CMLL Friday lineup, Tuesday results, other notes

CMLL

CMLL (TUE) 07/20/2021 Arena México [CMLL, Kaiser Sports]
1) Cholo b Apocalipsis [lightning]
2) Disturbio, Hijo del Signo, Magnus b Drone, Eléctrico, Robin
Electrico replaced Sonic, Signo replaced Espanto on Tuesday. Magnus appears to be a full time rudo.
3) Dark Magic, Okumura, Vangellys b Cachorro, Guerrero Maya Jr., Panterita del Ring Jr.
Cachorro & Panterita del Ring replaced Audaz & Magia Blanca on Tuesday
4) Cavernario, Euforia, Terrible b Blue Panther Jr., Dark Panther, Stuka Jr.
5) Gran Guerrero, Templario, Último Guerrero b Dulce Gardenia, Místico, Star Jr.
Guerreros took 1/3

Nothing happening here. An all rudo night.

CMLL (TUE) 07/20/2021 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara [Fuego en el Ring]
1) Bobby Black, Carlo Roggi, Fúnebre b Adrenalina, Estrella Oriental, Minotauro
2) Bestia Negra, Demonio Maya, Rugido b Leo, Mr. Samurai, Príncipe
3) Difunto, Furia Roja, Guerrero de la Muerte, Ráfaga b Ángel Rebelde, Halcón Negro Jr., Optimus, Trono
Team GDL beat Team QRO.
4) Silueta, Stephanie Vaquer, Valkiria b Isis Queen, Náutica, Sexy Sol
Isis Queen is Reyna Isis, unclear why the name change. Silueta beat Isis, asked for a title match.
5) Mr. Trueno, Nitro, Rey Trueno b Crixus, Flash, Gallo
Truenos asked Gallo & Flash for a OCCIDENTE TAG title match, tecnicos accepted as long as they do a mask match after. (That mask match rarely happens.)
6) Cuatrero, Forastero, Sansón DQ Ángel de Oro, Niebla Roja, Principe Daniel
Niebla Roja unmasked Sanson

I was double-checking to see if Sanson had a singles title I forgot about – no, it’s Niebla Roja CMLL LH title I’ve forgotten – and I realized Sanson hasn’t won a singles match since 2019. He’s had four singles matches in CMLL to Caristico, lost them all.

“Isis Queen” isn’t even the words in the correct order. That’s going to be so annoying. She hasn’t said anything about a name change as of yet.

Mas Lucha has an interview with Rugido about wrestling here and his hopes and dreams (being full-time in CMLL), though they don’t exactly explain how a recent Welcome to Mi Barrio guy ended up wrestling in Arena Coliseo Guadalajara. The closest thing to an answer is a mention he’s currently training under Volador Jr.

Friday’s lineup

CMLL (FRI) 07/23/2021 Arena México
1) Arkalis & Sangre Imperial vs Grako & Magnus
2) La Jarochita & Lluvia vs Amapola & Dark Silueta
3) Ángel de Oro, Niebla Roja, Panterita del Ring vs Cancerbero, Mephisto, Raziel
4) Atlantis Jr., Valiente, Volador Jr. vs Cuatrero, Forastero, Sansón
5) Carístico vs Negro Casas, Titán, Virus, Rey Cometa, Pólvora, Fugaz, El Felino Jr. [Leyenda de Plata, semifinal]
6) ? vs ?? [Leyenda de Plata, 8f]
7) ? vs ?? [Leyenda de Plata, 8f]
8) ? vs ?? [Leyenda de Plata, 8f]
9) ? vs ?? [Leyenda de Plata, 8f]
10) ? vs ?? [Leyenda de Plata, quarterfinal]
11) ? vs ?? [Leyenda de Plata, quarterfinal]
12) ? vs ?? [Leyenda de Plata, semifinal]

Nothing too notable outside of the tournament. The semi-main has all the players for a mailed-in match, maybe they’ll surprise. Magnus has gone from not being around to being booked on every show, an oddity for this moment. Angel de Oro & Niebla Roja being tecnicos is weird, being in the same match as Cancerbero & Raziel is weirder.

Templario won the first half of Leyenda de Plata, so it’s probably a tecnico coming out of the other half. It’s Caristico, Titan, Rey Cometa, and Fugaz in order of likelihood though Titan, Rey Cometa, Caristico and Fugaz in order of what final I’d like to see. (I don’t trust Fugaz in a singles match yet.)

CMLL appears to have a hard two-hour limit on shows due to COVID restrictions. The Mexico City government announced that when they increased capacity a month ago, but it wasn’t clear it was being enforced at first. The last few Friday night shows have felt like they’ve been rushing to get it done as close to two hours as possible (though it’s not a hard shutdown, they were still doing the post-match after the two-hour mark last week.) It is possible that some of the changes CMLL’s made – first two matches being one fall only, a five-match card instead of six – are happening because of that two-hour time limit in mind. They may all be reverted when/if that limit is removed. It also makes the decision to go with a single-elimination tournament instead of a cibernetico hard to understand, because they’re losing additional time with entrances and breaks after matches.

CMLL’s Monday Twitch stream was Star Jr., Magia Blanca, Guerrero Maya Jr. versus Felino, Povlroa, Rey Bucanero from the June 18th Friday show. This aired on PPV but was cut from the TV version, so it makes as much sense as anything. That also means there’s no more ‘new’ material turning up here; I didn’t want empty arena stuff, but had some hope they’d air the bigger matches from Tuesdays there. CMLL had some issues streaming the show; this is where I’ll let you know you can just schedule videos to go live on Twitch and don’t actually have to stream them (though you have to dig into the settings to find it.)

There’s no Ticketmaster Live listing for the July 30th PPV. I think this is an error. The actual tickets for a seat on that day are still on sale. Those who already bought the show – the people who bought the full month package – received an email saying the event had been rescheduled for August 27th. My guess is August 27th is the next ‘premium’ CMLL PPV and someone made an error in setting it up. It will cost CMLL money if they can’t figure out no one can buy the July 30th show, but they’ve still got some time to notice it.

CMLL Informa has Caristico, Virus, Templario (Leyenda de Plata), Atlantis & Blue Panther (Sunday main event) and Fantasy & Mercurio (minis cibernetico) today.

Other News

Fernando Robles, of Robles Parton Promotions, posted an all-caps message on his own Facebook, angry about an erroneous news article claiming the 07/31 show in Hidalgo, Texas has been canceled. That show is still on, even though tickets haven’t moved much with 10 days left. Robles said they had sold as many tickets as a WWE show three weeks later. He’s presumably referring to the San Antonio show on August 16th, about four hours away. WrestleTix has 87% of the tickets to that WWE show have been sold or otherwise made unavailable as of July 10th, while 28% of the Robles Patron Promotion show have been sold or are otherwise unavailable. Shorter version: WWE has sold a lot more tickets. Given recent patterns, WWE probably would’ve already canceled or moved their show if they had sold the same as the Robles Patron show.

AAA posted another Tormenta/Arez/Abismo/Latigo/Toxin skit about their mystery texter. I hope they solve this mystery soon or at least come up with a group name to make it easier for me. Still weird AAA is spending so much time on these guys when they don’t spend time on much else, but it does sort of suggesting it’s ultimately not about these guys. Maybe AAA’s airing the reveal this week and that’s why they’re getting these vignettes out.

Chik Tormenta mentioned on Twitter that she’s the Mucha Luchas (Guadalajara) Women’s champion. She didn’t win the title, it turns out she never lost it. She announced she was giving up the title due to her pregnancy in October 2019, but lost contact with the promoters. Tormenta reconnected with them recently, they explained they didn’t accept her relinquishing the title feeling she shouldn’t have to give it up to have a kid, and she’s still champion. She seems thrilled to find this out.

Thursday’s IWRG card

IWRG (THU) 07/22/2021 Arena Naucalpan
1) Bengalee & Karisma vs Amazonika & Satania
2) Pive Argentno & Silver vs Hip Hop Man & Kaoma Jr.
3) Chef Benito, Dick Angelo 3G, Lunatik Xtreme, Puma de Oro, Rey Halcón vs Caballero de Plata, Hellboy, Kenji, Lunatik Fly, Sol [Copa Higher Power]
4) Asterboy vs Noicy Boy
5) Tonalli vs Toxin vs Dr. Cerebro

These lineups seem, uh, scaled down to match the expected ticket revenue by booking a lot of young wrestlers. Or maybe they’ve handed the Thursday shows over to the MexaWrestling booker and he’s booking it more like his undercard. Asterboy & Noicy Boy are guys who can be entertaining with good opponents but may not be good opponents for each other. Tercera is Tryout students versus FILL students, which seems about the same thing.

Arena Jalisco held a big show Sunday to celebrate 47 years of existence. Dr. Wagner Jr. somehow lost to long ago CMLL luchador Mr. Power in the main event via foul, which must be planned to set up a hair match in the near future. It won’t be happening too near; Arena Jalisco was shut down on Monday for violating local health rules. The arena looks completely packed in photos. It’s not surprising a lucha libre arena is breaking COVID regulations, it’s more notable they got in trouble for it. There does seem to be an uptick in these shutdowns in the last week.

Murder Clown demanded to be included in the tournament for the vacant IWRG IC Heavyweight Championship, so I guess the title is vacant. Fresero Jr. is the most recent champion so it would make sense that it’s vacant, there was just no press release like got the lightweight title.

The Crash posted an Andrade promo and teased AAA names. That suggests they’re back on the same page with Konnan, though it’s indie wrestling so it could also be someone who was in AAA in the past.

MLW’s Battle Riot will air on YouTube (at BeIN Sports in the US) on Saturday at 9 pm. This should include Arez & Aramis. I’d presume new episodes will start to air after. VICE is notably not mentioned in the announcement; MLW programming hasn’t appeared on VICE in a few weeks after prior talk about it being for the promotion – a recent MLW Twitter post mentioned they’re off until the fall (maybe just airing when there are new Dark Side of The Ring Episodes?)

LuchaWorld has the latest Lucha Report, with more on the Negocio Traumado and this week’s Poster-Mania.

Box y Lucha 3481 has Rayo de Jalisco on the cover.

Mas Lucha has the latest episode of En+Carados.

R de Rudo has a story on the Perro Aguayo of Bolivia; literally, the promoter suggest he already wrestled like Aguayo so he used that name until he retired in 2005.

El Universal had an interview with Hera.