CMLL Puebla: 2018-01-08

Stigma best used as a weapon

Recapped: 02/03/2018

Matches:

Ares & Guerrero Espacial beat Centella Roja & Vega  
(13:24 [6:20, 2:19, 4:45], 2/3, n/r, VideosOficialesCMLL)

Flyer, Millenium, Pegasso  beat  Fuerza Chicana, Hijo del Signo, Policeman
(14:50 [6:17, 4:20, 4:13], 1/3, n/r,  VideosOficialesCMLL)

Guerrero Maya Jr., Rey Cometa, Stuka Jr. beat Hechicero, Pólvora, Universo 2000 Jr.
(11:19 [5:02, 2:50, 3:27], 1/3, ok, via VideosOficialesCMLL)

Euforia, Felino, Mr. Niebla beat Dragón Lee, Soberano Jr., Valiente  
(10:29 [4:07, 1:18, 5:04], 2/3, n/r, via VideosOficialesCMLL)

Diamante Azul, Gran Guerrero, Pierroth beat Marco Corleone, Rey Bucanero, Terrible in a relevos increíbles match
(6:12 [2:44, 3:28], 1/2, n/r, via VideosOficialesCMLL)

What happened: 

The main event sets up a Diamante Azul/Marco Corleone title match by Azul beating him in straight falls.

The semifinal did feature a great moment in a referee refusing to allow a double submission to count, with Mr. Niebla having no idea what wa going on.

Thoughts: 

maybe he just needs to hook the arm with the leg quicker

I’m trying (once again!) to cut back on my CMLL b-show reviews in order to redirect that time into more useful areas. I still think I need to watch at least one match a show to make this recaps worth the time it takes to post them. The tercera was no extraordinary match, but it was the best looking match on the card and a good enough match for a TV watch. Stigma & Universo 2000 surprisingly work well together in the first fall, the rudos come across strong taking the match over, and Guerrero Maya & Hechicero match up well together. They’d match up even better the next week, that’s where you need to use your time. Hechicero’s avoidance of Stuka’s splash into a submission is a tricky thing to pull off – if you don’t make it a big move, it feels like it should register as an impact, but Hechicero needs to shrug it off to immediately lock in his impact. It’s a good idea to do something different with Stuka’s splash, it just didn’t come across as smoothly as it needed to here. against each other.

Angel de Oro versus Cuatrero for H2L on 03/16, Elite back on TV (A+), Rey de Reyes

H2L 2018

CMLL (TUE) 02/06/2018 Arena México
1) Fantasy & Último Dragóncito b Pequeño Violencia & Pierrothito LUCHA LIBRE MARTES DE NUEVOS VALORES EN LA ARENA MEXICO 6 DE FEBRERO DE  2018 FUNCION COMPLETA (posted by VideosOficialesCMLL)
2) Astral, Oro Jr., Star Jr. b Espanto Jr., Nitro, Sangre Azteca LUCHA LIBRE MARTES DE NUEVOS VALORES EN LA ARENA MEXICO 6 DE FEBRERO DE  2018 FUNCION COMPLETA (posted by VideosOficialesCMLL)
tecnicos took 2/3.
3) Kawato San, Misterioso Jr., Virus b Audaz, Fuego, Guerrero Maya Jr. LUCHA LIBRE MARTES DE NUEVOS VALORES EN LA ARENA MEXICO 6 DE FEBRERO DE  2018 FUNCION COMPLETA (posted by VideosOficialesCMLL)
Rudos took 1/3. Kawato’s first win in CMLL.
4) Rey Cometa, Soberano Jr., Titán b Felino, Hechicero, Rey Bucanero LUCHA LIBRE MARTES DE NUEVOS VALORES EN LA ARENA MEXICO 6 DE FEBRERO DE  2018 FUNCION COMPLETA (posted by VideosOficialesCMLL)
5) Cuatrero DQ Ángel de Oro LUCHA LIBRE MARTES DE NUEVOS VALORES EN LA ARENA MEXICO 6 DE FEBRERO DE  2018 FUNCION COMPLETA (posted by VideosOficialesCMLL)
Cuatrero took 1/3, the last when Angel de Oro fouled and unmasked him. Mask match challenges followed.
6) Carístico, Niebla Roja, Valiente b Ephesto, Luciferno, Mephisto LUCHA LIBRE MARTES DE NUEVOS VALORES EN LA ARENA MEXICO 6 DE FEBRERO DE  2018 FUNCION COMPLETA (posted by VideosOficialesCMLL)
Tecnicos took 1/3.

Cuatrero/Angel de Oro was more set up than match.

Kawato keeps looking at Misterioso when he’s doing something – or not supposed to be doing something. He did it while applying a wristlock to beat Fuego in the first fall and then I couldn’t stop noticing it. They’ve been on the same team in every match so far. It is nice they’ve assigned someone to make sure Kawato knows what he’s doing in these matches, since they usually have Okumura in that role.

CMLL held it’s Dos Leyendas press conference today. Some of the stuff was already announced, some new, just like last week’s AAA show.

CMLL (TUE) 02/06/2018 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara [@Arena_GDL]
1) Omar Brunetti & Tigre Blanco ?? Joker & Thunder Boy
tecnicos took 1, rudos took fall 2, no third fall reported
2) La Seductora, Reyna Isis, Tiffany b Kaho Kobayashi, Lady Maravilla, Sanely
rudas took 1/3
3) Blue Panther Jr., The Panther, Tritón b Disturbio, Puma, Tiger
Puma’s return from Japan. Tecnicos took 2/3.
4) Blue Panther b Okumura
Okumura wore a Blue Panther mask to taunt him. Panther took falls 2/3 to win. Money thrown in.
5) Euforia, Gran Guerrero, Último Guerrero b Dragón Lee, Marco Corleone, Volador Jr.
Rudos took 1/3, UG sneaking in a foul on his current partner Volador.

Hooray, UG wrestling Atlantis & Volador, how novel.

Homenaje a Dos Leyendas

The show will take place on March 16th, with Angel de Oro versus Cuatrero in a mask versus mask match. This has seemed like the direction the last few weeks. It still mirror the past year’s Anniversary show, two guys who have never been used as singles main eventers on big shows being asked to carry a big show. The rest of the card is TBA.

Mil Mascaras will be the legend honored. He appeared in a video tape bit.

Tickets for the show on Ticketmaster run $336.00 – $1,476.00 MXN (18 -78 USD). Last year’s show (Pierroth/Diamatne Azul) went from 304-1849. Anniversary went 363-2352.

ELITE

It’s back. With a poster and TV.

This version of Elite is presented as more of an overt CMLL/ELITE co-promotional situation than in times past. Ernesto Santillán was there as Elite general manager, and Gerardo Melin & Rafaél Ayala will be announcers. Hechicero & Tirantes will also work as guest announcers, the role Shocker filled last time.

Elite will be airing on A+, an subchannel offshoot of the main Azteca channel in Mexico that was launched just last year. Most of the country can get the channel over the air, though it’s figures to have much less awareness than the channel they were on previously. (In the US, these digital subchannels have not caught on at all, not sure how it’s gone in Mexico.) Shows will air on Sundays at 2pm, the week after they take place.

It is possible the US Azteca eventually picks up this show, though that wasn’t announced as a plan here.

Ultimo Guerrero made it clear he wants the Elite heavyweight championship currently held by Cibernetico, in the process of burying him for not showing up for the press conference. Golden Magic was the sole ELITE luchador present.

Other CMLL announcements

The CMLL tag team titles were declared vacant, for not having been defended in 16 months. (The last defense was in October 2016.)  CMLL had been trying to get the titles off of Shocker & Casas for a while, only one or the other would get hurt or be otherwise busy or an earthquake would cancel shows for two weeks. It seemed like they should just vacate them for a while and had held off doing them. I’d think this means they had new champs and a plan to get there ready to go and just needed to get the titles freed, except CMLL said they didn’t have any specific plan to fill the tournament to announce.

The new Teleformula show starts this Sunday, at 1pm. They’ll air Friday matches, starting with the current tournament.

None of this will affect the internet/YouTube content. It’ll go on as it has.

No one appeared to ask about Drone, at least during the live press conference.

AAA & LA Park

(This is no longer the H2L press conference)

Last night, there was an interesting Twitter interaction R de Rudo picked up on. The shorter version is LA Park told a fan he can’t be at TripleMania or fight AAA guys without an invitation, and Dorian invited him. They’ve continued it today, and now AAA’s own Twitter has RT-ed it. That confirms it’s something AAA wants to promote.

There were rumors of LA Park making a surprise appearance as part of the Guerra de Titanes main event. It may have been a reason that whole cage match came off so badly; the theory goes LA Park just didn’t show and they threw something together – but the only people who know for sure are LA Park & AAA and they’re not saying. What we do know is Park would obviously like to have a payoff the level of what Wagner got last year, and AAA would like the attention bringing that would come with bringing back Park once again. This fits Dorian talking about trying to sign a national star and later talking about how stars want to work in AAA.

This doesn’t mean LA Park is necessarily going back to AAA – it’s LA Park, he does whatever he wants, he could show up in Elite on Sunday and no one would be shocked. But there’s smoke to this Twitter bit.

Other News

 

The California based Heroes of Lucha Libre hasn’t been seen since running it’s second show in December. Tinieblas says they’ll be back April 6, 7th and 8th. That’s WrestleMania weekend. There’s no location announced so I guess they could even be in New Orleans. The building they have been using, Citizen Bank Arena, is booked for a hockey game on April 6.

MDA posted a Rush promo (against the MAD group.) MDA sending out promos to build to matches is interesting, but the thing that struck me was this might mean about Rush’s status. This could mean he’s done with The Crash for the time being, since CMLL seems to let their top guys only pick one of these indie groups to work with. A big attraction of The Crash for Rush was to work with La Mascara and that’s not an option now. He’s not on The Crash’s next card and hasn’t been announced as coming with them to WrestleMania.

Lucha Memes says their next show will be on 03/11 back in Coacalco, with Keyra vs Kaho Kobayashi. This is not a title match, though the title is an interesting part of this. Keyra was CMLL REINA International Junior champion, REINA took the belt away (likely because a deal couldn’t be worked out with Keyra), and Kobayashi won the vacant title.

The art for this Memes show is Japanese themed. They’ve hinted about booking Kawato while he’s in Mexico, so I think there’s a chance he works this show

+LuchaTV’s latest podcast includes interviews w/NGD and Mr. Iguana..

Box Y Lucha has the Alvarados and Andrade Almas on the cover.

El Universal writes about lucha libre photographer Gonzalo Lopez.

Debate has an article on Culiacan luchador el Delfin.

New Zealand’s Stuff has the usual tourist visits Arena Mexico piece.

Arolucha is holding a contest to meet Rey Mysterio at a yet to be announced taping in Nashville.

2018 is Lucha Libre writes about NGD vs Kamikazes del Aire and Kawato’s latest match.

Lineups

CMLL (MON) 02/12/2018 Arena Puebla
1) Astro, Asturiano, Black Tiger vs Joker, King Jaguar, Saurón
2) Arkalis, Millenium, Starman vs Cancerbero, El Malayo, Raziel
3) Stuka Jr., Titán, Tritón vs Kawato San, Misterioso Jr., Sagrado
4) Mistico, Soberano Jr., Volador Jr. vs Ephesto, Luciferno, Mephisto
5) Atlantis vs Último Guerrero

This is the 7th time Atlantis & Ultimo Guerrero have wrestled a singles in this building alone in the last 7 years. Matches 3/4 could be good.

AAA TV (SUN) 02/25/2018 Plaza de Toros Rodolfo Rodriguez el Pana, Apizaco, Tlaxcala
1) Dinastía, Pimpinela Escarlata, Venum vs Chicano, Mamba, Villano III Jr. [Rey de Reyes, qualifying]
2) Raptor & Tiger Boy vs Ángel Mortal Jr. & Máscara de Bronce [Rey de Reyes, qualifying]
3) Dave The Clown & La Parka vs Monsther Clown & Murder Clown [Rey de Reyes, qualifying]
4) Angelikal & Bengala vs Histeria & Psicosis [Rey de Reyes, qualifying]
5) Dark Cuervo, Dark Scoria, Hijo Del Vikingo vs Averno, Chessman, Súper Fly [Rey de Reyes, qualifying]
6) La Máscara, Máximo, Psycho Clown vs Hernandez, Hijo del Dr. Wagner Jr., Rey Escorpión

AAA suddenly realized both they have a Rey de Reyes tournament coming up and also that they employ Dinasita. Great news for everyone. The main event might be a Rey de Reyes match too, who’s to say. Last year’s Rey de Reyes was an unannounced Royal Rumble, so no idea what these matches are leading into this time.

(What’s great here is it’s going to be pretty tough for AAA to announce a Rey de Reyes card without giving these matches all away.)

For what it’s worth, CMLL doesn’t own Maximo – another non-wrestling company had the rights to name for merchandise, which is why he ended up as Maximo Sexy. CMLL did file a trademark for La Mascara in 2010, listing this guy’s first usage of it in 2004 as the start. Plenty of people have used La Mascara even before then, which might be why that trademark has been stuck in “under review” status for the last 7 years.

AAA on Televisa: 2018-01-06 

 

nice to see Parka Negra

Recapped: 01/06/2018

This was the third of the annual three recap shows. The 12/23 show had matches from TripleMania (the ladder match, the four way tag match, and Wagner/Psycho.) The second show had matches from the other big shows (Rey de Reyes sword match, the Verano de Escandalo tag mask match, Ayako/Shani, and the Heroes Inmortales care match). This show focused on AAA’s charity efforts. They showed the Gold Guitar match from the Hard Rock show (which was used as charity) and the top three matches from the Luchando del Mexico show, which had not been aired previously.

The new matches were taped from Gimnasio Juan de la Barrera, on December 9th. The arena had a different stage than usual, and they bathed the arena in a black/purple light.

Matches:

Joe Lider, Parka Negra, Súper Fly beat Aerostar, Drago, Raptor
(9:04, Super Fly springboard splash Raptor, ok, Lucha Libre AAA)

Dark Cuervo, Dark Scoria, La Parka beat Dave The Clown, Monsther Clown, Murder Clown  
(11:17, COR, below average, Lucha Libre AAA)

Hijo del Fantasma, Pagano, Psycho Clown beat Averno, Chessman, Texano Jr.
(18:28, Pagano pin Averno + Psycho pin Chessman, ok, via Lucha Libre AAA)

What happened: 

this looked odd and weird

This is a show in Mexico City, so Fantasma (Sr.) is at ringside, and Texano taunts him while beating up his son, seemingly taking credit for his retirement. After 18 minutes of action, Tirantes slaps Fantasma in the back and grabs him, Texano kicks and gets Tirantes by mistake, Texano recovers and unmasks Fantasma, Fantasma fouls Texano and covers, and the rudos rush into break it up. Psycho and Pagano win with pinfalls on OGT and Averno ten seconds later.

Cuervo & Scoria are wresting in skeleton themed shirts underneath the straight jackets to match Parka, but we never get the big reveal because the rudos attack them first.

About 9 minutes in, with no explanation or provocation, Aerostar climbs a light tower. (He’s wearing a GoPro camera around his head as he climbs, which might be the reason. GoPro is a sponsor of this event.) No one is even outside when he does that. The announcers compare this to TripleMania, and it’s just like that in that they pretty much stop showing the match to shift to shots of Aerostar. The técnicos send the rudos out, send them around the corner teasing a dive, Scoria does dive and gets caught and dropped, and then Aerostar jumps onto everyone. (The camera is gone when we see Aerostar on the floor, he may have quickly pulled it off after he landed.) That feels like that should be a DQ, which Arturo Rivera points out at the announce table. The rudos never make it back in and are counted out.

Noti AAA focuses on the Guerra de Titanes card. All the matches are covered. Mundo/Wagner is hyped like there’s nothing strange going on there. There’s also the announcement that the Luchando de Mexico gate will be donated to charity, and a mention of Pagano’s injury.

Thoughts: 

if you watch this twice, you’ve seen it more times than AAA showed it

The main event went forever, included Tirantes turning rudo about 15 seconds, and was not that interesting most of the time. All of these matches felt a bit in house show mode, which is really what this is for all three matches despite the TV cameras, though at least the Fantasma/Texano was a bit more intense. I never think Pagano is much good, but he seemed particularly bad in this match. He’s not good at being a técnico doing a lot of flashy moves and hopefully they take him back in his original direction next time we see him.

This Parka match is a setup to do a Go Pro stunt. We never see the video from the Go Pro angle, and the angle we do see shows Aerostar as a dark blob falling to the floor. There is no replay. It is never mentioned again after this show. It is dumb on every level. Even if Aerostar was totally willing and eager to do this stunt, someone with concern for his safety should’ve said no. The Clowns, once again, put up the best effort they could in catching, but could’ve been hurt in something that wasn’t worth more than 30 seconds of attention on this show. The match itself was nothing, maybe because they knew it wouldn’t matter much, and was overtaken by the stunt in the end anyway.

Nothing much going on in the opener. The rudos do the minimum on offense. They are there to set up the técnicos, but it’s not a big night of them. Nice to see Parka Negra, who’s just doing his Último Gladiador stuff in the gimmick now because who cares. Parka Negra was given a big introduction and build up for one that’s petered out gong nowhere, yet they still keep it around. It’s strange. So is Super Fly winning on a slingshot splash out of nowhere. It was made weirder by Tirantes turning away from the ring before the finish for no reason, as if he needed to avoid seeing a foul, but there was just foul.

flying dino