CMLL Martes de Nuevo Valores: 2017-04-18 

Soberano

Recapped: 04/19/2017

Matches: 

All matches aired live from Arena Mexico on April 18, 2017

  1. Akuma, Hijo del Signo, Inquisidor defeated Bengala, Príncipe Diamante, Sensei  (13:16 [5:44, 2:52, 4:40], 1/3, below average)
  2. Mercurio, Pequeño Nitro, Pierrothito beat Eléctrico, Fantasy, Último Dragóncito  (12:39 [5:20, 3:00, 4:19], 1/3, OK)
  3. Misterioso Jr., Sagrado, Tiger beat Pegasso, Soberano Jr., Starman (11:15 [3:53, 2:41, 4:41], 1/3, ok)
  4. Virus beat Fuego in a lightning match (4:16, Gori Bomb, good)
  5. Euforia, Niebla Roja, Último Guerrero beat Dragón Lee, Marco Corleone, Mistico (10:07 [3:54, 1:39, 4:34], 1/3, ok)
  6. Máximo Sexy defeated Terrible to retain the CMLL World Heavyweight Championship (12:47 [2:48, 0:44, 9:15], 1/3, great)

What happened:

Terrible Clash

Máximo kept the CMLL Heavyweight Championship over Terrible.

Niebla Roja didn’t get along with his team, was friendly with the técnicos, and won anyway.

Misterioso ran from Soberano early in their match, beat him quickly in the first fall. Soberano rallied to be both Sagrado & Misterioso in the second fall, and wasn’t involved in the third fall finish.

Thoughts: 

Virus puts out Fuego

The main event got a lot of positive talk live and I didn’t really see it as I was watching early on. They did Último Guerrero style early falls and it was feeling like a routine match for a while; Máximo faking being tired to lure Terrible into a second dive was smart but it didn’t feel like anything much overall. They just kept on going though, and that’s the Máximo formula for his title matches: lots of big moves, lots of back and forth at a good pace, and lot of convincing moments where it can end. Máximo mostly wins with his kiss (which Terrible may have been immune to after a decade of exposure) but can and does win matches in plenty of other ways, which makes those near falls feel more weighty. Terrible too has a bunch of possible finishers they ran thru, and no problem going thru all of them. Máximo title matches are good for some bit of psychology, and they got a random hold over just by using it to win an early fall and teasing it again as the finish. This match didn’t rise any higher level than, say, his title match with Euforia and it’s not the epic heavyweight title matches of other promotions, but it was plenty satisfactory for what CMLL is offering. This is an easy watch and easy recommendation.

The semimain was overtaken by Niebla Roja’s turn, like Friday’s match. He’s entertaining at the sabotage, and Último Guerrero is great at doing a slow burn at this idiot who’s going to have to murder soon, but the matches are never really that good during this sort of angle and this was hurt just the same. The finishing kick was the best part, and Niebla Roja & Dragon Lee continue to have exchanges which make me frustrated we’re never going to actually get that singles match.

UG is going to kill this man

Short lightning matches usually don’t work, but this one did. Fuego coming out hot worked to get the fast pace this match needed, and from a logical strategy standpoint: you’re not going to win a mat battle with Virus, might as well cut it off before it can happen. Fuego kept the action going with Virus stopping him only a few times, and the finish looked devastating. There’s not a lot to this one because there isn’t the time, but it definitely worked and is a good alternative idea for this lightning matches.

Soberano continues to look outstanding in his recent matches, and continued on his feud with Misterioso nicely in the third match. I’m not convinced it’s going anywhere – it could use more focus on one show if it was meant to be, and it could be they just went with it because CMLL’s random match generator put them together this week – but they’ve got the roles well. Soberano was just as good if not better with the secondary rudos in this. Second fall ending minute was the best portion of this match and this was significantly better than the matches prior to it despite being about the same grade.

no

The rudos were more aggressive in the minis match, but nothing done that doesn’t feel like the same thing we’ve seen out of this decision for the last five years. There were small tweaks to the usual match – Mercurio getting in a hanging double stomp to the apron, and a failed attempt to mirror that in the ring only for Pierrothito to not take the right bump – but there’s more than small tweaks needed. Even when the luchadors put in more effort, there’s no great effort being put on the people who organize these matches and it limits how high they can go. This was good on the curve but nothing that would stand by normal standards.

I was never much into the opener and tuned out as soon as they badly blew Inquisidor’s front cracker spot

AAA in Tijuana, Copa Junior continues tonight in CMLL, Flamita/Ultimo Ninja in RIOT

two shows tonight

CMLL has it’s usual Friday night show with less going on than usual. Next week’s is usually CMLL’s annual Arena Mexico anniversary show, usually with one big match, but CMLL’s really set up nothing happening immediately outside the Copa Junior. Maybe something will come up out of tonight’s main event. Negro Casas, Barbaro Cavernario and La Mascara take on Dragon Lee, Volador and Caristico in a match with a lot of semi-dormant rivalries. Dragon Lee & La Mascara have their mask match feud, Cavernario & Volador won the incredible pairs tournament, and Caristico and Negro Casas have a long history of being friends and enemies. There’s also Volador & Carisico’s old simmering issues, which showed up briefly in the Reyes del Aire last week. It’s CMLL, so it’s also possible none of this could come up and they just have a fine enough three and a half star match, but at least there’s potential there.

There’s not quite as much potential in the semimain. The rudo side has strong personalities but not the best assemblage of wrestling talent; the match will be over but maybe not good. Pierroth, Mr. Niebla and Sam Adonis face Diamante Azul, Stuka Jr. and Valiente.

The Copa Junior is listed in the fourth match, up two spots from last week for no obvious reason (and with lesser talent.) CMLL rarely moves around matches, so I guess it’ll stay in the fourth spot. It’ll be the highest spot on the card Artillero has ever wrestled in, for the eight or so minute he’ll last in the match. Forastero & Sanson are the other two rudos and the natural opponents for Soberano Jr. Esfinge won the last Copa Junior of this type CMLL ran, and Blue Panther Jr. probably can’t be ruled out. Mangus, Stigma and Star Jr. will also be in the match.

The rest of the show are matches with mixed bags of luchadors and not the greatest promise. Guerrero Maya & Luciferno will be in the lightning match. Drone, Fuego and Rey Cometa take on Nitro, Raziel, and Virus, a trios match probably one luchador away from being good. Flyer & Robin, two second generation luchadors who coudn’t get in Copa Junior, face two who did, Canelo Casas & Espanto Jr.

 

CultIcon has a preview of the show and writes about Star Jr. before his Copa Junior participation. It’ll air on ClaroSports at 8:30 pm. I’m not going to be around. I’ll see if I can try to record it (and stream if necessary) remotely, but no promises.

There’s no results from last night’s Arena Coliseo show. CMLL didn’t seem to cover it.

AAA also tapes tonight in Tijuana. We know what the card lists for matches, but we also know these things change. La Parka versus Ricky Marvin is a match which doesn’t make any sense now, so maybe that won’t happen. (La Parka’s been generally dropped down the list a lot in the current creative direction and it’d be surprising if stays that way.) Wagner & Psycho are unlikely partners for the moment, so maybe their main event will get switched to something involving Poder del Norte. Ayako/Taya and Fantamsa/Kross were specifically brought up this week, so maybe they’re still on.

Killshot & Marty the Moth against Aerostar & Drago as a Lucha Underground match is probably still on too. Leo Riano wrote about how this match is the first time fans in Mexico will see a Lucha Underground match. Leo Riano called a Lucha Underground match at last year’s TripleMania, where Dragon Azteca, Prince Puma & Rey Mysterio defeated Marty the Moth, Matanza and Mil Muertes.

AAA’s taping is listed as 8:30 pm, but with the Pacific time zone and normal late starting time, it probably won’t actually start until about the time CMLL’s taping is completing. The taping also may not air for a couple  more weekends, perhaps on May 6th.

Violento Jack will be heading to Japan for a full year to work for Freedoms. They invited him to stay for as long as he wanted, and he decided to go for a full year so he could help build their company. His first match are on April 29th and he says he’s got eight matches already for May.

Dulce Garcia’s media tour for her boxing match includes interviews in La Jordana and La Aficion.

DTU announced Jason Cade, Dezmond Xavier, Trey Miguel and Serpentico from the US as guests for a May/June tour, along with Draztick Boy back from Dragon Gate. They’re running May 31st in Arena Actopan (Hidalgo), June 1st in Aguascalientes, June 2nd in Zacatecas, June 3rd in San Luis Potosi and June 4th in Irapuato.

MDA in Arena Coliseo Monterrey on 05/07

RIOT on 05/20 in Arena Femenil Monterrey

We completed our lucha libre indie fantasy draft over on Wrestling With Words today. You can see the first part and the second part that just went up for all our eight picks, and I’ll  put up a poll this afternoon, so you can decide who has the best.

A nice video feature on Halcon Suriano’s school, where Stukita helps train people.

LuchaWorld has the latest Lucha Report and a new edition of Lucha Clasica.

RobViper has highlights of 09/09/16 ELITE.

Kcidis’s cartoon is about Niebla Roja’s current situation.

CMLL Puebla: 2017-04-17 

this is not proper medical procedure

Recapped: 04/18/2017

Matches: 

All matches aired live from Arena Puebla on April 17, 2017

  1. Arkalis & Vega beat El Perverso & Rey Apocalipsis (13:43 [5:51, 3:51, 4:01], 2/3, ok)
  2. Joker, Pequeño Nitro, Pierrothito defeated Astro, Eléctrico, Último Dragóncito (14:46 [6:52, 4:34, 3:20], 1/3, ok)
  3. Drone, Espíritu Maligno, Stigma defeated  Disturbio, Olímpico, Policeman (15:51 [6:54, 4:01, 4:56], 1/3, ok)
  4. Kráneo, Ripper, Sam Adonis defeated Johnny Idol, Máximo Sexy, Titán (13:15 [5:17, 3:00, 4:58], 1/3, ok)
  5. Carístico, Dragón Lee, Mistico defeated La Máscara, Negro Casas, Último Guerrero (10:03 [5:24, 1:30, 3:09], 2/3, ok)
  6. Atlantis beat Rush (10:28 [0:50, 3:53, 5:45], 2/3 DQ, good)

What happened: 

so dumb

Rush jumped Atlantis before the match, then ripped up his mask so bad during the match that Atlantis bailed to get a new mask but it somehow wasn’t a DQ. Atlantis got the DQ fall win in the third when he had Rush in the Atlantida and Mascara attacked him. Los Ingobernables left Atlantis fouled and unmasked

Dragon Lee landed on his head on a dive in the semifinal, scaring Mistico (who dove right next to him) and Carístico. He seems fine afterwards.

The Policeman/Espiritu feud barely continued. Policeman pinned Espíritu in the second fall, and they were both pinned at the same time off a weak looking double clothesline spot.

Rey Apocalispis wore a green and yellow outfit, which the announcers identified as a tribute to Fishman.

Thoughts: 

cannonball

The main event was an explainer for why people think Rush is great. It was not a technical master piece or lot of near falls exchange, it was him relying up the crowd by being a jerk to Atlantis for most of 12 minutes. Atlantis showed fire when coming back and was a necessary part of the equation, but Rush came off like a giant star. It was his behavior as much as his wrestling, from going into the crowd to grab a piece of Atlantis’ mask back (not that he really wanted it, he didn’t want the crowd to have it), to grabbing a stretcher just to throw at Atlantis (and then swear loudly enough to get picked up on CMLL’s mic), to just playing with Tirantes’ suspenders to mess with him. He was super charismatic in this match, and made it as good as it was. I’m sure they want to save a decision in this for another day, but I Rush winning this match up cleanly until the day he has to lose it would work just as fine.

The semimain was a borderline match. The last two falls are the interesting ones, and they don’t last five minutes combined. It’s a good few minutes with usual stuff done well, but maybe not enough to be really a fully watchable match. La Mascara always looks at his best when facing Dragon Lee, which is probably more due to Dragon Lee willing to take big falls for Mascara’s offense more than anything. Lee landing on his head on the dive was more a freak occurrence than anything crazy he did, but he does go all out for every superkick sell.

everyone booed

The fourth match was the most entertaining undercard trios and came close to good at times. Crowd was into it from the start thanks to Adonis’ antics and the técnicos doing the matador bit and it everyone mixed well, it just got a little messy around the dives and the finish. Johnny Idol is basically the same simple high flyer he’s been so far, having to be directed to do the dive fake out spot by Máximo. Adonis seems like he’s come much farther in the one year.

The third fall in the tercera had Espíritu & Disturbio fail on tapatia attempt, both get pinned on weak looking clotheslines, and Drone cradle Olímpico for the three count in something the fans didn’t realize was the finish until after it happened. Stigma was one of the better guys in the match, which probablytells you all you need to know about the match.

Dragon Lee lived, somehow

Second match is not worth really going out of your way to see itself. It started off really slow, the DF guys were generally taking it easy, and only the end of the second fall really gets hot. It is notable for Astro coming off as a star, especially with strong work in the tercera. His dive looks good, his springboard cannonball before it was a neat idea.

It’s still better than the first match, which dragged and didn’t have a real highlight.

everyone cheered