Valiente leads En Busca de un Idolo, Niebla returns, IWRG show canceled, TxT and Dr. Wagner

photo by CMLL

CMLL (TUE) 05/21/2013 Arena Mexico [CMLL, Yahoo! Deportes]
1) Espanto Jr. & Herodes Jr. b Fresbee & Magnus
2) Amapola, Mima Shimoda, Tiffany b Goya Kong, Lady Afrodita, Luna Mágica
Listed as Lluvia’s return from knee surgery, but Goya Kong took her spot.
3) Cancerbero, Hijo del Signo, Virus DQ Hombre Bala Jr., Pegasso, Sagrado
Straight falls for the tecnicos. Cancerbero pulled Hombre Bala’s mask for the DQ.
4) Delta, Fuego, Guerrero Maya Jr. b Boby Zavala, Disturbio, Vangellys
Rudo side was originally Morphosis, Olimpico and Puma. Unclear why the trio change. Tecnicos took 1/3, Fuego beating Vangellys with a hurracanrana.
5) Hijo del Fantasma b Misterioso Jr. [En Busca de un Idolo]
first match for both. Hijo del Fantasma won with a Phantom Attack into a reverse short armscissors in nine minutes. Fantasma scored a 9 (Porky), 7 (UG), 7 (Salazar), 4 (Tirantes) for a 27. Misterioso, who made it clear he had no interest in anything the judges had to say and tried to intimidate Tirantes after his poor assessment, scored a 5/6/3/1 for a 15.
6) Valiente b Sangre Azteca [En Busca de un Idolo]
Strong match, Sangre Azteca looking very motivated. He landed all his big moves, Valiente survived, Sangre escaped one Valiente Buster but not the second. Valiente scored a 10, 9, 8, 4 (Tirantes calling this his highest score) for a 31 and appears to be a favorite. Sangre Azteca scored a 8, 7, 5, 3 for a 23.
7) Diamante Azul, Mistico, Thunder b Rey Bucanero, Terrible, Tiger
Blue Panther was announced, but replaced within hours by Thunder. Bucanero and Azul are feuding here as well.

About a week ago, Lluvia found out she was booked for this show via Goya Kong twitter message and said her knee was still hurting and she would talk to Colombo about it. So…why was she ever listed as wrestling? CMLL makes no sense.

Valiente is the prohibitive favorite to win En Busca de un Idolo after just one week. The judges love him and he’s getting enough polling support to score well from there as well. He should have no problem winning matches, but will advance even if he doesn’t. The other three finalists will be highly determined by the polling results. Those haven’t been announced for this week, but Misterioso is leading despite losing and getting savaged by the judges. Three more weeks of that, and he’s moving on anyway.

CMLL (TUE) 05/21/2013 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara [@acogdl]
1) Espectrum & Infierno b Leo & Metatrón
Rudos took 2/3.
2) Ráfaga & Raziel b Black Metal & Stigma
Rudos took 1/3.
3) Bárbaro Cavernario, Namajague, Shigeo Okumura b Gallo, Starman, Tritón
Rudos took 1/3.
4) Kráneo, Mr. Águila, Psicosis b Máscara Dorada, Rey Cometa, Stuka Jr.
National trios champions in non-title match. Rudo champs took 1/3, Psicosis beating Mascara Dorada.
5) Atlantis, Máximo, Rush DQ Euforia, Gran Guerrero, Mr. Niebla
Mr. Niebla replaced Ultimo Guerrero, announced ahead of time, because UG had judging duties. Tecnicos took 2/3. Niebla fouled Atlantis in the third.

IWRG announced tomorrow’s weekly Thursday show is canceled. No reason has been given and I can’t think of the last time IWRG has announced a show and canceled it. They’ve skipped some shows, but usually just don’t even mention they’re skipping them.) The main event was due to be Dinamic Black, Trauma I, Veneno versus Canis Lupus, Carta Brava Jr., Oficial 911, with a Hijo del Pirata Morgan vs Eterno semimain.

A local article on Friday’s taping in Tampico lists Eclipse (not that one) in Freelance’s spot and El Patriarca in Eita’s spot in the opener. Patriarca has worked for local promotion KBW in the area (including their shows with AAA & DTU luchadors). There’s an Eclipse who’s worked for that group, but less frequently.

Tercera Caida says they’ll be airing the fourway between Hijo de Perro Aguayo, Canek, Dr. Wagner Jr. and Blue Demon today. They’re on at 9, after a new episode of Fusion at 8. CMLL Puebla, which was pre-empted at least in part on Monday due to news coverage, repeats at 2AM and 10:30AM on Thursday and the bandit TVC Deportes feed is back working.

Jack Evans is no fan of Silver King. He apparently explain in more depth on Facebook, explaining Silver King pretends to be a good guy, but is really a guy constantly causing trouble, ratting out the locker room to the AAA office except he’s also exaggerating the stories he’s telling, to try and get ahead. Jack’s not even totally angry about Silver King’s “rat” behavior, but Silver King pretending he’s not a rat.

Lucha Libre in Japan

05/22 NJPW: Titan & Barreta [O] b BUSHI & Hirmou Takahashi [X]

Titan again promised to bring home a good result for CMLL. Holding him to it! Tournament starts early Friday morning.

Links

Lineups

IWRG (SUN) 05/26/2013 Arena Naucalpan
1) Ángel Del Amor & Galaxie vs Dragón Celestial & Fulgor
2) Chico Che, Dr. Cerebro, Golden Magic vs Alan Extreme, Apolo Estrada Jr., Imposible
3) Dinamic Black, Fenix (AAA), Trauma II vs Carta Brava Jr., Eterno, Pentagón Jr.
4) Negro Navarro & Trauma I vs Hijo de Pirata Morgan & Pirata Morgan [IWRG IC TAG]
Navarro & Trauma are champs. Seventh defense, first against the team they beat for the titles.
5) Monster Clown, Murder Clown, Psycho Clown vs Hijo del Dr. Wagner Jr., Último Gladiador, X-Fly

This is the show which is moved to 4pm to avoid the America vs Cruz Azul LigaMX final (starts at 9pm.) Perhaps an early start will better allow LAS and AYM to air the show in some sort of professional fashion?

CMLL (MON) 05/27/2013 Arena Puebla
1) Blue Center & Centauro de Fuego vs Akrón & Siki Osama
2) Camaleón, Höruz, Leono vs Disturbio, Nitro, Nosferatu
3) Pegasso, Rey Cometa, Sagrado vs Boby Zavala, Namajague, Shigeo Okumura
4) Delta, Guerrero Maya Jr., Hijo del Fantasma vs Felino, Mephisto, Negro Casas
5) Atlantis, Máximo, Rush vs Gran Guerrero, Último Guerrero, Volador Jr.

CMLL hasn’t posted this yet, but the Puebla commission tweeted it out. (It’d be neat if they covered other Puebla shows as well.) No Azul or Bucanero after their challenge last week.

TxT (SAT) 06/22/2013 Gimnasio Juan De La Barrera
1) Dinamic Black & Imposible vs Golden Magic & Poseidon (TxT)
2) La Chola & Rossy Moreno vs Esther Moreno & Lady Apache
3) Súper Muñeco, Súper Pinocho, Súper Ratón vs Black Terry, Scorpio Jr., Shu el Guerrero [WWA TRIOS]
Trio Fantasy are champions. Appears to be second defense.
4) Blue Demon Jr. & El Hijo Del Santo vs Heddi Karaoui & Zumbi [PWR TAG]
Santo & Demon’s first defense
5) Rayo de Jalisco Jr. & Universo 2000 vs Canek & Máscara Año 2000 and LA Park & Super Parka and Pirata Morgan & Villano IV [ruleta de la muerte]

This ruleta de la muerte can only go better than last one. All the hair guys in the pairs are plausible losers, though one would assume Super Parka wouldn’t mind a payoff for losing his hair given how hard Volador Jr. is working to raise money for him.

The big missing name is Dr. Wagner Jr. Hijo del Santo posted a Twitter message after the last show implying Wagner was leaving (saying the door would be open to a return) and he’s not on this card. Meanwhile, Wagner has continued to appear on cards with AAA luchadors and AAA is promoting a big name surprise for their taping in Toluca next Thursday. The darkened silhouette on the poster for the show even looks like Dr. Wagner. I am not able to confirm this right now, but I believe there’s a fairly strong chance Dr. Wagner Jr. will be back in AAA in Toluca and appear on TripleMania.

It’s always been much more likely Wagner would return to AAA than CMLL – he’s still under contract to AAA, the people at the very top of CMLL don’t want him, and he can still work indies while working for AAA. It’d be interesting to see how Wagner spins this – a new deal with AAA? the continued tease of jumping to CMLL in September (still not happening)? – but he’ll probably end up okay because he always does.

top six stories of the last two weeks

  • Long time US lucha libre promoter Rocky Roman passed away.
  1. TxT’s monthly show was main evented by a LA Park vs Dr. Wagner no DQ match. It was the usual crazy brawl with a finish where both men claim the won the match (though Park was the one actually declared a winner.) The implied mask vs mask post match signing didn’t happen, for LA Park lost too much blood to appear at the press conference. Park had said the mask match would only happen if they could sell out the 8,000 build they were running in, and they did not come close to selling out. In the days later, Santo hinted Wagner was leaving TxT for now. In the undercard, Esther Moreno won the mask of La Chola in a poorly constructed women’s ruleta de la muerte tournament.
  2. AAA officially announced the title match for TripleMania: Texano will defend the Mega title against the winner of Chessman and Heavy Metal, which will happen earlier on the day. That joins Perro vs Cibernetico as the only offical matches for TripleMania, though more matches have been hinted at. La Parka has challenges the Villanos for an AAA vs Villanos (or indepdents) match and Blue Demon and Mesias are suddenly feuding, which both seem like matches for TripleMania. Also, Puerto Rico’s WWL has said their two championships will be defended on TripleMania, but AAA hasn’t acknowledged those matches as of yet. A Twitter message posted by AAA’s guy in chargeof social media says TripleMania would be available on PPV, in movie theatres, and on iPPV, but no further details are available.
  3. CMLL started the second edition of it’s En Busca de un Idolo, this time focusing on “midcarders who’ve not made it.” Valiente, who sure appears to have made it as part of a new top tecnico trio, is the favorite to win and leads the complicated scoring system after 1 week. On the other side, Misteroiso received the lowest scores from the judges after all but telling them off – but he may still be among the leaders due to easily manipulated fan poll component. All matches from the tournament are airing live on the Terra.mx website, and may not air on any of CMLL’s many TV shows. One strange note is Shocker is all over the publicity for the tournament, but is instead off participating on a reality show. Rush has taken his place as coach of the tecnicos, though the coaches have yet to actually be shown participating in the tournament in any way. (CMLL might be planning to do the same weekly half hour shows recapping the tournaments which were run last year, but has not shared this plan with anyone.)
  4. AAA held two TV tapings, with three more scheduled in the next couple of weeks to fill their 3 hours of weekly TV. Outside of the matches already mentioned, Daga and Axel still seem to be feuding (though a multiman Daga title defense at TripleMania seems more likely) and the lesser Perros del Mal may have started a feud with the new Mirreyes trio.
  5. New top CMLL rudo Gran Guerrero and Comadante Pierroth made their debut. Gran Guerrero appears to be the former Taurus, who might become a very good luchador eventually but is being placed at the top way too soon. The latest Pierroth appears to be the former Toro Blanco, a 50 year old retired luchador who wasn’t much good 10 years ago. Both looked poor in their debut; Pierroth was just about edited out of his match.
  6. Marco Corleone will miss 3 to 9 months with a knee injury, suffered in his car accident on the way back from Puebla a couple months ago. Rush & Mistico suffered their own recent car accident on the way to Puebla, but both are saying they’re okay.
  • Billy el Malo may be out a year after being a horrendous knife wound by a carjacker (and possibly just as destructive surgery.)
  • Shinsuke Nakamura arrived from NJPW in CMLL. CMLL originally teased a Nakamura NJPW IC title match against Rush, but instead seem to be setting up a Sombra/Nakamura rematch on an upcoming Friday night show.
  • CMLL luchadors were allowed to work on a show with El Hijo del Santo in Sonora, violating the ban of not working with Santo on shows in Mexico. Brazo de Oro working the show and being head of the luchador union might have had something to do with it, but CMLL overall seems to be weakening on it’s veto.
  • A CMLL vs Indepdents show in Coacalco on Sunday sold out the arena (a small tented ring) and had good matches with indecisive finishes. Later that night, Arena Lopez Mateos celebrated it’s 46th Anniversary with a sold out show of it’s own, with Dr. Wagner Jr. besting Canek, Perro Jr. and Blue Demon Jr. in the biggest match of the show.
  • WWL also announced they’d be holding another major show in Monterrey on 07/07, which may be an iPPV from Arena Coliseo Monterrey.
  • Rey Bucanero vs Diamante Azul in a hair vs mask match was announced for the Arena Puebla Anniversary show, though that date has not been announced.
  • Carta Brava Jr. won IWRG’s Junior de Juniors championship and Oficial 911 won the annual IWRG Rey del Ring 30 man match. Both championships were held by Comando Elite’s Factor, who now has no title and no mask.
  • Mistico, Volador and Sombra had a title match in Monterrey where Mistico lost the title by time limit draw. Everyone agreed that made no sense.