him to leave when Konnan got in charge last year, and the same principles the people of Mexico have. Yea, he’s a tecnico again.

Next, Mesias appeared in street clothes, saying he was too hurt from the last taping to wrestle today. If you recall, that was the taping where he was hurt, told not to wrestle, and wrestled anyway. So either he got smarter in the last week (doubtful) or plans changed for the next match.

Instead of Mesias/Marco vs Chessman/?, they just did Marco vs Chessman with no mention of a mystery man. At the end of the match, a masked man – looking very similar to the masked man who kidnapped Dorian – fouled Marco. Unfortunately for him, the masked man did not have a sound exit strategy, and the AAA tecnicos cut him off before he could run away. The masked man was unmasked as Alex Koslov. Konnan appeared, threatening violence to Dorain if Alex wasn’t freed. Dorian is the 2009 version of Antonio Pena’s urn.

For reasons unclear to me, Ozz made friends with the tecnicos after taking the loss. Cuervo and Scoria got ticked and walked out on him. Of all the shows where the Dark Family were on the shows doing absolutely nothing of note, the show with 500 things is the time to do this bit?

Crowd was behing the WagnerManiacs in the main event. Silver King was left alone in the ring with one of the Clowns, but was distracted by Konnan, Rain and Blake, then beat for the win. Legion interference sets up Monday’s main event, but Clowns going with the Legion might actually be useful.