Month: July 2017

MDA (SUN) 07/23/2017 Arena Jose Sulaiman, Monterrey, Nuevo Leon [+LuchaTV, LuchaMania Monterrey]
1) Androide & Vasco Jr. b Babe Fox & Última Sombra
2) Panthro & Vaquero Romo b Furor & Galactar
3) Antifaz, Caifan, Toscano b Hijo de Pirata Morgan, Máximo, Rey Escorpión (Indie)
Toscano & Pirata were added to the match. Pirata snuck in a foul on Antifaz. Pirata challenged Antifaz to an apuesta match (noting Pirata Sr. once lost his hair to Antifaz.)
4) Dos Caras Sr. & Hijo De Dos Caras DRAW Charles Lucero & Hijo de LA Park
Charles Lucero replaced Super Parka. The fans didn’t like the draw finish but threw money in.
5) Alberto el Patrón b Cibernético, LA Park, La Máscara
LA Park was the most over of the bunch, though Alberto was still well cheered. La Mascara fouled LA Park, Cibernetico fouled La Mascara, Alberto submitted Cibernetico. Challenges followed, with Alberto making fun of people for always making post match challenges that never happen (which got some brief booing.)

The last we saw of Alberto and LA Park, they were the two making the big challenge which never happened (which Alberto might have been hinting at it there.) Building looks about 80-85% full, though they discounted tickets to get that much. MDA says they’ll air a TV show in Monterrey on TV Azteca Norte (7.2) at 10pm on Saturday, so this show might turn up – but there doesn’t appear to be an internet feed for me to record.

Today’s CMLL show is the quiet before a big couple months. It’s a show with some promising matches, but the bigger news shows are happening in August and September.

Right now, we’re still in the processing of guessing what’ll be on the big show on 09/16. CMLL again will present Niebla Roja against the Guerreros, which appears to be the best candidate because nothing else has been offered. Niebla Roja teams with Mistico & Caristico this week against Gran Guerrero, Ultimo Guerrero and Mephisto. It is about time they pick a direction, but there’s no sure sign they will.

The semimain has a clear direction: it’s Blue Panther & Sam Adonis meeting for the last time before their hair match. Rush & Pierroth will team with the only person hated more than them, and face Diamatne Azul and Valiente.

The rest of the card is just regular matches. Panther/Adonis should do OK on it’s own, but a second important match would help and perhaps something will emerge tonight. Hechicero faces Stuka in the lightning match. Drone, Soberano and Titan meet the new Mexican National Trios champs (and the still Occidente Trios champs) in the tercera. Puma & Tiger team with invincible Raziel to face Esfinge, Fuego and Pegasso. The show opens with an Electrico & Stukita vs Mercurio & Pequeno Nitro minis match, which is one of the better minis matches CMLL can do if Mercurio & Nitro aren’t fooling around. I wonder if Pequeno Nitro is going to have to become Pequeno Consejo? (CMLL did briefly tease a mask feud with him and Fantasy.)

CultIcon also previews this show. It’ll air at 8:30pm on Claro and on Facebook. CMLL will have it on their YouTube channel about 20 minutes after it airs.

Negro Navarro, Solar Jr. and Canek Jr. will in having MMA bouts for Lutador MMA tonight. This was just announced a couple days ago and it seems awful quick to have those kind of matches (which may mean they’re not actually those kind of matches.) It’s so last minute that they’re not on the only fight card I can find. Solar Jr. and Canek Jr. will face each other, while Navarro faces Jean Montanez. They’re using CMLL edecanes as well, trying to pull in a lucha libre audience.

Mexico City’s government held a special celebration of the El Santo’s 100th birthday Thursday, with photographs and important people. They announced the Santo outdoor photo exhibition will now be extended to September 6th. They did not say anything about Hijo del Santo’s plan to run a show in the Zocalo in September, though it did at least coming up in passing. This seems like a function where that sort of announcement would be made if it was locked in to happening, but there’s still time left to figure it out.

Lucha Memes says they’re going to run the day after the Anniversary show. I think more people will be in town that day than the day after Gran Prix, but I think a lot more people will be running shows.

Sensacional de Luchador has an interview with Black Terry about his trip to Japan. Black Terry Jr. is going too, so perhaps we’ll end up seeing some videos of this trip.

The Crash promoter Nacho de la O told media at a press conference in Mexicali that The Crash would be on TV by the end of 2017. They had previously said they would be on TV by July. Nacho said they actually had two TV offers right now – which must not be that good, because otherwise they would’ve taken one or the other already. The Crash should probably avoid saying anything specifically about TV until they have something to firm to announce.

The Crash is coming to Guadalajara at some point. Mark all the days on your calendar.

Updated CMLL participation on the Ring of Honor/UK cards (via Hashtag Wrestling)

08/18: Titan vs KUSHIDA (c) [ROH TV], Dalton Castle, Boy 1, Boy 2 (c) vs Jushin Liger, Delirious, Misticio [ROH TRIOS], Christopher Daniels & Frankie Kazarian vs Rey Bucanero & Ultimo Guerrero

08/19 (iPPV): Ultimo Guerrero & Rey Bucanero vs Mistico & Titan

08/20: Ultimo Guerrero & Rey Bucanero vs Mark Briscoe & Jay Briscoe, Mistico & Titan matches still TBA

What we can learn from this is ROH still believes Ultimo Guerrero & Rey Bucanero are a tag team (or that their ROH fans will want to see them that way, which might be correct.) I’m going to guess that the 08/18 title match was going to be Mistico/Kushida originally, with the original idea doing a Masked Legends Trio to challenge for those belts.

LuchaWorld has a news update, a new edition of the podcast, and an interview with Tiger.

Segunda Caida reviews Black Terry & Diablo Jr. vs Los Traumas.

Kcidis draws some advice.

Lineups

IWRG (WED) 08/02/2017 Arena Naucalpan
1) Celestial Boy vs Tentáculo
2) Climax Jr. & Shaolin vs Atomic Star & Lunatic Xtreme
3) Alas de Acero, Aramis, Kanon vs Kempo Jr., Monaguillo, Warrior Jr.
4) Demasiado, Diva Salvaje, Miss Gaviota vs Acero, Demonio Infernal, Picudo Jr. [lumberjack]
5) Black Dragón, Dinamic Black, Dragón Fly vs Diablo Jr., El Hijo del Diablo, Imposible

The tecnicos are going by the Dynamic Dragons. I don’t know why the semimain is a lumberjack match and neither do you.

CMLL (TUE) 08/01/2017 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara
1) Black Sugar & Vaquero Jr. vs Pitbull I & Ráfaga
2) Fiero, Magnum, Retro vs Grako, Maléfico, Templario
3) Astral, Blue Panther, Esfinge vs Disturbio, Sagrado, Virus
4) Johnny Idol, Niebla Roja, Titán vs Dragón Rojo Jr., Pólvora, Sam Adonis
5) Carístico, Diamante Azul, Volador Jr. vs Euforia, Terrible, Último Guerrero

The CMLL rookies advance in Guadalajara in mass. They must be setting up something else to have Niebla Roja not be in a main event against Ultimo Guerrero, but who knows what.

The semiannual Television Critics Association is taking place. El Rey, the home of Lucha Underground, doesn’t really rate high enough to get it’s own presentation time at this point. They do rate high enough to buy the critics lunch and have a quick conversation with them over the meal, and that’s what happened yesterday.

The headline grabber was IGN’s quick interview with Skip Chaissen, who’s technically the Chief Creative Officer for El Rey, but also probably better know to use as the guy who’s in charge of the Lucha Underground vignettes. Chaissen said LU S4 “looks good” and he and Robert Rodriguez love the show, but could not confirm a renewal. This is exact same thing other El Rey/Lucha Underground people have been saying for months, both on the record and behind the scenes, but it feels like news in a vacuum of any information about Season 4. It’s not really anything we didn’t know before, it just may stop people for panicking for a couple weeks before something else triggers it.

(It remains the position of this blog that El Rey wants to bring back Season 4 and would announce it this very moment if they could, but El Rey can not afford to pay for themselves and the hold up is seeing if the other owners – MGM? other mysterious people? – also want to come back for a Season 4. It remains the position of this blog that we’re not going to get a yes or no on Season 4 until Season 3 has finished airing. It also remains the position of this blog that this uncertainty is driving everyone involved insane.)

The actual news in that piece is El Rey is having discussions about “where to place [Lucha Underground] on the schedule going forward.” That means they’re at least considering moving it off Wednesday. It’d probably help a little bit not to be heads up against the “live” airing of NXT, but there’s not many places to move too which doesn’t already have some wrestling programming. Also, my hunch is that the percentage of delayed watching (DVR, Amazon/iTunes, even Netflix) is pretty high for Lucha Underground and a chance of time isn’t going to really affect that either way.

The thing El Rey actually wanted to talk about is it’s next new show, Bushido Battleground. If you’ve ever seen a UFC or MMA or WWE show that follows people behind the scenes training for a big match and then having the big match, that seems to be what this is. It’ll be a ten episode, two hour series (notable because everything else El Rey has done has been one hour.) Lucha Underground and the current El Rey martial arts films are mentioned in the release; this show is supposed to sit along with it.

Probably literally sit along with it. As we know, the reason Season 3 was cleaved in half was because El Rey wanted Lucha Underground to still be running when they had their new series ready, and those series weren’t going to be ready until Summer 2017. That press release for Bushido Battleground does not have even an estimated air date. It took about six months for Rite of Passage & Man at Arms to go from announcement to TV screen. LUS3 ends in the middle of October 2017. Six months from today is February 2018. Expect another significant break between seasons.

CMLL (TUE) 07/25/2017 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara [Martes de Glamour]
1) Difunto & Guerrero de la Muerte b Capitán Cobra & Metatrón
Rudos took 1/3.
2) Inquisidor, Metálico, Sádico b Flyer, Príncipe Diamante, Star Black
Rudos took 2/3.
3) Blue Panther, Esfinge, Vaquero Jr. DQ Felino, Olímpico, Sam Adonis
Vaquero Jr. replaced Drone. Tecnicos took 1/3, Adonis fouled Panther.
4) Cuatrero, Forastero, Sansón b Ephesto, Luciferno, Mephisto © [MEX TRIOS]
Title change! NGD took falls 2/3 to win the titles, Sanson defeating Mephisto. Champions fall on their 12th defense
5) Diamante Azul, Mistico, Rush b Euforia, Hechicero, Kráneo
Tecnicos took 1/3.

Title match looks like it had all the big Infernals spots and it wasn’t enough.

Olimpico actually hasn’t worked in Coliseo or Mexico since March, only a few matches here and in Puebla. I’d guess he’ll be back to pick up Ripper’s bookings.

IWRG FILL (WED) 07/26/2017 Arena Naucalpan [Black Terry Jr. (Flickr), Estrellas del RIng, The Gladiatores]
1) Bambino & Kraken b Dinámico & Draxter
Bonus opener. Dinamico’s partner is ether Dranzer or Draxter.
2) Fireman & Puma King b Guerrero 2000 & Matrix Jr.
straight falls
3) Power Bull & Tentáculo b Celestial Boy & Fly Star
4) Acero, Atomic Star, Lunatik Xtreme b Blue Monsther, Picudo Jr., Vórtize
5) Ángel Oriental, Kanon, Shadow Boy b Kempo Jr., Monaguillo, Skanda
6) Marduk, Taylor Wolf, Warrior Jr. b Gallo Frances, Hijo del Alebrije, Mike
Gallo Frances betrayed his teammates, fouling Alrbrije. Estrellas del Ring lists Marduk as Harry Sick, from Chile like Taylor Wolf.
7) Alas de Acero, Aramis, Black Dragón, Black Terry, Diablo Jr., Dinamic Black, Emperador Azteca, Eterno b Arez, Fly Star, Fly Warrior, Fulgor I, Fulgor II, Glenn Calavera, Mr. Leo, Séptimo Dragón [Copa Higher Power]
IWRG (Black Terry) vs Indy Nation (Arez). Centvrion & Latigo, were listed but did not participate, replaced by Arez & Mr. Leo. Black Terry replaced Demonio Infenral. Arez beat Emperador Azteca (in a rare clean finish for one of these) to set up a title match.

This is a match I think I’ll really enjoy when I get to watching it in November. Indy Nation has had a lot of turnover for a couple months (which is one of the problems with having a dozen people), but they really need to actually beat people and win things and at least they’re doing it in this match.

AAA tapes tonight in Aguscalientes. The one match we’re pretty sure is happening is a #1 contenders match for the Reina de Reinas championship, with the winner getting on the TripleMania show. AAA announced it Tuesday at the TripleMania press conference and it should hold together, though it’s still 2017 AAA so who knows. Sexy Star as a champion came out of nowhere, so there’s no obvious contender. Faby Apache is the usual pick and probably will end up in the match, but she hasn’t been on TV much the last few months. Ayako Hamada appears to be back in Japan. Of the rest, AAA’s seemed to start and stop on doing something with Lady Shani the most, but it’s an outside shot at best. AAA probably really would like Taya to be Sexy Star’s opponent and might have gotten that if they handled the situation better from the start, but it doesn’t look like she’s headed to Aguascalientes today.

Mundo is heading to Aguascalientes. He’s supposed to team with Kross and Hijo del Fantasma & Texano Jr., which might end with both teams splitting up if it actually happens. You can see the whole card here, while thinking about how few of the matches will actually occur; this is kind of a lame duck taping giving the TripleMania lineup is already out. Outside of Sexy Star’s challenger, the only things left to determine are the La Llave de la Gloria winners (which will be later) and slotting people into the Copa TripleMania (which might happen tonight.) They’ll probably try to explain the Mundo angle in a way that might get over – Mundo should be teasing taking the belts to Konnan and mention him by name, Fantasma & Texano should be defending AAA – but we’ll see.

Sexy Star was on +LuchaTV’s podcast, and didn’t seem all that interested in facing AAA women. My guess is she’s back in AAA because she knows she’s more marketable as a wrestler under the Sexy Star name, part of this deal may give her a chance to use the name and mask elsewhere.

I guess Pirata Morgan’s not working Copa TripleMania at the moment. He and his son posted a video, asking luchadors if they’ll work the battle royal on a big show he’s putting on for 50 pesos or perhaps just the exposure of being on the big show. It’s a parody of Copa TripleMania, which Pirata implying AAA is not offering much to work that match and real professional luchadors would turn it down. It’s Pirata, so he’ll end up working it if they up his pay.

The WON says Jeff Jarrett is trying to get The Crash & AAA to work together “to at least a minor way” for TripleMania. It’s brought up in the idea of Maximo & La Mascara showing up to support Psycho Clown. Dorian specifically brought up people who left AAA showing up in the Copa TripleMania, so it could factor into those names.

The WON also makes note of another TripleMania lineup floating around Wednesday. I saw it – it had Pagano/Mesias in a hair match, which is why I was I thought I heard them announce it that way even though they never did. That other lineup had some stuff that would’ve been hard to guess (Aerostar & Drago and Monster & Murder challenging for the tag titles) – it probably was an early draft of the lineup, but it’s hard to tell from when. The notable thing is it had Alberto defending the GFW title against Lashley. Lashley’s now in the Copa TripleMania and Alberto wasn’t used. Perhaps it’ll be added after something happens to set up in GFW, but it also may be that there’s no real guarantee GFW will have Alberto as champ a month from now.

There’s also a bit about the AAA show on Frontrunner TV. The first show drew 14K (three times as much as any other show on the network.) The third week was down to 2K and the last show (7/5) was down to 1K. The network got complaints about the content not being suitable for prime time and the announcers were said to be terrible.

(This is possibly bad advice but: if you are someone with wrestling announcing skills and would like to work for a dysfunctional but still major wrestling promotion, maybe put together a lucha libre demo video and sneak it to AAA throw social media somehow. It’s probably not going to go anywhere, but AAA both wants something that’ll work and has no money/time to go look for people on their own. I’m guessing this announce crew got the job sight unseen because someone recommended them, so try being your own recommendation.)

Instead of a full press conference, CMLL held one of their smaller contract signings in the office for a the small hair match between Canelo Casas & Cholo. You can watch the whole thing here if you’ve got 11 minutes to kill. In the CMLL quotes from it, Canelo even talks about it being a stepping stone win, and that’s probably all it is.

CMLL Informa announced Michael Elgin as the final member of Team World for the 09/01 Gran Prix. The final teams are

• Mexico: Volador Jr, Ultimo Guerrero, Rush, Diamante Azul, Dragon Lee, Mephisto, Euforia, Valiente
• World: Michael Elgin, Marco Corleone, Satoshi Kojima, Juice Robinson, Sam Adonis, Matt Taven, King Haku, Johnny Idol

In context of last week’s discussion, it’s notable there’s only one ROH name (Taven) on the list, and it’s the same and only name CMLL has brought in from ROH. Kojima, Elgin, and Robinson are from NJPW and Haku was likely booked thru them (and it wouldn’t be too big of a surprise if NJPW was paying them.) On Informa, Princesa Sugehit mentioned she’ll be carrying out the Mexico flag for the match.

El Consejo appears to be Nitro, based on the promo photo CMLL is using. Nitro was pulled from Consejo’s match at the same time as Consejo was added, so CMLL had him on the books with two different names at the same time. Nitro has been a poor rudo for some time and will be an even worse tecnico. He’s also the acting head of the wrestler’s union, now named the promotion itself and this seems like the most obviously shady move in some time. Even if CMLL needs to use the name El Consejo for some trademark reason, Nitro would be the worst person to have it.

CMLL also posted a video introducing Fiero. They should do that every time someone new is added to the roster – but of course, he’s not actually new, they just stopped booking him last year.

Douki, Black Terry, Sammy Guevera, Syrus were announced for KDojo’s 09/18 Lucha Fiesta show. Douki wrestled in KDojo back in 2015 and the idea is he’s coming back with his lucha libre friends. It’s a long way to go for one show for a promotion that doesn’t normally bring people in, so I wonder if they might be involved in others to be announced. This is Terry’s first match in Japan since 1991 and I would like him to bring home the UWA Middleweight Championship so I can stop updating that title history. Syrus is from Torreon and is billed as the nephew of Silver King & Dr. Wagner Jr.

DTU has a poster up with their extended September tour dates (16-26), although a lot of locations are TBA. The Arena Aficion show is on Tuesday 09/26.

Tonight’s show in Torreon’s Arena Gran Markus is being promoted as an AAA show because the main event has people who advanced in the La Llave a la Gloria tryout.

The 08/10 Crash show in San Luis Potosi is doubling as a local benefit show.

TKD and CultIcon review this week’s Lucha Underground.

Caristico wants to send a special mask to Raul Jimenez, who wore a Mistico mask for a goal celebration a little while back.

An interview with retired Sinaloa luchador El Remolino.

Video interview with Morelos luchador Lady Egipica.

Kcidis draws Black Warrior and Caristico.

Lineups

NGCW (SAT) 07/29/2017 Florida Fire Frogs Baseball, Kissimmee, Florida
1) ? vs ??
2) ? vs ??
3) ? vs ??
4) ? vs ??
5) Ivelisse vs Santana Garrett [WS WOMEN]
6) Lightning (Puerto Rico) & Thunder (Puerto Rico) vs Minotaur & Mr. Águila
7) Blue Demon Jr. & Boricua Guerrero vs Noriega & Savio Vega
8) Fénix (LU) vs Mr. 450, Mil Muertes [#1 Contenders, WS SUBMISSION]
9) Ec3 & Son Of Samoa vs Apolo & Chicano
10) Pentagón Jr. vs Cage [WS SUBMISSION]

This is the Hugo Savinovich show a while back, using his title belts. They’re airing it on iPPV (except locally), where it’s $3 if buy it buy tomorrow and $5 if you buy it day off the show. It’s using a service I’ve never seen before but it’s also only $5.