Lucha Underground 2×17: Crime and Punishment

Moth Power
Moth Power

Matches

Daga [O] beat Máscarita Sagrada [X], Kobra Moon, Argenis (4:58, Thunder Rosa sit down Air Raid Crash→Daga elbow drop , OK)

Killshot beat Marty the Moth (7:08, storm cradle driver, good)

Chavo Guerrero [O] beat Aerostar, Texano, Joey Ryan [X], the Mack, Marty Martinez, Sexy Star (8:32, Cage Drill Claw->pin, good)

developments

not sure how much longer Mascarita can survive Famous B's management
not sure how much longer Mascarita can survive Famous B’s management

Chavo Guerero is the new Gift of the Gods champion without having even won a Medallion match. Chavo was able to use Cage’s stolen Medallion after tricking Cage into stealing back a medallion sized washer instead. Dario ruled whoever place the Medallion in the belt got entry into the belt, so Cage was out of the match. There was no clear favorite in the match, and everyone eventually teamed up to take out Chavo, only for Cage to walk into the match and destroy everyone but Chavo. Chavo won the match and is indeed the Gift of the Gods champion – this week, and maybe this week only, since Cage revealed Dario had already given him a shot against the winner for the belt next week.

Marty tried confronting Killshot before their match, and ended up on his back. The match was no different, with Killshot pulling out his finish in an even match. Marty took this badly, attacking Killshot and taking his dogtags.

on target
on target

Kobra Moon was more interested in flirting with Daga than winning the match, even giving up the likely winning pin so Daga could take it instead. Daga didn’t appear too interested in anything besides the win.

Vampiro’s “recovery” strategy for healing Pentagon appears to be hurting Pentagon so much that he becomes immune to pain. This week, Vampiro hit Pentagon first with a cane, then a barbed wire bat, as the show ended.

Thoughts

The grades are all about the same, but Marty/Killshot was the best match of the night for me. The others had a few highlights that gave some value for them, these two guys did the best of putting together a match. They clicked well together with a few really impressive spots – Marty catching the dive looked really good, and Killshot’s offense looked sharp. The post match felt a little hammy but obviously the feud must continue.

Aerostar!
Aerostar!

The fans didn’t seem particularly into the Gift of the Gods match or rooting for any particular person to win, which hurt. They really seemed into the concept at Ultima Lucha. This match was left as a collection of big spots, some cute, but it didn’t overall feel on the level of the other massive man matches they’ve done. Chavo winning was a groaner, and can only salvaged by Cage destroying him next week. There’s decent hope of that – we are a long way from episode 2 LU lead rudo Chavo.

The four way was as good as it could’ve been expected to be when the random selection of people (and Daga & Argenis were better at working with Máscarita than most people they could’ve picked.) Not sure what to make of Kobra Moon & Daga, though between it and Joey & Sexy in the main event, we had two intergender “fights” that turned into something else.

My first thought when this was over was to check my notes and figure out how much longer we have of these Pentagon Jr./Vampiro vignettes. They are not working for me. Pentagon will get built up at the end, as everyone does, but they’re taking him way down before they get there. And the Ian/Vampiro thing is just all over the place’ maybe the idea is he’s now Vampiro all the time but pretending to be Ian at the Temple, but I’m not sure and I’m not sure I care all that much. I’d like to just get back to seeing Pentagon in the ring, soon.

This was one of the weaker episodes of the season; it’s felt like a lot of setup for things they’re going to payoff later, and the payoff episodes are the much better ones. There was nothing terrible on this one, but not a lot worth going back and checking out.

officer down
officer down

UG/Stuka & Panther/Skandalo in Mexico, LU preview, LWC

Titan ramp dive
Titan ramp dive

CMLL (TUE) 05/17/2016 Arena México [CMLL, thecubsfan]
1) Demus 3:16 & Mercurio b Aéreo & Último Dragóncito LUCHA LIBRE MARTES DE NUEVOS VALORES EN LA ARENA MEXICO 17 DE MAYO DEL 2016 (posted by VideosOficialesCMLL)
13:32. Rudos took 1/3.
2) Arkángel de la Muerte, Canelo Casas, Metálico b Flyer, Metatrón, Robin LUCHA LIBRE MARTES DE NUEVOS VALORES EN LA ARENA MEXICO 17 DE MAYO DEL 2016 (posted by VideosOficialesCMLL)
15:51. Rudos took 1/3. Metatron replaced Star Jr.
3) Soberano Jr. b Sangre Azteca [lightning] LUCHA LIBRE MARTES DE NUEVOS VALORES EN LA ARENA MEXICO 17 DE MAYO DEL 2016 (posted by VideosOficialesCMLL)
8:23. Soberano won via small pacakge.
4) Blue Panther Jr., Oro Jr., The Panther DQ El Cuatrero, Sansón, Skándalo LUCHA LIBRE MARTES DE NUEVOS VALORES EN LA ARENA MEXICO 17 DE MAYO DEL 2016 (posted by VideosOficialesCMLL)
11:31. Straight falls, with Skandalo feuding with Panther and unmasking him in the second fall.
5) Bobby Z, Mephisto, Vangellys b Blue Panther, Dragón Lee, Guerrero Maya Jr. LUCHA LIBRE MARTES DE NUEVOS VALORES EN LA ARENA MEXICO 17 DE MAYO DEL 2016 (posted by VideosOficialesCMLL)
14:39. Rudos took 1/3.
6) Máscara Dorada, Stuka Jr., Volador Jr. b Gran Guerrero, Rey Bucanero, Último Guerrero LUCHA LIBRE MARTES DE NUEVOS VALORES EN LA ARENA MEXICO 17 DE MAYO DEL 2016 (posted by VideosOficialesCMLL)
11:17. Tecnicos took 2/3. Ultimo Guerrero bullied Stuka, Stuka beat him in the end.

This show died in the first hour and never really recovered. Skandalo losing his mask to The Panther as a retirement makes some sense on paper, but I’m not sure I’d like to see that two month feud. There wasn’t much of an indication they’re going that way, CMLL just has no real reason to do a Skandalo feud except for him to lose his mask right now.

Ultimo Guerrero has a championship and Stuka makes as much sense as a challenger as anyone, but there were no challengers. Like Monday night in Puebla, the main eventers just got out of there as quick as possible without saying anything.

There is no ELITE show today. They’ve moved to Saturday, at least for the moment. Today, Press Conference Wednesday, would make sense for an ELITE press conference to explain what’s going on, but there’s no sign of one happening.

Today’s Lucha Underground episode is “Crime and Punishment”, the 17th of the season. Matches on the show

  • Daga vs Kobra Moon vs Mascarita Sagrada vs Argenis
  • Marty the Moth vs Killshot (teased by this extra promo)
  • A Gift of the Gods match

There’s a preview vignette that starts to address the Cage/Chavo issue over who has a Medallion.

Over at Roster Resource, they list all the Lucha Underground luchadors sorted by tiers of importance. There’s no one they rank in tier one in a match tonight. There’s only a couple people in tier two. This show features the a lot of the bottom half of the roster by any measure, with people who’ve only lost feuds or haven’t been put in them. It doesn’t mean the show will be bad – people given opportunities usually do pretty well on Lucha Underground – but it’s interesting to see if the ratings reflect the lack of star power or if the week to week variance is shown to be more random noise than actionable information.

Eric has a preview of the show.

Rey Mysterio & Johnny Mundo were at the Univision upfront yesterday, taking photos with invitees. Univision owns 5% of El Rey and they appeared to be the (sole) representatives from the channel, but there was no news about the channel. Univision itself announced a deal with Netflix, but maybe not the one you’d expect: the TV network will be airing Netflix’s originals Club de Cuernos (soccer drama) and Narcos (drug drama) after they’ve aired on Netflix. Mysterio’s been doing press for Lucha Underground all week: this twitlonger post has links to his interviews with ESPN & SI.

AAA announced the third women’s team for the Lucha World Cup: a Team Canada, with Taya, KC Spinelli and TNA’s Allie. “TNA’s Allie” actually appeared with that name for the first time a few minutes after she was announced on the team; she debuted with the new name on last night’s TNA show, and is better know on the indies as Cherry Bomb. (She’s married to “TNA’s Braxton Sutter”, also better known as Pepper Parks, and it’s possible he’ll end up on one of the men’s teams.) Spinelli, like Taya, is a Lance Storm trainee who appeared on the World of Hurt reality show and has wrestled in Canada and in the US for women’s promotions.

Seven of the twelve teams are now complete. It seems like the LWC strategy is to announce a new name or trio every evening to keep people talking about it. Tonight would be a good night for the US people from Lucha Underground or Rey Mysterio’s team.

There’s also an AAA interview with Fabi Apache talking about wanting new challenges and the tag titles being that challenge.

TNA announced Tigre Uno/Extreme Tiger has signed a new contract. There’s no details. There’ are reports TNA is trying to sign their wrestlers to exclusive contracts, which might mean he’d be prevented from working ELITE or elsewhere in Mexico. It wouldn’t be in Tiger’s interest to sign a deal like that – he’s working a lot more in Mexico than he is in TNA due to their limited schedule – so there must be something else going on.

Psicosis II/Ripper took Infector’s mask in a cage match in Estado de Mexico on Sunday.

Caristico, Negro Casas and (a) Hijo del Rey Misterio defeated Rush, Mr. Elektro, and Fuerza Guerrera in Monterrey by DQ, when Rush unmasked Caristico. The DF trio of Flamita, Metaleon, and Golden Magic beat the northern trio of Laredo Kid, Ultimo Ninja and Ninja Jr., and the two teams fought post match suggesting a rematch. The Arena Coliseo Monterrey matches are airing on about a two week delay, so those matches may air the weekend of May 28th, but it’s always subject to change with Monterrey.

LuchaWorld has an interview with Oriental.

Apolo Valdes writes about intergender wrestling.

Llaves and Candados say they’re back on 06/26 in Monterrey. They’re teasing Rush versus Konnan Big, without using either name.

Casandra talks about her title defense this weekend.

Lineups

IWRG (SUN) 05/22/2016 Arena Naucalpan
1) Astro & Rocket vs Galaxy & Hip Hop Man
2) Leo, Mike, Rafy, Teelo vs Diablo Jr., El Hijo del Diablo, Emperador Azteca, Hijo del Alebrije
3) Dinamic Black vs Cerebro Negro
4) Imposible © vs Freelance [IWRG IC Light]
Imposible 13th defense
5) Danny Casas, Hijo De Dos Caras, Ultramán Jr. vs Electroshock, Fuerza Guerrera, Toscano

Electroshock is listed under his AAA name, which is probably a mistake. Ultraman and Fuerza haven’t been here for a while. Imposible has been here for a while, and is giving Freelance a second chance in a row. Tercera is a prelude to a title match if Dinamic Black can win.

CMLL on ClaroSports.com: 2016-05-06 

Volador has no time for Cavernario's silliness
Volador has no time for Cavernario’s silliness

Recapped: 05/16-17/2016

What happened: Rey Escorpión seemed to cause problems between La Mascara & Rush, but was dumped to the side at the end. The first two matches had botched finishes due to referees counting unplanned eliminations, and the third had a pointless DQ.

What was good: The semimain was the best match, with some of the undercard derailed by the bad finishes (and the main event hurt by feed issues.)

Where can I watch it: It’s on rockerGamer30’s channel. Read More