WWL (FRI) 09/06/2013 Gimnasio Nazario Ortiz Garza, Saltillo, Coahuila, Mexico [LuchaMania Monterrey]
1) Canek Jr., Heddi Karaoui, Zumbi b Laredo Kid, Super Laredo, Vengador Radioactivo
2) Apolo, Hercules Gomez, Ivelisse Vélez b Rico Casanova, Super Crazy, Taya Valkyrie
3) Extreme Tiger b Chessman
Tiger moonsault thru on to Chessman and a wood panel
4) Mr. E & Sexy B b Crazy Boy & Joe Lider [WWL TAG]
Mr. E & Sexy B kept the titles in their first defense. Rico distracted the ref when the Mexican Powers were about to win, and Los Mamitos used a weapon to set up Mr. E beating Crazy Boy.
5) Huracán Castillo, Miguel Perez Jr., Savio Vega DCOR Monster Clown, Murder Clown, Psycho Clown
Los Boricuas reunite to face the Psycho Circus. Boricuas will have Richard Negrin with them, Mini Clown will be with his team.
6) Carlito b Blue Demon Jr., La Parka Jr.
Carlito beat Parka. Solicited as a PWR Heavyweight Championship match, does not appear to have been one.
7) Hijo De Dos Caras, Mil Mascaras, Sicodélico Jr. b Cien Caras Jr., Máscara Año 2000, Universo 2000
Confusing finish. Mil had Mascara in a tirabuzon, Cien & Universo fouled Dos and Si, Psycho Circus and Los Boricuas all ran in (???) and the ref raised Mil’s arm.
8) John Morrison COR Monster Pain [WWL HEAVY]
Moved to main event. Monster Pain made his second defense, but lost by countout after Morrison did a stage dive on to him. It was announced after the match that titles in WWL do not change hands on countout.

The building looks like a half full high school gym. It was a not great situation – after the original location was canceled, it was either running a place they didn’t want to run or paying everyone to sit around an extra day.

CMLL (SUN) 09/08/2013 Arena Mexico [CMLL, Yahoo Deportes]
1) Guerrero Negro Jr. & Herodes Jr. b Metatrón & Robin
Rudos took falls 1/3.
2) Arkángel de la Muerte, Hooligan, Nitro b Magnus, Pegasso, Starman
Tuareg took falls 2/3. Nitro beat Starman with a Flashina.
3) Dalis la Caribeña, Estrellita, Marcela b La Seductora, Princesa Blanca, Princesa Sugheit
Straight falls. No Dallys/Marcela issues. Sugheit beat Esterllita at the end and challenged her to a title match.
4) Pólvora b Diamante [lightning]
Polvora defeated Diamante in a rough match.
5) Delta, Fuego, Super Porky b Ephesto, Niebla Roja, Shigeo Okumura
Tecnicos took 2/3. Usual Porky comedy match.
6) Mr. Niebla, Pierroth, Rey Escorpión b Marco Corleone, Thunder, Titán
Mr. Niebla fouled Marco with the ref down. Marco challenged Niebla to a singles match.

Show was about what you’d think with that lineup. Low turnout. No one in a significant role on Friday’s card appeared on this show. Sugheit versus Estrellita seemed set for next week, while Marco & Niebla seemed like it was just for down the road. (This turns out to be wrong.)

CMLL (SUN) 09/08/2013 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara [@acogdl]
1) Índigo & Javier Cruz b El Piraña & El Tapatío
2) El Ídolo & León Blanco DQ Acertijo & Jocker
Offense not specified
3) Mr. Trueno & Rey Trueno b Gallo & Leo and El Hippie I & El Hippie II and Demonio Maya & Demonio Rojo [OCCIDENTE TAG, semifinal]
Leo replaced Halcon de Plata. Listed as “FULL RING”, appears to be a four way tag match (but not really explained.) Truanos beat Gallo & Leo to advance.
4) Ángel de Oro, Mistico, Rey Cometa DQ Felino, Misterioso Jr., Negro Casas
No offense specified. (Sides not specified either.)

Much less detail than usual, with a lot of pictures instead. New person? New phone?

AAA announced Heroes Inmortales will take place 10/18 in Gimnasio Miguel Hidalgo in Puebla. They’ve only officially announced Psycho Clown versus Texano Junior for that show. Other matches have been hinted at, but there’s only two tapings left before the show and only one (09/22 in Plan Sexenal) which will actually air before Heroes Inmortales takes place. Maybe some more matches will be announced online and inserted into TV before the next taping, but that looks to be a very important show.

In a more general sense, AAA’s drifted to a setup of having 2 very important shows (TripleMania and Guerra de Titanes) and two less major shows which set up matches for the bigger shows (Rey de Reyes & Heroes Inmortales.) I wouldn’t expect too much important to be added.

That 10/18 date is going to be exceptionally busy. It’s the same Friday night WWE runs Arena Ciudad de Mexico and CMLL will have it’s usual Friday night show.  Puebla is 1:45 to the southwest from Mexico City. Lucha libre fans generally do not travel that far for shows – it’s the reason small shows in small town can still exist – but AAA would normally hope to draw some fans from Mexico City from a big show and WWE and their local promoters definitely expect to get people in from Puebla. These are all going to hurt each other a bit. The rumor had been Heroes Inmortales in Guadalajara, where WWE is running earlier in the week, and AAA might have decided flipping Heroes Inmortales/Guerra de Titanes venues was the best option.

LuchaWorld has a recap of Friday’s shows and 70 to 61 on the 2012 countdown. Machine Rocker is too low!

Rob has highlights of 07/30/13 CMLL.

Lucha Libre in Japan

09/08 REINA: lacking official results, but Zeuxis reports…
Zeuxis & La Vaquerita b Leon & Hagane [REINA TAG]
They’re the 9th champions. 3rd time for Zeuxis, who also holds the Junior title.

09/07 NOAH: Fenix b Kaiser
09/08 NOAH: Fenix [O], Shane Haste, Mikey Nicholls b Genba Hirayanagi [X], Takashi Sugiura, KENTA
Before the tour, NOAH had Fenix do a 20 minute workout of highspots so the press could see his moves. Fenix said after that he invented much of the moves that day. Why is this not on YouTube right now? (Also, that might tell you about the current level of visibility of AAA in Japan.)

09/08 Stardom: Takumi Iroha b Dark Angel [5STAR GP]
Dark Angel drops to 1-2, and can not advance. She’s got one more match to go.

Links

Rush says he had “un traguito” of tequila before his hair match with Terrible, to calm his nerves.

Pasion Kristal talks about being an exotico.

Kristal says La Braza lost his hair in a four way match, though it’s not clear if Kristal or Polvo gets credit for the win. (It would’ve been this show.)

Cronicas y Leyendas looks back at Ray Mendoza vs El Nazi.

Lineups

CMLL (SUN) 09/15/2013 Arena Mexico
1) Bengala & Oro Jr. vs Espanto Jr. & Zayco
2) Astral, Bam Bam, Eléctrico vs Mercurio, Pequeño Nitro, Pequeño Olímpico
3) Estrellita vs Princesa Sugheit [MEX WOMEN]
Estrellita is champion. Second defense, both versus Sugheit
4) La Máscara, Super Porky, Thunder vs Ephesto, Felino, Pierroth
5) Máscara Dorada, Mistico, Valiente vs Kráneo, Psicosis, Volador Jr.
6) Marco Corleone vs Mr. Niebla

As it turns out, they’re both happening! Plus Estetas versus Invasors (possible Volador Jr. unmasked debut) and a good minis match.

Excluding tournament matches, this will be Marco’s first singles match in Arena Mexico in five years. He beat Hijo del Lizmark for his hair in 2008. Marco is 4-0 in singles matches all time, excluding those tournament matches (just a loss versus Tanahashi last year.) Marco tried to stand with the Mexican people in his post match promo, but I’m not sure he’ll be cheered over Niebla.

CMLL (FRI) 09/06/2013 Arena Mexico [Black Terry Jr. (flickr), CMLL]
1) Astral, Eléctrico, Último Dragoncito b Mercurio, Pequeño Nitro, Pequeño Olímpico
Ultimo Dragoncito replaced Bam Bam. Tecnicos took 2/3. Mercurio was strechered out after taking double team moves from Astral & Electrico for the finish.
2) Delta, Guerrero Maya Jr., Tritón b Misterioso Jr., Sangre Azteca, Shigeo Okumura
Tecnicos took 1/3.
3) Marco Corleone, Máximo, Super Porky DQ Terrible, Tiger, Vangellys
Tecnicos took straight falls in a comedy match. Tiger was initially listed but replaced by Rey Escorpion early in the week. Escorpion appears to be feuding with Porky, and fouled him here for the DQ.
4) Diamante Azul, La Máscara, Shocker b Felino, Mr. Niebla, Pólvora
Polvora replaced Negro Casas, who appeared but was announced as out with an injury. Tecnicos took 1/3 in a normal match.
5) Último Guerrero & Volador Jr. b Atlantis & La Sombra
Rudos took 1/3, UG and Volador working together to beat Atlantis & Sombra with their big moves clean. Most of the match was the feuding guys facing off and ignoring the partners. Rudos taunted the tecnicos post match, though they had a strong difference of opinions about who which tecnico was losing his mask next week.
6) Hiroshi Tanahashi b Rush [CMLL Universal, final]
Seconds were Sombra & Okumura. Rush won the first with a suplex. Tanahashi won the second in with a german suplex after a very botched blocked suplex spot. Match finally picked up a couple minutes into the third and was good for most of that fall. Lots of near falls, with Rush surviving a German suplex and avoiding a High Fly Flow. Rush landed the hard corner dropkick, but Tanahashi blocked the Rush Driver, dropped Rush with a Sling Blade, and landed the High Fly Flow to win the tournament. No angle after – Rush walked off while Tanahashi got the belt.

Attendance was nothing special, which is no surprise going up a Mexican national team game. Crowd seemed more into the mask match than the main event. Terra feed was fine all night.

Leo Riano responded to a fan on Twitter that CMLL is off of Televisa (on Terra instead) permanently. He didn’t seem much heartbroken about it. CMLL, as they do, has said absolutely nothing about their TV situation. (The only acknowledgement is both Friday and Sunday shows are listed as “taped for Terra Mexico” and not any TV network.) There was no mention of a change during tonight’s broadcast, though the announcers included Leo Magadan and Miguel Linares who would’ve been normally at the Televisa booth. In theory, CMLL is less hurt by losing Televisa than AAA, because CMLL’s TV is of poor quality and they have a billion other hours of TV. In reality, losing an over the air show when your marketing yourself as low cost entertainment is a very big issue.

At least for this week, that hour that would’ve been on Galavision has turned on 52MX. That might only be because there was no Sunday taping, but so we’ll see what they do next week.

No CMLL on GalaTV in Mexico means no CMLL coming back to GalaTV in the United States, of course. They would be able to shop the additional hour of footage around, but CMLL produced TV hasn’t found great network homes in the US.

The last CMLL on GalaTV episode was the one with the Blue Panther Anniversary match and Volador/Sombra. Not a bad show to go out on.

Dinastia, Mini Abismo Negro, Argenis and Aerostar visited children in the hospital before Thursday’s show.

LuchaMania Monterrey has an interview with Hugo Savinovich.

Terra video report on the Anniversary mask match.

Porra Fresa previews Monday’s card.

Lineup

IWRG (THU) 09/12/2013 Arena Naucalpan
1) Sky Ángel vs Fulgor I
2) Aliado de Dios & Freyser vs Acero & Alan Extreme
3) Astro Rey Jr., Centvrión, Golden Magic vs Canis Lupus, Imposible, Rayan
4) Ciclon Black, Guerrero Mixtico, Tony Rivera vs Black Terry, Dragón Celestial, Fulgore II
Neza (Gym Tony Rivera) va Naucalpan (FILL)
5) Trauma I, Trauma II, Veneno vs Fuerza Guerrera, Hijo de Máscara Año 2000, Oficial 911

Ciclon Black was on Team Tony on the last FILL show. Lupus hasn’t been around in a while.

AAA TV (THU) 09/05/2013 Gimnasio Agustín Millán [AAA]
1) Mini Abismo Negro & Mini Charly Manson b Dinastía & Máscarita Divina
Abismo submitted Dinastia and asked for the title shot. Dinastia said he’s asked AAA to make it.
2) Alebrije & Flamita b Carta Brava Jr. & Gran Apache
Apache fouled Alebrije, Cuije fouled Apache, Alebrije pinned Apache. Tecnicos danced with kids in the ring after the match.
3) Aerostar & Drago b Cuervo & Escoria and Eterno & Steve Pain
Aero & Drago beat Eterno & Pain. La Secta (including Espiritu & Ozz) beat up everyone post match.
4) Angélico, Argenis, Jack Evans b Machine Rocker, Pentagón Jr., Soul Rocker
Angelico gave Soul Rock a crucifix powerbomb and Jack added a 630 senton for the win.
5) Monster Clown, Murder Clown, Psycho Clown b Máscara Año 2000 Jr., Silver King, Texano Jr.
Before the match, AAA announced this was a captains rules match and the only way the match could even was if one of the captains – Texano and Psycho – beat the other captain. (The live notes mentioned Texano told Psycho he would never get a shot if Texano beat him here; that’s not mentioned in the recap.) Texano bled. Psycho finally beat Texano with a Canadian Destroyer. Joaquin immediately made Texano versus Psycho offical for Heroes Inmortales
6) Cibernético, El Mesías, La Parka DQ Chessman, Ozz, Parka Negra
Tecnicos won by DQ when Escoira, Cuervo and Espiritu came thru the crowd and attacked the tecnicos. Psycho Circus made the save.

Air Date:  10/05

If you measure success in number of post match beatdowns, La Secta went 2-0. If you measure it in winning matches, 0-2. I’m very surprised Cuervo & Escoria couldn’t beat Eterno & Steve Pain themselves.

Psycho Clown finally got his pinfall…because they changed the rules so he and the rest of the Circus couldn’t screw it up any more, which is not as much as them finally figuring it out themselves. Psycho versus Texano is the first match offical for Heroes Inmortales and could be a surprise quality wise, but it’s not as a meaningful title match as previous ones.

Matches 3 and 4 were said to be very good. Arena looked to be full, at least on the side facing away from the hard camera.

Next taping is 09/22 back in Mexico City.

IWRG (THU) 09/05/2013 Arena Naucalpan [Black Terry Jr. (Flickr), IWRG]
1) Fulgore II b Emperador Azteca
Fulgor II won with the “Super Power Boom”
2) Alan Extreme, Aliado de Dios, Astro Rey Jr. b Dragón Celestial, Fulgor I, Imposible
Alida de Dios (main show debut, from Zacatecas) and Alan Extreme replaced Mr. Leo & Seiya. Astro beat Imposible with the Dragon Cutter and asked for a title match.
3) Apolo Estrada Jr., Avisman, El Hijo del Diablo b Centvrión, Golden Magic, Veneno
Gringos VIP get a win before their title match.
4) Oficial 911 b Dinamic Black [IWRG Rey del Ring]
Dinamic Black came in as champion, but fell on his 3rd defense. Oficial 911, in a new blue outfit, won the title back from him by taking the falls 1/3, the last with a power bomb.
5) Fuerza Guerrera, Hijo de Máscara Año 2000, Tony Rivera b Black Terry, Trauma I, Trauma II
Rudos took 1/3. Tony snuck in on a foul on Terry, beat him, and then challenged him.

Tonight’s CMLL show concludes this year’s CMLL Universal Tournament. One man will win, and wear a giant red/gold belt for about three weeks before CMLL forgets about the concept for another year. It can’t get bigger than that. The final is Rush versus NJPW’s Hiroshi Tanahashi. Tanahashi has played the part of the visiting rudo who may be more interested in playing air guitar than winning these matches (but still wins these matches.) Rush is all over the place, including losing a singles match to Mr. Niebla (who doesn’t hold a title) in Puebla and acting rudo-ish in other matches and on the sparsely seen En Busca de Un Idolo.

Rush would be the easy pick in a vacuum. Between a possible rudo turn and CMLL going out their (and NJPW’s) way to specifically bring in Tanahashi for this role, another result is actually possible. Rush can definitely defeat the evil foreign baddie to win the biggest tournament in CMLL and still get loudly booed by the Arena Mexico crowd, because that’s what the landscape is right now, but I’m not totally sure that is what is happening tonight.

(that said, I still picked him in the poll below.)

Tonight also has a Atlantis & La Sombra vs Volador Jr. & Ultimo Guerrero in a preview of next week’s big anniversary match. CMLL’s done nothing since the press conference to build up the tag match prior to the mask match, but they may get around to doing something here. (It won’t air on TV before the Anniversary, but they prefer photos anyway.) The undercard doesn’t have much going on, but does feature some people who won’t be on next Friday’s show.

Tonight’s show will stream live on Terra.mx at 8:30 pm.

Shocker was eliminated from his reality show. He was second out of eighteen (though about six episodes in.) It did seem like he turned back up in Mexico very fast. This is good timing – he’ll do extra interviews this week and can promote the Anniversary show. On the other hand, it’s not the greatest reason to be kicked off a reality show: the main event luchador was  voted out because his knees were too injured to help his team.

Savio Vega wins best dressed at the WWL press conference. The WWL Satillo show is tonight, and the Monterrey one is this Sunday. LuchaMania Monterrey has a video interview with the group’s president/owner.

Alex has highlights of the 01/22/12 CMLL show.

An article on an El Paso lucha libre promotion.

Function Estelar figures out the current IWL champions.

Aerostar and Dave the Clown hype an upcoming Arena Queretaro show.

El Hijo del Santo, who uses old wrestlers who do not normally work as referees, writes about the importance of fully trained referees. (Whoever is ghost writing this column needs to follow Todo x el Toro closer.)

Blue Demon Jr. assures us lucha libre is the best. Demon blames “Los medios” for for introducing WWE and people liking it, and says lucha libre will get back ahead by being less like the thing people seem to like.

Lucha Libre in Japan

09/06 Zero1: Billyken Kid b el Hijo del Pantera [Tenkaichi Jr., eightfinal]
Oh well. Since Pantera has been training Wrestle-1 trainees, it’s possible Hijo del Pantera is one of the mystery wrestlers on the Wrestle-1 debut card. (It’s possible Pantera is too, since he hasn’t been in IWRG in a little bit.)

NJPW has a mystery CMLL tecnico on their 09/29 show opposite  Rey Bucanero in a midcard atomicos. No hints. It seems like a spot for Maximo or someone like him.

Lineups

BSW (FRI) 09/27/2013 Auditorio de Tijuana
1) Dragon Chino & X-peria vs Black Phantom & Silencio Negro
2) Johnny Goodtime & Johnny Yuma vs Eddie Randle & Ryan Kid
3) El Kaliman, Pancho Cachondo, Rubi Gardenia vs Enfermero, King Azteca, Shamu
4) Angel Negro, Arandú, TJ Boy vs Alex Koslov, Kaos, Rocky Romero
5) Canek & LA Park vs Carlito & Dr. Wagner Jr.

Carlito playing Jusin Credible in the main event.. Koslov and Romero make it back to Mexico – though only to a random Tijuana show for now.