IWRG (THU) 06/28/2012 Arena Naucalpan [Black Terry Jr. (flickr), The Gladiatores]
1) Infierno Kid & Matrix Jr. b Alan Extreme & Serpiente de Oro
Alan Extreme replaced Templario. Infierno Kid’s main card debut, having appeared on a few FILL shows and for XMW.
2) Douki & Eita b Centvrión & Mr. Magia
Mr. Magia replaced Dinamic Black. Team Japan won without many problems.
3) Oficial Factor, Oficial Rayan, Oficial Spartan b Chicano, Danny Casas, Golden Magic
Oficials took 1/3. Rayan was pinned in the third, but distracted the ref to allow Factor to pull Magic’s mask and roll him up for the win.
4) Heddi Karaoui, Scorpio Jr., X-Fly b Dr. Cerebro, Trauma II, Veneno
Dr. Cerbero replaced Negro Navarro.Team X-Fly took falls 1/3. Veneno turned on his partners, reversing a Trauma II roll up on Scorpio to give Scorpio the win. Veneno and Trauma II had friendly fire issues during the last fall.
5) Cien Caras Jr., Hijo de Máscara Año 2000, Niko b Bestia 666, Damián 666, Súper Nova
Dinamitas took falls 2/3. Hijo de Mascara beat Bestia with a top rope splash, setting up Sunday’s title vs mask match with Hijo de Pirata

So creepy. I’m never buying movie tickets online again.

Tonight’s Arena Mexico main even is the ten women’s cage match.

Dark Angel, Dalis, Marcela, Goya, and Princesa Blanca all seem very safe. Dalis and Blanca seem included just to raise the number of women. Angel & Marcela have never lost their hair and there’s no reason for them to do so here. Goya will inevitably lose her mask, as family tradition, but it seems too soon for that.

Tiffany or Amapola could lose their hair, though they would both be slight surprises. Tiffany has been in the background on the setup to this match, but is closer to the end of the career to the start and this might be right time for her to get one last significant payday. Amapola’s previous hair loss was a surprise loss to Lady Apache while she was champion. Both are feuding with Estrellita, the women CMLL seems to be concentrating on. If Estrellita is going to win, a decent possibility, it’s likely by beating Tiffany or Amapola.

Lady Apache’s recent ruda turn, with nothing setting it up, seems a sign that plans were being changed. It could’ve been they just wanted another good wrestler in the cage match without having unbalanced tecnicas and rudas, but it also could’ve been a need to find someone to lose their hair because the planned person backed out. Lady Apache herself was one of the two (with Blanca) in the March Guadalajara hair match that never happened, which also might have been someone backing out for all we know. Apache did not appear in the main arenas for a few weeks after that, worked regularly for a couple weeks, and has only shown up on Friday night shows since the end of April, so maybe she’s being phased out. On the other hand, she’s been booked for a match with Marcela in Guatemala next month, so she can’t be going too far. I’m not sure what to make of Lady Apache.

The two strongest candidates to lose are La Seductora and Estrellita. CMLL cage matches tend to end with the first feud in the group. Seductora vs Goya started off the direct build to this match, but Estrellita and Amapola were feuding weeks prior to that.

Seductora is the closest thing to an opening match luchadora in the women’s division. It’s impossible to actually be booked any lower than any other woman, since they’re almost always kept in one match a card, but she’s was on the fringes of the roster until the last few months and often responsible for her team losing falls (to a comic degree.) Seductora has the veteran last ruda on the roster spot. Before Seductora, Rosa Negra had that spot, and she lost her mask to Marcela in what became her retirement match. Before Rosa Negra, Medusa had that spot, and she was the loser of the last female cage match (and lost her mask before that.) Seductora losing would be easy, expected outcome.

Estrellita would be the opposite, though there’s plenty of reasons it would make sense. Estrellita has been giving a huge emphasis the last few months, and this would be a good payoff. Estrellita is part of the next season of El Luchador, and losing her hair would be a dramatic twist. Estrellita losing her hair would come off as a meaningful conclusion, while Seductora losing her mask would feel closer to a cheap way out of the stipulation.

Estrellita is my pick.

[poll id=”85″]

I’d guess around the same attendance for this show as Escorpion/Warrior.

The semamain has new main event superstar Titan teaming with Atlantis and Sombra vs Dragon Rojo, Ultimo Guerrero and Euforia. That’s going to make it really hard for Rey Escorpion to turn on Ultimo Guerrero this week, but he seems to be only doing it every odd week.

Halloween and Extreme Tiger did the usual interview hyping up their TripleMania match with MedioTiempo, saying they’ll be a strong team but have no problem facing each other if it comes to it. Tiger is now calling Halloween the traitor, which Halloween and Konnan have been calling him. Halloween does let something slip that may not be official until Saturday: when mentioning their opponents, he lists Lider, Psicosis, “Hart Fundation” and Daga. Daga’s mentioned a couple times, but Daga’s not in the match last time it was brought up…unless Teddy was pulled, Halloween forgot his name, and he’s Jack’s new partner. Or Daga and an unnamed partner (Juvi?) has been added to the match. This will probably be cleared up tomorrow night.

Teddy did appear Monday in Tampico, which should mean he’s still in Mexico. On that show, Alan Stone needed 18 stitches after injuring his arm.

IWL will not allow video taping of it’s show this Saturday because the video quality is poor, and so when people buy the video from pirates, they think IWL is a promotion of low quality. I don’t think they believe that because of the video, but okay.

AAA’s announced a new TV taping on July 13th in Toluca. That should take them thru TripleMania. Lineup will probably turn up early next week, after Saturday’s taping.

Lucha Libre USA: Masked Warriors announced their episodes would start to appear on Hulu as “extended cuts”. The first season of seven episode, which was already up on Hulu.com (just links to MTV.com’s feed), are now up natively on Hulu. I haven’t watched them, but the comments mention the music has been changed. Season two episodes will start to go up every Wednesday on July 11th. They should be done with the 3 that aired by August 1st, so any ‘new’ episodes would start on August 8th.

Rob has highlights of 06/12/12 CMLL.

LuchaWorld has KrisZ’s news update and news on Masked Republic’s new charity project.

Links

• Stuka is still very angry at Sangre Azteca.
• 411 wrestling picks the eight most absurd lucha gimmicks. Gato Eveready is disrespected!
• Dr. Lucha previews the Pesadilla vs Bestia 666 match on the Extreme Rising show.
• Pesadilla promises to represent Tulancingo and Mexico well.
• Sabotage Times visits Arena Mexico, lucks in to seeing the Psicosis vs Mascara Dorada match.
• Kcidis wonders if the new Mistico will get booed like the old Mistico and the old Dragon Lee and the current Rush
• Psycho Circus are still angry with El Consejo.
• LA Park vows to hit Dorian Roldan more often.
• Dorian and Joaquin blah blah blah
• Relampago explains he left AAA because he’s more of an independent style luchador. Sure.
• Ciclope hypes up his match on the Arena Aficion DTU show.
• Arena Xalapa’s show this Sunday is canceled due to the elections.
• Juan Maldad looks back at Estela Molina.
• Preview of tonight’s LLF show.

Lineup

CMLL (TUE) 07/03/2012 Arena Mexico
1) Bengala & Robin vs Ramstein & Zayco
2) Hombre Bala Jr., Molotov, Super Halcon Jr. vs Bobby Zavala, Disturbio, Hooligan
3) Eléctrico vs Pequeño Nitro [lightning]
4) Mr. Cacao, Stuka Jr., Valiente vs Arkángel de la Muerte, Hijo del Signo, Skándalo
5) Blue Panther, Hijo del Fantasma, Valiente vs Felino, Pólvora, Vangelis
6) Dragón Rojo Jr., Mr. Niebla, Rey Escorpion vs Ángel de Oro, Máscara Dorada, Rush

1/5/6 on the Tuesday card shuffled around or completely new.

Out: Horus, Camorra, Volador, Shocker
In: Hijo del Signo, Blue Panther, Valiente, Fantasma, Felino, Vangelis

No idea what happened with Shocker to get him pulled four days ahead of time. Unsure why Voldor isn’t just working Vangelis’ spot.

One of the frequent points brought up comparing the debut of the original Mistico and the soon to be Mistico are the amount of television appearances. Mistico debuted in 2004, when CMLL was usually limited to a hour of TV in Mexico City.* Astro Boy would turn up on in the Stellar Moments highlights, but he was largely hidden from TV view and only seen by fans who already cared enough about the product to go to live events and arrive in time for the openers. Astro Boy had been around for a few years, but he was an unknown to most regular viewers when he debuted as Mistico.

CMLL now airs 6.5 hours of weekly television in Mexico City* every single week. If you don’t want to watch matches on TV, you can also find most of them on various YouTube channels. It’s impossible to not make a recorded match in some form, and everyone gets on a little. 152 wrestlers have had at least one TV appearance in Mexico City so far this year, compared to 58 the first half of 2004***, right before Mistico debuted.

The big unknown**** is how typical fan is treating all the secondary shows. We know the CMLL on Televisa show gets a poor rating, but numbers for all the other shows are complete unknown. Logic would should the Televisa show would be the most widely watched because it’s the most accessible channel, but how much more watched is unknown. People who visit this website tend to watch many different shows*****, but there are definitely people who only watch Televisa.

If you were one of those people, your view of CMLL might be very different:

CMLL luchadors who’ve had 7 or matches on CMLL on Televisa this year

13 Rey Escorpion, Black Warrior
11 Atlantis
10 Último Guerrero, Rush
09 Volador Jr.
08 Estrellita, Guerrero Maya Jr., Amapola, Delta, Terrible
07 Mr. Águila, Mephisto, La Máscara, Psicosis II

All TV appearances are not the same, but the two guys who’ve been the focus the last few months easily rise to the top. Estrelita & Amapola and the national trios champions are also points of emphasis.

If you follow CMLL overall, either by watching shows or reading blogs, Escorpion & Warrior were two guys in the middle who had a hair match that might be good but didn’t seem important in the grand scheme. If your only interaction with CMLL is watching it’s television show on it’s main station, they’re two of the biggest stars in the promotion.

I’m not sure if there’s a conscious effort to focus more on a smaller group of luchadors, or if the longer than usual feuds have just happened to cause this outcome. Warrior going straight from the hair feud to a trios title feud and Escorpion going straight to a possible breakup with Ultimo Guerrero seems to imply this is an intended result.

The rest of the roster…

6 Stuka Jr., Ángel de Oro, Marcela, Marco Corleone, Valiente, Ephesto, Pólvora

5 Mr. Niebla, La Sombra, Lady Apache, Dark Angel, Princesa Blanca, Máscara Dorada, Averno

4 Olímpico, Máximo, Misterioso II, Hijo del Fantasma, Blue Panther, Dalis la Caribeña

3 Shigeo Okumura, Felino, Virus, Tiffany, Fuego, Triton, Rey Bucanero, Euforia, Princesa Sugheit, Negro Casas, Super Halcon Jr.

2 Ángel Azteca Jr., Prince Devitt, Shocker, La Comandante, Ayumi Kurihara, Metro, Namajague, Hombre Bala Jr., Astral, Yujiro, Pegasso, Electrico, La Seductora, Hooligan, Brazo de Plata, Kráneo, Goya Kong, Skandalo, Titán, Nitro

1 Bobby Zavala, Sagrado, Disturbio, Apocalipsis, Dragon Lee, Cholo, Rey Cometa, Aereo, Luna Mágica, Lady Afrodita, Mercurio, Pequeño Nitro, Pequeño Olímpico, Tiger, Vangelis, Raziel, Súper Comando, Último Dragoncito, Puma King, Dragón Rojo Jr., Diamante, Zeuxis, Demus 3:16, Pierrothito, Sensei, Cancerbero, Niebla Roja, Pequeño Warrior

If you’re someone who only follows the Televisa show, Dragon Lee may be as new to you as Astro Boy was. He’s appeared exactly the same amount of times as Cholo, and that one match was on their best of show way back on January 7th. (Again, key point: We have no idea the percentage of fans who also watch something else.)

A large portion of Dragon Lee’s disappearing act has been the run of tournaments: Sangre Nueva was a C3 deal, Gran Alternativa aired on Fox Sports, and En Busca de un Idolo didn’t air anywhere. In fact, the Busca tournament almost served as CMLL’s usual vacation before someone changes characters, taking Dragon Lee off a lot of TV for about eight weeks prior to the gimmick change. The 1,000 of us who go to CMLL’s YouTube channel saw him plenty, but he just disappeared for most.

Flipping this around, what shows has Dragon Lee been appearing on?

8 C3 (and En Busca de un Idolo)
5 Fox Sports (over 3 episodes; 3 matches in the GA)
3 52MX, TVC Deportes
1 Televisa, Guadalajara

Not counting the web only En Busca de un Idolo matches, Dragon Lee last made TV on either of Friday night tapings in April.

Since I’m doing this for CMLL, here’s the comparable chart for AAA. Note that AAA’s had 30 minutes longer for a while, so there’s a little more opportunity to make TV. Also, I’ve left in the ‘classic TripleMania’ matches, so some odd names will pop up.

11 Chessman

10 Nicho el Millionario/Psicosis

9 Cibernético

8 Dr. Wagner Jr., Texano Jr.

7 Jack Evans, el Hijo del Perro Aguayo, Héctor Garza, Fenix (AAA), Mesías, Halloween, Fabi Apache, LA Park, Mascara Ano 2000 Jr.

6 Extreme Tiger, Mascarita Dorada, Dark Dragon, Toscano, Joe Lider

5 Tito Santana II, Silver King, Electroshock, Juventud Guerrera, Sexy Star, Atomic Boy, La Parka Jr.

4 Mari Apache, Lolita, Mini Psicosis, Octagoncito, Octagón, Argenis

3 Teddy Hart, Heavy Metal, Mini Histeria, Último Gladiador, Murder Clown, Gran Apache, Psycho Clown, Monster Clown, Drago

2 Semental, Aerostar, Mini Charly Manson, Argos, Decnnis, Cinthia Moreno, La Hechicera, Jeff Jarrett, Ozz, Relampago, Ángel Mortal, Zorro, El Elegido, Daga, Cuervo

1 Sexy Lady, Tigre Cota, Mini Psycho Clown, Sugi, CIMA, Yuriko, Abyss, Pasion Kristal, Pimpinela Escarlata, Alan Stone, Dinastía, Dizzy, Escoria, X-Fly, Billy Boy, Perro Aguayo Sr., Villano III, Damián 666, Súper Fly, Charly Manson, Kenzo Suzuki, Villano IV, Gallego, X-Pac

Note that Aerostar, someone considered underused by AAA, has actually appeared more times on Televisa than Dragon Lee. This measurement isn’t quite as relevant for AAA, since luchadors are much more likely to make appearances outside of participating in matches. Not all matches mean the same, too.

* As it does now, the length of the TV show could vary during different points of the year. CMLL wasa definitely producing a 90 minute version, since that eventually turned up in Canada and may have popped up elsewhere. Guadalajara appears to have an hour of TV at this time, but only locals would’ve had access to it. I’m unsure when CMLL Puebla started airing on TVC Deportes but do not believe it goes this far back.

** 2 hours of Tuesday & Friday tapings, 1 hour of the Sunday taping, 1.5 hour of Monday. That doesn’t include the recent En Busca de un Idolo web matches (between 15 minutes and 1 hour in TV time), the GDL show (1 hour), the Terra stream (1.5 hours) and whatever else might turn up.

*** Even that 58 number is inflated. CMLL was running the second Guapos U segment. A lot of rookies – Psycho Clown, 3 gimmick changes before being Psycho Clown! – made TV appearances they wouldn’t have otherwise earned.

**** maybe even to CMLL

***** I’d love to know which shows the people who visit SuperLuchas watch.

CMLL (TUE) 06/26/2012 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara [Fuego en el Ring]
1) Relampago Azul & Thunder Boy b El Divino & Virgo
2) Èvola & Malefico b Black Metal & Metatrón
3) Princesa Blanca b Marcela
Princesa Blanca threw a drink in Marcela’s face and rolled her up for the win.
4) Sagrado, Stuka Jr., Valiente b Namajague, Sangre Azteca, Shigeo Okumura
Sagrado beat Okumura, challenged for a title shot. Okumura walked out without answering.
5) Averno, Mephisto, Volador Jr. b La Máscara, Máscara Dorada, Super Porky
Rudos took 2/3.

In the second part of Kaiser Sport’s interview with New Mistico, he says he will not be relying on La Mistica, but coming up with new holds of his own. He’s looking forward to being able to team with his brother. That’s going to be quite a team.

Today’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter says Abyss has been pulled from Saturday’s AAA TV taping. The section suggests TNA will send someone else instead, and it may be Robby E or Robby T in his place.  It goes on to say AAA is high on Robby T. You may remember Robby T as tall muscular man Robby Terry, who wrestled Mesias at last December’s Guerra de Titanes.  You probably do not remember him, because no one cared and the whole thing was forgettable. The idea of sending any one from TNA to Mexico thinking they’d get popular over time misses the point that TNA (and AAA) seems incapable of sending anyone regularly to Mexico, or even on occasional important dates. The only guy who was around consistently and long term was Hernandez, and while he was recognizable by the end of his run, he didn’t mean much.

LuchaWorld reviews Rayo Tapatios vs Hombre Bala & Super Halcon.

Links

• Estrellita feels she’s proved she’s at the level of everyone else. She’s looking for Tiffany and Amapola in the cage.
• Kcids draws the three faces of Remo Banda.
• The women in the cage match emphasis what a big opportunity for them to be in an Arena Mexico main event.