CMLL

CMLL (MON) 02/19/2024 Arena Puebla [Mano a Mano, Porra Fresa]
1) Rayo Metálico & Xelhua b Asturiano & Novato
2) Astral b Enfermero Jr. [lightning] 
3) Amazona & Zeuxis b Marcela & Skadi
Originally Vaquer vs Catalina
4) Arkalis, Guerrero Maya Jr., Rey Samuray b El Malayo, Rey Apocalipsis, Siky Ozama 
Rey Samuray’s first match since his father, King Rocker, passed away on February 4th.
5) Esfinge, Fugaz, Star Black b Ángel de Oro, Hijo del Villano III, Niebla Roja
Fugaz & Star Black beat the Chavez, asked for a tag title match
6) Bárbaro Cavernario, Dragón Rojo Jr., Terrible © b Atlantis, Flip Gordon, Star Jr. [CMLL TAG]
Cavernario submitted flip.

King Rocker (Ignacio Sandoval) was a wrestler for 30 years and a mask maker for 25. He wrestled as King May, Chupacabras, and King Rocker. Rey Samuray, King Rrcker Jr. and King May Jr. followed him into wrestling; I presume it was “King Rocker Jr.” who was wrestling in Arena Puebla shows in 2018 and 2019.

There’s no mention of why the women’s match got challenged. Both women, but Catalina especially, have a lot of social media admirers. Those fans seemed displeased she wasn’t there. It was odd CMLL had that match booked back to back nights; maybe there was a change but the only person who does the posters was busy in Japan at that moment?

CMLL (TUE) 02/20/2024 Arena México [CMLL]
1) Mercurio, Minos, Pequeño Violencia b Fantasy, Galaxy, Shockercito
2) Dr. Karonte I, Enfermero Jr., Sangre Imperial b Diamond, Robin, Valiente Jr.
3) Dulce Gardenia, Espíritu Negro, Rey Cometa DQ Akuma, Dark Magic, Espanto Jr.
Dulce faked a foul on Akuma after Akuma repeatedly tried to use the ropes to win. Challenges followed.
4) Hijo del Villano III, Villano III Jr., Zandokan Jr. b Futuro, Max Star, Neón
Villanos seemed to get a tights pull on the finish but it wasn’t played up.
5) La Catalina DQ Stephanie Vaquer
Vaquer got willingly DQed using the hanging in the ropes armbar
6) Esfinge, Flip Gordon, Star Jr. b Bárbaro Cavernario, Dragón Rojo Jr., Terrible

The women’s match came off as a story match: Vaquer kept going after Catalina’s arm, apparently more to injure her (and prove Catalina isn’t on her level) than to actually win the match. Catalina eked out the second fall with a reinera, and maybe a reason the match was three falls was just so Catalina wouldn’t get totally squashed. She got other comeback in there, but the match ended before either women came close to having a match. It was good in an contextless space, but if it’s meant to be character building (in other words, if I’m reading into it something that was actually meant to exist), it was effective in it’s aims. La Catalina was in a sling on Wednesday selling the beating.

I think Vaquer is better playing the cruel rudo than just doing action matches, and Catalina fell into the role of sympathetic tecnica. Vaquer wrestles a lot like her training/ex Ricky Marvin, and CMLL needs to find her the female equivalent of an Arez to beat up on. That may be a tall task; I’d settle for finding more happy young foreigners who don’t mind being kicked very hard.

La Escudra versus the tecnicas was not the crazy go nuts match those two teams are capable and have shown to be capable of in the past. It was a good match with solid teamwork. The tecnicos had good nights in terms of hitting what their big moves, and the rudos had good energy. (The Barbaros had some weird and not great energy at times in their match, but that’s a different story.) Those two teams have a better match in them but this one was pretty good for a Tuesday.

There’s clearly something coming with the Atrapasuenos, Ola Negra, Cancerberos and (less so) Indestructibles all having cheating finishes versus each other. A multiteam trios feud is unusual ground for CMLL, no knowing how it’s going to work out. Or when – there’s no room for it on Homenaje a Dos Leyendas, but the Arena Coliseo & Arena Mexico Anniversary shows are coming up in April.

Corey Taylor of Slipknot met Atlantis before the show. It is unclear if either man knew who the other man was before their meeting.

CMLL (TUE) 02/20/2024 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara [Arena Coliseo Guadalajara, Mas Lucha]
1) Atilius, Maximus, Rey Urano b Avispón Negro Jr., Lince Del Bajio, Último Ángel
2) Arlequín & Garrabato b Guerrero de la Muerte & Shezmu and Cowboy & Omar Brunetti and Abigor La Pesadilla & Cris Skin and Bestia Negra & Rav and Johnny Dinamo & Prince Drago and Adrenalina & Obek and Amenaza Negra Jr. & Minotauro and Demonio Maya & Mandala and Leo & Temerario and Canalla & Principe Daniel and Fantástico & Halcón de Plata [Gran Alterantiva Tapatia]
worked as a cibernetico, though teams worked together at random parts. Garrabto got hurt on a tope con giro (didn’t turn over enough, opponent was too far away, landed on shoulders/neck) and was stretched out; Arlequin quickly won on his own.
3) Gallero, Halcón Negro Jr., Vaquero Jr. b Azteca Warrior, Desafio, Gato Fantasma
4) Barboza, Draego, Persa, Satánico b El Coyote, Felino, Felino Jr., Pólvora
Peras beat Felino Jr. via mask pull
5) Dark Silueta b Estrellita Mágica [lightning]
6) Lady Amazona, Sexy Sol, Skadi b Hera, Metálica, Olympia

I don’t understand this Gran Alternativa at all. I’m also confused how they went two straight women’s matches at the end.

CMLL Informa today has

• Mascara Dorada (FantasticaMania, AEW, other shows he may or may not be working)
• Zeuxis, La Catalina, Skadi (?)
• Fugaz (challenging Magia Blanca again)
• Dulce Gardenia & Akuma (whatever’s going on with the trios)
• Xelhua (Torneo Escuelas)

That’s a low amount of guests for Informa, so maybe more segments. The incredible pairs tournament is the next item on the calendar to announce. There’s still three more Informas to announce so it might be too soon to even get the first team announced.

At today’s CMLL media day, Tony Salazar took credit for training KeMalito. True evil.

Mascara Dorada is off the Prestige Wrestling show this weekend in Los Angeles. I believe he’s working that Sunday Arena Coliseo Guadalajara show. Rey Horus will now face a mystery wrestler, who I believe is a Mexican wrestler. Mascara Dorada is still working the Pro Wrestling Revolucion show on Saturday in San Jose.

Lluvia & La Jarochita teaching lucha libre on morning TV (in a pre-taped segment, i’d assume.)

Box y Lucha 3591 has the Torneo de Escuelas final.

AAA

AAA has no update on Hijo del Vikingo. I mean, they’ve not mentioned Hijo del Vikingo even getting hurt yet on social media. His injury (more so the lack of stretcher) was a viral story for a day there. Just not one AAA was participating in.

Mas Lucha posted a lot of interviews from after the Showcenter taping. They used to hold these back until the tapings aired. Maybe AAA’s very delayed airing schedule has caused them to no longer wait. (That taping may air mid March.) The New Taurus talks about how the previous Taurus left the name very high and there are going to be someone new people who like him and some people who hate him. I’m guessing more in one category than the other. I keep going negative on this strategy so here is a roundabout positive: he’s probably not goin got get over Taurus but AAA also probably wasn’t going to get him over as Dick Angelo 3G. If, for whatever reason, he gets over on his own or AAA decides to actually push him, at least they have him under a gimmick they’re comfortable. It’s going to be tough to get him over when he has to get out of the shadow of the previous guy but it doesn’t really matter either way if he’s just going to be a prelim guy. He lost in a fourway in his debut, he’s probably going to be a prelim guy. Abismo Negro Jr., who’s in the same spot and is a mentor to both the new Taurus and the new Bengala, wrote a long Facebook post defending them against the haters.

Flammer & Hiedra said Maravilla is injured and that’s why she missed that show.

Other News

Tijuana luchador, trainee and referee Kamaleon Negro (David Espinoza Lopez, 63) passed away on Tuesday.

Damian 666 told Guadalajara’s Lucha Libre Select that he plans on retiring on August 9th of this year. That sounds like there’s a show already booked.

Laredo Kid will face Jake Something on 02/24 for TNA in New Orleans. That doesn’t appear to be an Xplosion match for Laredo. It also doesn’t appear to be a win but you take what you can get. I wonder where the sources complaining about Pentagon not being used on Dynamite were when Laredo and Taurus were frequently being flown in to TNA’s taping and either only on Xplosion/BTI or not at all last year.

Thunder Rosa, doing an interview written up by Ovaciones, mentioned she has plans to run a show in Arena Mexico in mid-September where the profits would go to food banks. This is a thing a wrestler might say and then it doesn’t actually happen, but there’s at least a chance it’s a real thing with Thunder Rosa.

GCW announced Myron Reed versus Oni El Bendito for their 03/01 show in St. Louis.

CMLL

CMLL (FRI) 02/16/2024 Arena México [AS, CMLL, Excelsior, FDDE, Kaiser Sports, The Gladiatores, thecubsfan]
1) Hombre Bala Jr. b Felino Jr. [lightning]  
7:27
2) Cancerbero, Luciferno, Virus b Dulce Gardenia, Espíritu Negro, Rey Cometa  
11;19. straight falls, with Virus using the ropes and his partners to illegally beat Rey Cometa. Cometa wanted a rematch and masks versus hair, Virus said he’d save Cometa the embarrassment of being bald again for now.
3) Flip Gordon & Star Jr. b Ángel de Oro & Niebla Roja   
13:45
4) Stephanie Vaquer & Zeuxis © b Lady Frost & Tessa Blanchard [CMLL WOMEN]   
9:23. second defense. Thunder Rosa, seated in the front row, was introduced to the crowd before the match. She didn’t get involved in the match.
5) Adrenalina, Barboza (Jalisco), Calavera Jr. I (Jalisco), Calavera Jr. II (Jalisco), Fantástico, Persa (Jalisco) b El Hijo De Centella Roja, El Malayo, El Novato (Puebla), Rayo Metálico (Guanajuato), Rey Apocalipsis, Xelhua [Torneo de Escuelas, semifinal]   
37:41. Order of elimination: Malayo (13:32, via Calavera), Persa (15:26, Rayo Metalico), Rey Apocalipsis (17:07, Fantastico), Rayo Metalico (19:42 Barboza), Fantastico (20:09, Xelhua), Novato (22:40, Adrenalina), Hijo de Centella Roja (25:16, Calavera II), Barboza (26:36, Xelhua), Novato (29:37, Calavera I), Calavera II (31:08, Xelhua), Calavera I (37:41, Xelhua) leaving Xelhua and Team Puebla as the winner. Team Guadalajara falls in an attempt at back to back wins.

This Torneo de Escuelas team was built around Xelhua as the protagonist. He faced a tag team on his own, showed off some cool holds, and got the upset win. It was asking a lot, and he came through well. So did the Calaveras. The Arena Mexico crowd got into the closing five minutes, treating each near fall between unknown wrestlers as a big deal. The entire match came across stronger than the previous week.

The women’s match had a couple of good spots and was a mess at other times. Zeuxis failed to catch Tessa Blanchard on her dive and didn’t make much of an effort, and Blanchard was visibly angry at Zeuxis about it. There were a couple of other things in the ring that didn’t go well either. The finish didn’t make any sense – Blanchard and Frost hit their big moves, picked up the champs instead of covering, and the champs immediately reversed it into their finish.

Everyone else sold with, match two best of the bunch.

CMLL (SAT) 02/17/2024 Arena Coliseo [CMLL]
1) Retro b Príncipe Odín Jr. [lightning]
2) Astral, Eléctrico, Leono b Grako, Nitro, Sangre Imperial
Leono replaced Electrico
3) Crixus, Raider, Vegas b El Audaz, Fuego, Panterita del Ring
4) Volcano b Valiente [lightning]
about 8 minutes
5) Lady Frost, Reyna Isis, Tessa Blanchard b Amapola, Metálica, Persephone
6) Esfinge, Fugaz, Star Black b Gran Guerrero, Magia Blanca, Rugido
Fugaz beat Magia Blanca and challenged for a title match again

Fugaz has challenged Magia Blanca and failed twice so far. Hector Garza once lost four straight times against Ultimo Guerrero for the CMLL Heavyweight title before beating him on try five, so there’s hope there.

Volcano beating Valiente caught me by surprise.

CMLL (SUN) 02/18/2024 Arena México [CMLL]
1) Leono b Bengala [lightning]
2) Angelito, Shockercito, Último Dragóncito b Mercurio, Pequeño Violencia, Pierrothito
3) Akuma, Dark Magic, Espanto Jr. b Apocalipsis, Cholo, Disturbio
Ola Negra cheated to beat Los Indestructribles, who wanted a rematch
4) Guerrero Maya Jr., Hijo de Blue Panther, Hijo de Octagón b Felino, Rey Bucanero, Sagrado
5) Hera, Lady Frost, Tessa Blanchard b Andrómeda, Marcela, Skadi
6) Blue Panther, Octagón, Valiente b Averno, Euforia, Mephisto

A lot of the midcard trios cheating the other midcard trios right now.

CMLL (TUE) 02/20/2024 Arena México
1) Fantasy, Galaxy, Shockercito vs Mercurio, Minos, Pequeño Violencia
2) Diamond, Robin, Valiente Jr. vs Dr. Karonte I, Enfermero Jr., Sangre Imperial
3) Dulce Gardenia, Espíritu Negro, Rey Cometa vs Akuma, Dark Magic, Espanto Jr.
4) Futuro, Max Star, Neón vs Hijo del Villano III, Villano III Jr., Zandokan Jr.
5) Stephanie Vaquer vs La Catalina
6) Esfinge, Flip Gordon, Star Jr. vs Bárbaro Cavernario, Dragón Rojo Jr., Terrible

This looks good, though it is a Tuesday show so it may not always deliver. Match four has people who do crazy things if motivated to do so. Vaquer/Catalina was set up last week. The main event was solid.

CMLL (FRI) 02/23/2024 Arena México
1) Micro Gemelo Diablo I & Micro Gemelo Diablo II vs Mije & Periquito Sacaryas
2) Marcela & Skadi vs Hera & Olympia
3) Bárbaro Cavernario, Dragón Rojo Jr., Terrible vs Averno, Euforia, Mephisto
4) Alom (CDMX), Astro Boy Jr. (CDMX), Dragón de Fuego, Forneo, Hunter (CDMX), Legendario vs El Hijo De Centella Roja, El Malayo, El Novato (Puebla), Rayo Metálico (Guanajuato), Rey Apocalipsis, Xelhua [Torneo de Escuelas, final]
CDMX vs Puebla
5) Ángel de Oro, Atlantis Jr., Brillante Jr. vs Máscara Dorada, Neón, Soberano Jr. [Relevos Increíbles]

FantasticaMania is over, though not as much of the roster are showing up on the first day as might be expected. It’s just three – Atlantis Jr., Mascara Dorada and Soberano. They’re playing off the Gran Alternativa final, though not with Mistico.

Puebla still seems like the underdog to Mexico City. Match 2 is mother/daughter versus sister/sister. The micros make a rare Friday appearance.

CMLL FantasticaMania

CMLL, NJPW (SAT) 02/17/2024 Makuhari Messe International Conference Hall 1, Chiba, Japan [NJPW (English), NJPW (Japanese)]
1) La Jarochita & Lluvia b Ruaka & Starlight Kid
12:37, Jarochita beat Ruaka
2) Kamaitachi, Tetsuya Naito, Yota Tsuji b Difunto, Ryusuke Taguchi, Súper Kokeshi Machine
6:51. Tomoaki Honma as Súper Kokeshi Machine, replaced Satoshi Kojima on 02/08 (knee injury). Yota submitted Difunto with an inverted camapana.
3) Hechicero, Okumura, SHO, Yoshinobu Kanemaru b Atlantis Jr., Dark Panther, Hiroshi Tanahashi, YOH
11:59. Hechicero submitted Dark Panther.
4) Brillante Jr. & Soberano Jr. DQ Douki & Templario [Relevos Increíbles]
8:40. Templario unmasked Soberano for the DQ, then took out some young lions.
5) Francesco Akira, Máscara Dorada, Místico b El Desperado, Rocky Romero, Tiger Mask [Relevos Increíbles]
10:43. Akira beat Tiger Mask
6) Bushi & Titán b Pegasso & Stigma [FACTION, third place]
8:35. Angel Inmortal on Stigma.
7) Stuka Jr. & Último Guerrero b Magnus & Volador Jr. [FACTION, final]
13:07. Guerrero Special on Magnus. Ultimo Guerrero wins this tournament in back to back years, once with Stuka and once with Atlantis Jr.

This was the best of the non-Korakuen Hall shows, though there was nothing you had to see. The tag tournament matches were good, the other matches were fine. The women’s match got a lot of attention because it existed – CMLL women on a NJPW show, Stardom wrestlers showing up – but the match itself was long and not really special.

CMLL, NJPW (SUN) 02/18/2024 Korakuen Hall, Tokyo, Japan [CMLL, NJPW (English), NJPW (Japanese)]
Attendance: 1455
1) Hiroshi Tanahashi, Pegasso, Ryusuke Taguchi b Súper Kokeshi Machine, Tiger Mask, YOH
8:03. Tanahashi beat Súper Kokeshi Machine. Ryusuke Taguchi replaced Satoshi Kojima on 02/08 (knee injury)
2) Bushi, Kamaitachi, Tetsuya Naito, Yota Tsuji b Magnus, SHO, Yoshinobu Kanemaru, Yujiro Takahashi
8:28. Tsuji submitted Magnus (after HOT left instead of making the save)
3) Titán b Brillante Jr.
7:47. Titan submitted Brillante Jr. to a Llave Inmortal, and motioned for Brillante Jr. to make it back to Korakuen Hall for a rematch.
4) Atlantis Jr., Dark Panther, Musashi b Douki, Hechicero, Okumura
11:55. MUSASHI replaced Master Wato (knee injury) on 01/25.
5) El Desperado, Máscara Dorada, Místico, Stigma b Difunto, Francesco Akira, Stuka Jr., Último Guerrero
13:03. Stigma wrestled in Black Cat themed gear, beat Difunto with the Skandalo Driver.
6) Soberano Jr. b Templario
18:40. Soberano won via two Soberano Drivers.
7) Volador Jr. b Rocky Romero
22:34. Volador springboard Canadian Destroyer. Volador introduced his son as the (soon to be) third generation of the Volador name.

Soberano/Templario and Volador/Romero delivered as expected. Soberano and Templario went crazy with big moves from the start and bordered on too much; a Soberano Skandalo Driver on the apron caused both of them fall off the apron and Templario to take a scary additional bump on his head/neck. He seemed fine enough to finish the match. Volador/Romero had a slower build (and really needed to follow the previous match), but had a more focused story on Romero targeting the arm and coming close to finishing Volador off. Volador landed one shot to get the win, but Romero had most of the match.

Titan/Brillante was a good lightning match, but not one where Brillante really made an big positive impression. He’s still got room for improvement. The tag matches were generally better than the previous nights. In related news, Salvador Lutteroth (and his wife) were visible watching the show from ringside. He and the NJPW heads spoke before Sunday shows, thanking the fans and saying they were already planning the 2025 tour.

CMLL, NJPW (MON) 02/19/2024 Korakuen Hall, Tokyo, Japan [NJPW (English), NJPW (Japanese)] Attendance: 1455
1) Brillante Jr., Ryusuke Taguchi, YOH b Francesco Akira, Pegasso, Stigma
8:31. Brillante beat Pegasso.
2) Bushi, Kamaitachi, Tetsuya Naito, Titán b Difunto, Magnus, SHO, Yoshinobu Kanamaru
Titan defeated Difunto. HOT tried to attack their parnters post match but were thwarted.
3) Okumura b Dark Panther
9:13.
4) Atlantis Jr. b Hechicero
12:42. Atlantis won after two frog splashes.
5) El Desperado, Musashi, Templario, Volador Jr. b Hiroshi Tanahashi, Rocky Romero, Soberano Jr., Tiger Mask [Relevos Increíbles]
11:53. Desperador beat Tiger Mask. MUSASHI replaced Master Wato (knee injury) on 01/25. Post match, Rocky Romero told Soberano and Templario they should end their rivalry and team with him instead. They agreed to form a new (unnamed) trio.
6) Místico b Último Guerrero
13:34. La Mistica
7) Máscara Dorada b Stuka Jr.
17:13. Shooting star press.

Both big matches delivered. You know pretty much everything Mistico and Ultimo Guerrero did in their match, and maybe even the order they did it, but they had in front of a crowd that was very excited for it. Dorada/Stuka was more dynamic and varied – you don’t see tables getting smashed in Arena Mexico – and both men came through in their big main event chance. Atlantis Jr. & Hechicero was a smartly wrestled match, worked around Hechciero ripping a hole in the knee of his trunks near the end. Hechicero took some unusually big bumps in the match, definitely won by Atlantis in the end.

The big news is the Romero/Soberano/Templario trio. A CMLL promo made it clear they’re going to be coming to Arena Mexico as a unit at some point. Soberano hinted about having a new team after he teamed rudo, so maybe this was in the plans for some time.

RevPro announced FantasticaManiaUK will return on Sunday 05/19 at York Hall in London. That’s a decent size venue, bigger than they ran for the previous show I believe.

AAA

The biggest news from the weekend is El Hijo del Vikingo may be out for some time. He suffered a severe looking right knee injury on Saturday in Arena Lopez Mateos. Vikingo got tossed into a flip, landing on his right leg, and his knee gave out. It’s possible there was something wrong with the ring at that right exact spot, but more likely it was just an accumulation of strain on the knee over time adding up. Vikingo has worked through and rehabbed a lot of injuries over the last couple of years, but sometimes body parts just give out. The ringside doctor believed Vikingo tore or ruptured a ligament.

AULL/Arena Lopez Mateos had doctor, but there didn’t seem to be a stretcher. Demonio Infernal had to carry Hijo del Vikingo to the back himself, a visual that caught more attention later in the weekend. Beyond the lack of medical equipment, there’s been a (increasingly) vocal minority unhappy deciding that Vikingo as heavyweight champion is the actual problem with AAA. The megachampionship isn’t meant to be a strictly heavyweight title, but Vikingo’s reign ending with him getting carried away like a child is a lot of fuel for people who already feel someway. (Likewise, it wasn’t hard to find people triumphantly posting on social media about someone getting hurt, taking is as proof that Vikingo was doing a too risky style, and choosing to ignore that what he got hurt on didn’t have any special risk.)

Knee surgery could keep Hijo del Vikingo out anywhere between four weeks and nine months. Early indications is it’ll be the towards the higher end. Vikingo’s also shown an ability (and maybe a stubborness) to come back quick from serious seeming injury situations; maybe he’ll beat whatever estimate that’s given, or maybe beating those estimates lead to this injury. AAA seemed to continue as normal on Sunday’s TV taping, though they did film a video with cheering to send to Vikingo as a supportive message. The next taping is on March 9th in Saltillo, but the actual next storyline event is supposed to happen in the next few days with a TripleMania Monterrey card announcement. AAA probably would’ve announced plans for Vikingo there, doesn’t really have to now, but may give some indication of a direction forward.

AAA taped at the Showcenter in Monterrey on Sunday night. All I have at the moment are the barebone results from Lo Mejor de Lucha:

AAA TV (SUN) 02/18/2024 Showcenter Complex, San Pedro Garza García, Nuevo Leon [Lo Mejor de Lucha]
1) Bebote Valdez b Ryno, Negus
2) Epydemius Jr., Rey León, Sayrus b Estrellato, Oro Negro, Vazco Jr.
3) Belcegor & Toscano b The Mummy & Ultra
4) Mr. Iguana b Drago, Taurus, Epydemius
debut of the second Taurus (the former Dick Angelo 3G)
5) Lady Shani, Pimpinela Escarlata, Sexy Star b Dulce Kanela, Flammer, La Hiedra
No Maravilla, Dulce Kanela moved to the ruda side and Pimpinela added.
6) Laredo Kid © b Antifaz del Norte [Showcenter Championship]
7) El Patrón Alberto & Mecha Wolf vs Abismo Negro Jr. & Chessman
match changed around (and Abismo Negro added) due to injury to Hijo del Vikingo the night before

No details on any of the matches, so not sure if Laredo/Antifaz set up anything.

Taurus is Dick Angelo 3G, which was the popular guess. Drago hasn’t really gotten over with the new gimmick, and there’s no reason to believe it’ll go better with Bengala or Taurus. Getting over doesn’t seem to be real point, the point is just to keep the IP active. Lady Wind is the other Lucha x El Barrio winner and presumably will be regimmicked soon. AAA still has a match with all of these people in their original gimmick left to air.

The next Showcenter event will be on June 30th. That’s a big gap, but they have a TripleMania in Monterrey between. 06/30 slides in after TripleMania Tijuana, and probably right before Verano de Escandalo and TripleMania Mexico City. If AAA was a show building to things, it would be an important show to build on.

I don’t have results from the AAA/EMW show in Tijuana as of yet. Of note, QT Marshall didn’t appear. Antifaz del Norte moved up to his spot. QT didn’t indicate any issue making the show on Twitter, and earlier replied to a fan to make it clear he was allowed to wrestle for any promotion (except for WWE.) Working for AAA shouldn’t be a problem, though I guess there’s a chance AEW asked him not to wrestle with Marty Scurll. I know others have been advised (or decided themselves) not to do so in the past, I do not know if that’s the specific case here. That EMW show looks to have been another sell out. They’re back there on 04/13, which sounds like the Origenes concept but not a TV taping. Not completely sure.

AAA’s on Space wasn’t much. Both semifinals were done with the remit of “Hijo de Tirantes has to be unfair to explain him getting kicked out later, but Shani/Apache still have to win despite the unfairness, and also the match has to be good.” It’s a difficult challenge to hit all three. They came closer in the second one but neither was memorable. A post match angle set up a Reina Dorada/La Hiedra feud, and a tacked on promo by Dalys pushed a match with Faby Apache. Neither of those match ups were follows on Sunday’s taping and neither is on the Saltillo one, so those stories aren’t going anywhere any time soon.

AAA filled out the time by airing the opener from the 01/06 Mexico City taping, which Latigo & Toxin over Monster Extreme and Epydemius Junior. It was billed as a “Exhibicion”, which that word on screen for most of the match. It otherwise was the same as any other match, which just sort of drew attention to AAA insisted it was an exhibition match. Perhaps the issue was Monster Extreme, who appeared to be 13 or 14. (Jose Manuel Guillen did say the exact age at one point, but Hugo was talking over.) Mexico City doesn’t usually license wrestlers that young, which may have been why it was an exhibition match. Monster Extreme wrestled a lot of like Mini Vikingo; he knows wrestling and knows his highspots, but much of the actual work is done by the people taking the spots. Latigo & Toxin did a great job of that so Monster Extreme looked great.

(They still have a full unaired episode from that 01/06 taping, which might air next week.)

IWRG

IWRG (SUN) 02/18/2024 Arena Naucalpan [IWRG]
1) Ajolotl & Auzter b Histeriosis & Rey Espartano 
2) Heddi Karaoui b Avisman 
3) Keyra b Sádika [IWRG IC WOMEN] 
second defense
4) Gran Pandemónium, Hijo de Pandemónium, Pandemónium Jr. © b Carnicero, Granjero, Leñador [IWRG IC TRIOS] 
5) Noisy Boy b Hijo del Alebrije, Séptimo Dragón, Spider Fly, Aster Boy [IWRG IC MIDDLE] 
Puma de Oro scheduled to defend, not mentioned as appearing, so presumably quit again.
6) DMT Azul & Tornado b Rey Halcón & Vangellys and Fussion & Hell Boy and Lendaor & Rey Aztaroth (Estado de México) and Águila Roja & Hijo del Pirata Morgan and Hijo de Canis Lupus & Multifacético Jr. [El Protector] 

This one is only over on the IWRG channel; Mas Lucha was streaming an Aereo/Pagano hair match.

Big Lucha

Big Lucha World (FRI) 02/16/2024 Arena Big Lucha, Iztapalapa, Distrito Federal [thecubsfan]
1) Piraña & Zenky b Obelyus & Skayler
10:20
2) Hombre Sin Nombre Big Lucha & Reiyel b Bogdan Klimov & M2R
9:32.
3) Morfosis b Helios, Cósmico
8:27.
4) Brujo, Limbo, Torito Negro b Atómico Jr., Auzter, Black Skayde
13:29
5) El Potro de Oro DCOR Jack Evans, Hijo del Pirata Morgan
6:34. Pirata added himself to the match while saying he called out Flamita to appear and he didn’t. All three battled outside (and the ring announcer announced the draw before the referee got there)

This was a match of good machces, nothing great, nothing bad (except if you really didn’t like the main event finish.) Match four had post match challenges for titles but I couldn’t follow what titles they were talking about. Match 3 had some cool highspots but not a lot connecting it in between. Match 2 had a guy with no name who seems to be targeting M2R for whatever mysterious reason. The guys in match 1 came out to back Hijo del Pirata Morgan in the main event, so they may be doing an INJUVE versus Big Lucha (versus Locos Evans) feud.

Other News

Friday in Saltillo, Promociones AOZA held a press conference to introduce Blue Demon III. He’s slightly taller than the current wrestler and talked about defending the family name. The Demons billed Blue Demon III as the nephew of Blue Demon Jr. Blue Demon III appeared on Saturday’s show with some very visible tattoos.

There’s an obvious history of Mexican wrestlers being passed off as (fake) family members. Billing Blue Demon III as a Blue Demon Jr.’s nephew as a nephew is a red flag. Demon and his sole known brother (Alejandro Munoz) have been on poor terms at times. Munoz’s shown up in CMLL to endorse the Leyenda de Azul, Demon Jr. hasn’t worked with CMLL for years, and Munoz would seem likely to appear if it was his son debuting as a luchador. Perhaps it’s a relative on his Blue Demon Jr’s wife’s side of the family, but the little we’ve heard about that relationship has been negative. Five years ago, when TripleMania set up the Blue Demon Jr/Dr. Wagner Jr. mask versus hair match, a skinny teenager showed up portrayed as Blue Demon Jr.’s son in training. It felt like Demon invented a child that time just for the purpose of the angle (Wagner had his kids with him.) Around that time, Munoz appeared on CMLL Informa and made a point of saying Blue Demon Jr. owned only the “Blue Demon Jr.” name, which makes it unclear how he could create a Blue Demon III without Munoz involved. (IMPI’s copyright database differs on this point.) My roundabout point is it’s possible Blue Demon III is just another unrelated related under a mask – and those tattoos are going to out him quick if that’s the case – but I don’t have any hard proof that’s the case.

On that same AOZA show, Dark Escoria lost his hair to local Hijo del Guerrero Negro Jr. It would be a surprising outcome at any time – national guys don’t lose to local guys – but more so with La Secta back on AAA TV. Normally, the TV company wouldn’t want someone to change their look with a hair loss, or would pay more to get that hair loss on one of their shows. All I can figure is the outcome was agreed upon before Escoria realized he’d be picking up AAA TV bookings again.

Cibernetico missed that show; his father passed away and he sent a video saying he wouldn’t be appearing.

Black Taurus, Latigo and Toxin defeated Lio Rush, Lee Moriarty, and Jacob Fatu on West Coast Pro Wrestling’s show Sunday night. Taurus was a mystery wrestler. The explanation I got is Black Taurus is supposed to start in AEW “soon”, has his new name and mask worked out, but the first place where all of that is going to be introduced is on AEW. An agreement was worked out to allow Black Taurus to keep using that name after all on dates he’d already agreed to until he gets that AEW name. No one was quite sure if he’d debut that new name before this show, so West Coast just listed him as a surprise wrestler.

That trios match was pretty great, as all the Vipers trios matches in West Coast tend to be. Latigo & Toxin got the pin over Lio Rush, which the sort of victory they’d be unlikely to get in AAA any time soon. The downside is that, every time I see a West Coast Pro show from this Los Angeles venue, the crowd seems to be smaller. There may have been 100 people at this show. These shows seem positively reviewed but they’ve not been able to build much of an audience, and I can’t figure how the economics work. It’s not my money, I’m only worried in that I’m not sure how it can keep going.

Mexico State venue Arena CM announce this past Sunday’s show would be their final show at that venue. They held a press conference earlier in the week, explaining they were moving to a new location with 2-3X seating capacity. The last minute nature of the move – they had a show on the 02/24 that’s now changing locations – is a bit strange.

Pagano defeats Aereo in a hair match in Ciudad Juarez on Sunday.

Relampago’s Japan tour starts soon.

Laredo Kid talks about his upcoming action figure.

Segunda Caida watches more 90s Monterrey.

CMLL

CMLL (FRI) 02/16/2024 Arena México
1) Hombre Bala Jr. vs Felino Jr. [lightning]
2) Dulce Gardenia, Espíritu Negro, Rey Cometa vs Cancerbero, Luciferno, Virus
3) Flip Gordon & Star Jr. vs Ángel de Oro & Niebla Roja
4) Stephanie Vaquer & Zeuxis © vs Lady Frost & Tessa Blanchard [CMLL WOMEN]
second defense
5) Adrenalina, Barboza (Jalisco), Calavera Jr. I (Jalisco), Calavera Jr. II (Jalisco), Fantástico, Persa (Jalisco) vs El Hijo De Centella Roja, El Malayo, El Novato (Puebla), Rayo Metálico (Guanajuato), Rey Apocalipsis, Xelhua

There’s actual some history for the Guadalajara and Puebla teams: Rey Apocalipsis, Malayo and Siki Osama beat Adrenalina, Fantastico and Explosivo for the Occdiente Trios titles back on 12/29. Guadalajara won the entire thing last year and seem likely to make the final this year, though there’s a lot of people who haven’t been in a big matches on that team. The Puebla guys have struggled to stand out on their own shows; Apocalipsis is a good character but I don’t know about the rest of these teams.

Lady Frost missed some media obligations with what was said to be “stomach discomfort“, but presumably will be ready to go tonight. Those four are going to want to have a memorable match. A title change seems unlikely. The rest of the show are matches that could be good if they want to be and should be at least OK. This will stream live for 25 USD members, and will go up on 02/25 for 9 USD members.

Almost 4,000 tickets were sold in the lower bowl for 03/29 Homenaje a Dos Leyendas in the 24 hours after the card was announced. A in-person ticket buyer today was told the lower bowl is sold out. There’s scattered seats still visible on Ticketmaster, but those may be gone tonight. There’s a good chance this sells out in the next few days.

Some of that ticket moving is reminding people H2L was on sale – CMLL usually waits until they have a big main event before doing so, but they went up quietly a couple of weeks ago with not much info. A lot of that movement is clearly that BCC vs CMLL match. I know some people wanted other things, but those buying tickets sure seem happy enough with what they’ve got. I always thought this show would sell out, but I didn’t think it would be this quick.

That speed of ticket selling makes me rethink a lot. I keep expecting the BCC to do a run-in to set up the match; the match is now set up, and it seems like burning money to have those guys show up without being advertised. CMLL’s got to be interested in doing more with AEW wrestlers if they’re available, and might give them more freedom to do what they want if it helps keep them around. Money changes everything and this situation looks to be money.

The one sure thing is the scalpers are going to make a killing on this one. Prices for tickets were essentially the same as last year, and demand is clearly much higher.

Worth noting: CMLL’s press release hyping Homenaje a Dos Leyendas pushed the four way mask match as the biggest match on the card.

CMLL (TUE) 02/20/2024 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara
1) Avispón Negro Jr., Lince Del Bajio, Último Ángel vs Atilius, Maximus, Rey Urano
2) Arlequín & Garrabato vs Guerrero de la Muerte & Shezmu and Cowboy & Omar Brunetti and Abigor La Pesadilla & Cris Skin and Bestia Negra & Rav and Johnny Dinamo & Prince Drago and Adrenalina & Obek and Amenaza Negra Jr. & Minotauro and Demonio Maya & Mandala and Leo & Temerario and Canalla & Principe Daniel and Fantástico & Halcón de Plata [Gran Alterantiva Tapatia]
13) Cris Skin, Gallero, Halcón Negro Jr. vs Azteca Warrior, Desafio, Gato Fantasma
14) Dark Silueta vs Estrellita Mágica [lightning]
15) Barboza, Draego, Persa, Satánico vs El Coyote, Felino, Felino Jr., Pólvora
16) Lady Amazona, Sexy Sol, Skadi vs Hera, Metálica, Olympia

I have no idea how that tournament is going to work, only that they’re advertising a final on this show after talking about doing a league format before. Maybe instead of two groups of six, it’ll somehow be six way matches? That is one of the weakest main events; I’m not entirely sure why it’s the main event over the semi-main (which isn’t great either.)

CMLL/FantasticaMania

CMLL, NJPW (FRI) 02/16/2024 Nagoya Congress Center Event Hall, Nagoya, Japan [NJPW]
Attendance: 1150
1) SHO & Yoshinobu Kanemaru b Difunto & Tiger Mask
7:12. Kanemaru unmasked Tiger Mask, and Sho rolled him up for the win.
2) Dark Panther & Súper Kokeshi Machine b Francesco Akira & Okumura
7:35. Tomoaki Honma (as Super Kokeshi Machine) replaced Satoshi Kojima on 02/08 (knee injury). Panther pinned Okumura
3) Kamaitachi & Tetsuya Naito b Brillante Jr. & El Desperado
9:30. Kamaitachi pinned Brillante.
4) Atlantis Jr., Hiroshi Tanahashi, YOH b Hechicero, Musashi, Ryusuke Taguchi [Relevos Increíbles]
12:58. Yoh beat Taguchi.
5) Máscara Dorada, Místico, Templario DQ Brillante Jr., Douki, Rocky Romero [Relevos Increíbles]
15:22. Soberano unmasked Templario for a DQ.
6) Pegasso & Stigma b Magnus & Volador Jr. [Faction, semifinal]
12:00. Magnus beat Stigma.
7) Stuka Jr. & Último Guerrero b Bushi & Titán [Faction, semifinal]
12:24. Stuka beat BUSHI.

This show sounded like it didn’t go well. Mistico seemed to be working through a leg injury on night one, and it was bugging him again here. Mistico’s had some leg/knee issues in his big 2023 CMLL matches, but they didn’t seem to affect his performance at that time. Something’s gotten worse, it’s affecting him now and I wonder if that impacted the decision to have Dorada/Stuka as the main event on the final show.

There’s also an accidental problem of the NJPW guys wanting to get on the masked fun, which ends up with four different comedy characters (Kamaitachi, Taguchi, Honma and to some extent Bone Solider Jr.) running around in this early matches. A little bit of that is fine, but it downgrades the CMLL participation if the NJPW characters are the focus of these matches. Add on a DQ to build Soberano/Templario and the usual mayhem with NJPW’s House of Torture team, and it wasn’t set up to be a great show.

The tournament matches had to save it, and that didn’t work out. Volador was visibly upset that he won his match; the referee counted three when he earlier than planned and everyone noticed Volador’s reaction. (NJPW fans did get the authentic CMLL experience on that one.) The LIJ/Guerreros match sounded like it was fine but not enough to go out of your way to see.

Attendance after four shows:

2023
Kagawa 768
Kyoto 765
Osaka 962
Chiba 1092

2024
Osaka 963
Osaka 831
Kagawa 741
Nagoya 1150

Slightly up, but about the same. This year’s tour is one show longer; they’ll be in Chiba tonight for the end of the tag team tournament, followed by the two Korakuen Hall shows early Sunday and Monday morning Mexico City time.

AAA

AAA on Space airs the two women’s semifinals from Rey de Reyes. They’ll probably have to fill time with something else – maybe there were other AAA/military interactions.

AAA in real life will run a TV taping at the Showcenter

AAA TV (SUN) 02/18/2024 Showcenter Complex, San Pedro Garza García, Nuevo Leon
1) ?, ??, ??? vs ????, ?????, ??????
2) ?, ??, ??? vs ????, ?????, ??????
3) ?, ??, ??? vs ????, ?????, ??????
4) Drago vs Taurus, Mr. Iguana, Epydemius
5) Flammer, La Hiedra, Maravilla vs Dulce Kanela, Lady Shani, Sexy Star
6) Laredo Kid © vs Antifaz del Norte [Showcenter Championship]
7) El Patrón Alberto & Hijo Del Vikingo vs Chessman & Mecha Wolf

things to note here

• Alberto is inevitably going to challenge Vikingo again
• Laredo and Antifaz should make mask match challenges again
• there’s probably a new Taurus in the fourth (and you can tell it’s not an important one given where he’s positioned.

AAA previously said they’d have a press conference to announce some matches for that show sometime after this show.

The WON has a news bit Pentagon Jr. worked the Jericho Cruise, hung around two more days to work Dynamite, and then was unhappy to find out he was not working Dynamite or Rampage because CMLL wrestlers were working. He (and Vikingo) did work a Ring of Honor match as part of that taping. The issue here is Penta seems upset he hung around in the US a couple of extra days just to work a Ring of Honor show. It gets extrapolated into AEW betraying a founding member of AEW by picking CMLL over them and that the Lucha Brothers will now be kept off PPVs and TV shows out of deference to other people.

There were eight PPVs in 2023 AEW. Pentagon Jr. appeared on three of them (and all in matches with a lot of people.) One of the PPV skips may have been CMLL related – Forbidden Door – but Penta had the other four off all by AEW decision. I would like to see Penta on more PPVs myself, but the decision to put him or Fenix on PPV seems more related to AEW creative decisions than CMLL deals. The travel/logistics thing is a problem – there’s no reason to keep Penta around just do that match – and is a frequently cited problem with AEW. (It’s evident even on AEW’s  podcasts, where the hosts are told stories by wrestlers about how last minute they were told about an idea or even their debut, and the hosts agree that’s just how AEW works.)

The WON report states policy is “non-CMLL Mexicans” can’t work the same shows as CMLL wrestlers. Komander wrestled Wardlow on the same show as the CMLL wrestlers debuted, so there’s already some pushing at the margins of that idea. I think “Mexicans” is oversimplification, brought on because no one outside of Arena Mexico is quite sure who CMLL would object too. Rush & Dralistico are a sure objections, because both walked out on CMLL. (Dralistico’s spent this AEW/CMLL run posting positive things about the relationship, while Rush is trying to get attention with teases of big stories on Twitter.) On the other side of the spectrum, Thunder Rosa is a Mexican and CMLL clearly doesn’t have any issue with her; they let her come backstage to an interview with Stephanie Vaquer last year. I have no idea what CMLL feels about Bandido nowadays, or how they’ll feel about not-Black Taurus when he debuts and has all ties broken with AAA.

The other part of this story is I don’t think CMLL on AEW is going to be a regular thing by any means. I think they did it a lot at first to get the angle going, but it may not be as frequent going forward. The BCC seems to be going in a different direction for AEW’s PPV. CMLL wrestlers may end up on that show, but it’s far from a sure thing for a variety of reasons. If Penta & Fenix aren’t PPVs in 2024, it’ll more likely due to whatever decisions AEW makes than their CMLL partnership. And that’s a fair thing to be annoyed with; it’s hard for those guys to make these shows already and now they’ve got another obstacle. But the Lucha Brothers problem would still be there if CMLL wasn’t.

I believe AEW would eventually like to remove any restriction about CMLL and AAA wrestlers on the same show. I don’t think you’re ever going to see AAA/CMLL matches in AEW, but I think it’s a long term possible goal just to have some AAA wrestlers in one segment and CMLL wrestlers in another.

The source for the Penta/AEW/CMLL story is left uncredited; it does not appear to be Penta itself. It makes the entire story read differently if it is indeed the booker for AAA arguing that AEW needs to stop using CMLL guys, which is a problem with anonymous sourcing. Konnan may not have done is purely for AAA/CMLL reasons – Penta is his guy, he’s sticking up for him – but it’s part of the story if it is him. In the past, whenever a story like this crops up in the WON, Konnan says the same story using many of the same words on his (previously recorded) podcast in the next few days. I guess we’ll know if that sequence happens again.

The WON had no further details on the Luchatitlan closure beyond which was already reported here.

Big Lucha

Big Lucha World (FRI) 02/16/2024 Arena Big Lucha, Iztapalapa, Distrito Federal
1) Rey Espartano & Zenky vs Rey Halcón & Skayler
2) Reiyel vs M2R, Bogdan Klimov
3) Morfosis vs Helios, Cósmico
4) Brujo, Limbo, Torito Negro vs Atómico Jr., Auzter, Black Skayde
5) El Potro de Oro vs Jack Evans

Last week’s show set up a three way for a #1 contenders spot with Flamita. No Flamita. Not sure if that match is happening at another time or what.

Klimov is a Russian pro wrestler who is teasing cross training at the gym. That probably doesn’t turn out well for wrestling.

Other News

The state of Quintana Roo will celebrate the state day of lucha libre and luchadors on September 21st, starting this year. This idea, following Mexico City doing the same last decade, was first proposed last July. It doesn’t mean much on the government’s part, but it’s always been an odd state to go second. There’s not that much lucha libre in Quintana Roo, even putting aside the Lucahtitlan failure. There is Total Wrestling Stars that runs in Cancun, and other promotions around that area that run maybe once a month. Perhaps the Quintana Roo legislatures believe Mexico City’s declaration helped Mexico City’s lucha scene and would help theirs as well.

There’s a benefit show for Blue Win next Sunday.

Riot announced Arez, Toxin and Latigo vs Aramis, Iron Kid, Demonio del Aire on March 2nd.

IWRG says they’re going to start airing their Tryout show on Monday.

Cinta de Oro was part of a lucha libre parade at a children’s hospital in El Paso.

CMLL

CMLL (MON) 02/12/2024 Arena Puebla [Grada, Porra Fresa]
1) Centella Roja & Hijo de Centella Roja b Dreyko & Fénix SO
2) El Novato b El Perverso [lightning]
3) Lady Frost & Tessa Blanchard b La Catalina & Stephanie Vaquer 
Team USA beat Team Chile
4) El Malayo, Rey Apocalipsis, Siky Ozama b Dulce Gardenia, Espíritu Negro, Rey Cometa 
5) Hijo del Villano III, Villano III Jr., Zandokan Jr. b Esfinge, Fugaz, Star Black 
6) Atlantis, Flip Gordon, Star Jr. b Bárbaro Cavernario, Dragón Rojo Jr., Terrible
Barbaros DQed in the first, win the second, lose the third. Tecnicos asked for a trios title match.

I do not believe the team of Atlantis, Star Jr. and Flip Gordon are going to end Los Barbaros title reign after two weeks. But, they’ve got to do something to kill time.

CMLL (TUE) 02/13/2024 Arena México [CMLL, thecubsfan]
1) Fantasy, Kaligua, Pequeño Magía b Full Metal, Minos, Pequeño Polvora
9:55
2) Capitán Suicida, Fuego, Valiente Jr. b Dr. Karonte I, Enfermero Jr., Inquisidor
11:50. Tecnicos took 2/3.
3) El Coyote b El Audaz [lightning]
9:59, via double underhook superplex
4) Blue Panther, Blue Panther Jr., El Hijo De Blue Panther b Gemelo Diablo I, Gemelo Diablo II, Kráneo
13:03. Panthers took 2/3.
5) Averno, Euforia, Mephisto b Bárbaro Cavernario, Dragón Rojo Jr., Terrible
12:39. Infernales took 1/3, Averno pinning Cavernario and challenging for his CMLL LH title.
6) La Catalina, Lady Frost, Tessa Blanchard b Dark Silueta, Stephanie Vaquer, Zeuxis
10:29. Frost & Blanchard beat Vaquer & Zeuxis to set up Friday’s title match. Catalina and Vaquer teased a feud as well.

Nothing really you need to watch here. Coyote/Audaz seemed like the best match, though mostly I was watching while working on other things so maybe it’s really Barbaros/Infernales and I missed it. Averno/Cavernario has been good in the past and should be again.

CMLL (TUE) 02/13/2024 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara [Arena Coliseo Guadalajara]
1) Demonio Maya & Mandala b Amenaza Negra Jr. & Minotauro
2) Guerrero de la Muerte & Shezmu b Abigor La Pesadilla & Cris Skin
3) Johnny Dinamo & Prince Drago b Canalla & Principe Daniel
4) Astro Oriental, Calavera Jr. I, Calavera Jr. II b Black Boy, Thunder Boy, Yaky Boy
5) Gallo Jr., Ráfaga, Rafaga Jr. b Misterio Blanco, Misterio Negro, Misterioso Jr.
6) Satánico & Trono b Halcón Suriano & Halcón Suriano Jr.
7) Lady Amazona, Sexy Sol, Skadi b Andrómeda, La Maligna, Persephone
8) Dulce Gardenia & La Fashion b Bestia Negra & Furia Roja

I saw nothing, nothing jumps out to write about here.

CMLL (SAT) 02/17/2024 Arena Coliseo
1) Retro vs Príncipe Odín Jr. [lightning]
2) Astral, Diamond, Eléctrico vs Grako, Nitro, Sangre Imperial
3) El Audaz, Fuego, Panterita del Ring vs Crixus, Raider, Vegas
4) Volcano vs Valiente [lightning]
5) Lady Frost, Reyna Isis, Tessa Blanchard vs Amapola, Metálica, Persephone
6) Esfinge, Fugaz, Star Black vs Gran Guerrero, Magia Blanca, Rugido

The big Retro/Principe Odin Jr. feud gets a lightning match. It’ll be wild if CMLL is doing things with prelim guys on these shows just to make the YouTube uploads more interesting, but this might be Principe Odin Jr. losing his way out of a promotion he’s barely working now.

CMLL (SUN) 02/18/2024 Arena México
1) Leono vs Bengala [lightning]
2) Angelito, Shockercito, Último Dragóncito vs Mercurio, Pequeño Violencia, Pierrothito
3) Akuma, Dark Magic, Espanto Jr. vs Apocalipsis, Cholo, Disturbio
4) Guerrero Maya Jr., Hijo de Blue Panther, Hijo de Octagón vs Felino, Rey Bucanero, Sagrado
5) Andrómeda, Marcela, Skadi vs Hera, Lady Frost, Tessa Blanchard
6) Blue Panther, Octagón, Valiente vs Averno, Euforia, Mephisto

Leono/Bengala is another classic. Lady Frost and Andromeda may have a flip off.

CMLL (MON) 02/19/2024 Arena Puebla
1) Asturiano & Novato vs Rayo Metálico & Xelhua
2) Astral vs Enfermero Jr. [lightning]
3) Stephanie Vaquer vs La Catalina [lightning]
4) Arkalis, Guerrero Maya Jr., Rey Samuray vs El Malayo, Rey Apocalipsis, Siky Ozama
5) Esfinge, Fugaz, Star Black vs Ángel de Oro, Hijo del Villano III, Niebla Roja
6) Bárbaro Cavernario, Dragón Rojo Jr., Terrible © vs Atlantis, Flip Gordon, Star Jr. [CMLL TAG]

Barbaros are unlikely to lose. Back to back lightning matches is unusual.

CMLL Informa revealed the full Homenaje a Dos Leyendas card. A reminder: this will be the first show under the new YouTube plan, where only the Fan Leyendas (35 USD) tier gets to see this live. 9 USD & 25 USD both get his only on VOD delay the following Sunday. (This will be confusing through the day of the show.)

CMLL (FRI) 03/29/2024 Arena México
***CMLL Homenaje a Dos Leyendas, 2024***
1) Magnus & Rugido © vs Brillante Jr. & Neón [MEX TAG]
4th defense
2) Esfinge © vs Zandokan Jr. [MEX LH]
4th defense
3) Bárbaro Cavernario © vs Averno [CMLL LH]
4th defense (1st in six months)
4) Angelito vs Pierrothito, Acero, Pequeño Olímpico [mask]
four way, winner escape, last person remaining loses their mask
5) Lluvia, Stephanie Vaquer, Zeuxis vs La Catalina, Tessa Blanchard, Willow Nightingale
6) ? & ?? vs ??? & ???? [natl pi, final]
tournament final, teams undecided
7) Bryan Danielson, Claudio Castagnoli, Jon Moxley, Wheeler Yuta vs Blue Panther, Místico, Último Guerrero, Volador Jr.

This is a really strong card. If the last month of AEW/CMLL stuff didn’t happen, you could cut off the main event and still have a solid card. (People would’ve wanted a bigger main event, but it still a pretty good rest of the card.) The main event makes it special. The AEW cross over – Panther compared it to NJPW/UWA matches from the 70s – and Bryan Danielson finally getting his match with Blue Panther is super. The atmosphere for that main event is going to be incredible, and bringing in big ex-WWE names to a place they’ve never been should be a big draw. All the matches look good and important, something not always said about big CMLL shows.

Most reactions to the main event are really positive. There are Mexican fans who don’t the Danielson/Panther backstory and don’t understand why Panther is main eventing instead of a bigger name. There are also fans who know that Danielson/Panther story and want to see the singles match. That concern is based on this maybe being the one and only time these AEW guys show up in Arena Mexico; that’s what generally happens with AEW wrestlers who appear in AAA. I have no inside on this, none, but – how do we know this is the one and only time? This is all weird uncharted territory, and who knows how far it’ll go. This CMLL/AEW relationship already is significantly different from that AAA one. AEW plugged this main event right off the top on Dynamite tonight, which they never did with those TripleMania appearances. (They haven’t done it much with NJPW or DDT matches either; AEW usually only talks about them after the fact.)

(There’s also a few people who’d rather see Hechicero instead of Ultimo Guerrero. I’m certain Guerrero was a specific request from the AEW people; Claudio’s had UG on his bucket list for some time.)

AEW’s Willow Nightingale makes her debut in the semimain, in a match that’s sort of CMLL trueborns versus those with US experience. The minis wanted specifically not to have a cage, not to have a incredible partners match, so a fourway it was. Acero is the most likely to lose his mask based on status, but either of the veterans cashing in on a big show is not out of the question. Cavernario/Averno was set up on a Tuesday show and doesn’t end on a Tuesday show, almost as mindblowing concept as AEW wrestlers showing up here. All three title matches feel like different title matches; there’s great variety in this whole card.

The biggest obstacle is running a seven match card on a Friday night. Aniversario was a seven match show but it also had an early holiday start time. CMLL doesn’t want to run past 11 m; they usually don’t even want to run that late. It’s going to be tough to get all of this done in 2h30m, and it probably means a couple of these matches will go shorter than expected.

Someone really should do English commentary for this. A lot of impossible things seem to be possible but that one is still a little out of grasp.

CMLL/FantasticaMania

CMLL, NJPW (TUE) 02/13/2024 Towa Pharmaceutical Ractab Dome Sub Arena, Osaka, Japan [CMLL, NJPW (Japanese)]
1) SHO & Yoshinobu Kanemaru b Difunto & Ryusuke Taguchi
Kanemaru beat Difunto
2) Pegasso & Tiger Mask b Magnus & Taiji Ishimori
6:36 Pegasso beat Magnus, who is still feuding with Tiger Mask.
3) Brillante Jr., Stigma, Súper Kokeshi Machine, YOH b Bushi, Kamaitachi, Tetsuya Naito, Titán
9:36. Tomoaki Honma (as Súper Kokeshi Machine) replaced Satoshi Kojima on 02/08 (knee injury.) Titan beat Brillante Jr., then demanded he show his best in their singles match.
4) Atlantis Jr., Dark Panther, Musashi DQ Gedo, Hechicero, Okumura
10:57. Musasahi replaced Master Wato (knee injury) on 01/25. Okumura unmasked Dark Panther for the DQ.
5) Francesco Akira, Stuka Jr., Último Guerrero b Desperado, Máscara Dorada, Místico
15:42. Ultimo Guerrero defeated Mistico with the Guerrero Special.
6) Hiroshi Tanahashi, Templario, Volador Jr. b Douki, Rocky Romero, Soberano Jr. [Relevos Increíbles]
14:50. Templario defeated Soberano Jr.

I neglected to mention with the Monday results, but Hechicero challenged Zack Sabre Jr. to a singles match in his post-match promo there. It felt like the Villanos & Zandokan challenge. It’s unlikely was no firm plan to do a match (and no firm plan to do so when ZSJ mentioned Hechicero’s name last week), but they put it there because why not.

This Kamaitachi may not actually be Hiromu Takahashi; or he’s making some super quick wardrobe changes to do interviews as his manager.

CMLL, NJPW (WED) 02/14/2024 Takamatsu City General Gymnasium 2, Kagawa, Japan [NJPW (Japanese)] Attendance: 743
1) Brillante Jr. & Ryusuke Taguchi b SHO & Yoshinobu Kanemaru
7:09. Taguchi beat SHO after a foul.
2) Bone Solider Jr. & Gedo b Difunto & YOH [Relevos Increíbles]
Bone Soldier Jr. (Taiji Ishimori) submitted Difunto
3) Dark Panther, Musashi, Pegasso b Douki, Magnus, Okumura
8:54. MUSASHI replaced Master Wato (knee injury) on 01/25. Magnus beat Pegasso.
4) Bushi, Kamaitachi, Tetsuya Naito, Titán b Boltin Oleg, Stigma, Súper Kokeshi Machine, Tiger Mask
11:40. Tomoaki Honma (as Super Kokeshi Machine) replaced Satoshi Kojima on 02/08 (knee injury). Boltin Oleg replaced Hiroshi Tanahashi (moved up).
5) Rocky Romero, Soberano Jr., Stuka Jr. b Máscara Dorada, Templario, Volador Jr. [Relevos Increíbles]
14:45. Stuka beat Mascara Dorada with the torpedo splash as prelude.
6) El Desperado, Hechicero, Último Guerrero b Atlantis Jr., Hiroshi Tanahashi, Místico
16:23. Hiroshi Tanahashi replaced Francesco Akira (?) and the match was switched around. Hechicero beat Atlantis.

This, like the Tuesday show, was untelevised. This tour takes a day off, then resumes on TV Friday. Not sure where Akira disappeared to; he survived the cage match but not two days of FantasticaMania.

Other News

IWRG is running their rookie/veteran tournament on Sunday

IWRG (SUN) 02/18/2024 Arena Naucalpan
1) Ajolotl & Auzter vs Histeriosis & Rey Espartano
2) Heddi Karaoui vs Avisman
3) Keyra vs Sádika [IWRG IC WOMEN]
second defense
4) Gran Pandemónium, Hijo de Pandemónium, Pandemónium Jr. vs Carnicero, Granjero, Leñador
5) Hijo del Alebrije vs Séptimo Dragón, Noisy Boy, Spider Fly, Aster Boy, Puma de Oro [IWRG IC MIDDLE]
6) Rey Halcón & Vangellys vs Fussion & Hell Boy and Hijo del Fishman & Rey Aztaroth (Estado de México) and DMT Azul & Tornado and Águila Roja & Hijo del Pirata Morgan and Hijo de Canis Lupus & Multifacético [El Protector]

The idea this year is six team match, where teams are eliminated if the rookie gets pinned. Looks like we’ve got another new Multifacetico, which makes him the favorite. Relampago was the most recent Middleweight champion, but hasn’t been here since November. IWRG lists it as a five man match, it has six people. They also list it for the “IWR” title, so I guess it could be a different weird title. Keyra/Sadika will be good for GIFs. Avisman fans are getting a live streaming match.

RIOT has started to upload shows under the paid subscription area of the Luchamania Monterrey channel, and will start to upload new shows there on Friday.

GCW announced Gringo Loco versus Volador Jr. for their 04/05 WM weekend show in Philadelphia. Gringo hasn’t been in AAA this year but it still seems like a challenging match to put together with a CMLL wrestler.

Octagon posted a YouTube video claiming a legal victory of AAA. It seems like he makes the claim of a court win over AAA every six months. Like in some those others, Octagon claims he’s going to win AAA’s headquarters. I don’t know Mexican law, but it sounded more like Octagon would get the AAA headquarters only if AAA didn’t pay what they owed Octagon (and then the government would give Octagon something AAA owns as a tradeoff.) AAA will likely just pay Octagon. Octagon doesn’t mention how much that amount is.

El Hijo del Dr. Wagner Jr., FantasticaMania and Team Mexico City are on the cover of Box y Lucha 3590.

CMLL

CMLL (FRI) 02/09/2024 Arena México [AS, CMLL, Cronista del Ring, Kaiser Sprots, thecubsfan]
1) Acero & Pierrothito DQ Angelito & Pequeño Olímpico [Relevos Increíbles]
6:52. Rematch. Olimpico unmasked Pierrothito this time. Challenges followed, teasing a 2v2 mask match.
2) Dulce Gardenia, Espíritu Negro, Rey Cometa b Apocalipsis, Cholo, Disturbio
11:56.
3) Reyna Isis & Tessa Blanchard b Marcela & Skadi
16:52.
4) Averno, Euforia, Mephisto b Max Star, Rugido, Volador Jr.
12:36. Max Star, who’d been given the Depredador mask on an Informa and mentioned as being part of the group, got to actually team with the other Depredadores (and wear their colors.)
5) Alom, Astro Boy Jr., Dragón de Fuego, Forneo, Hunter, Legendario b Emperador Jr., Infarto (Laguna), Misterio Blanco, Misterio Negro, Platino Kid (Laguna), Viento Negro [Torneo de Escuelas, semifinal]
34:04 Legendario defeated Emperador Jr. to win in for Team Mexico City over Team Comarca Lagunera

This comparison isn’t going to work for everyone but these Torneo de Escuelas are essentially (much less common than they used to be) IWRG FILL ciberneticos between schools. CMLL wrestlers should be more steady than some of the raw rookies seen in those, but the basic concept of a lot of young guys trying to keep together a match they’ve previously worked out remains the same. Some are going to make the most of their time, others (Hunter) are going to be totally forgettable.

Legendario – the former Ultimo Legendario of Juventud Guerrera’s Super X, the former winner of an Octagon protege search reality show who got the name Dragon Dorado, the former Vengador Celestial who won a Super Crazy NOAH tryout but never made it to NOAH – won for his team and looked like the major league wrestler he’s seemed at other points of his career. Forneo was good too (and his Big Lucha time seemed to fill him with more confidence than the rest of these guys had.) I had concerns about Alom coming in, because someone with as much height seems likely to be pushed somewhere if he’s got any talent at all and he’d never gotten that sort of push. I’m not sure why though, because he looked perfectly fine here and showed some potential when he stuck to the power stuff benefiting his size. Platino Kid, Emperador Jr. and Infarto stood on the other side, though part of that was due to Infarto getting a lot of the match. Viento Negro appeared to be accidentally counted down before he got his big run and now his team is out of the tournament, so he’s got the worst luck. Maybe they’ll run another cibernetico with some of these guys at the Arena Coliseo anniversary show again and he’ll get a second chance then.

Everything else was better than the Tuesday everything else but nothing you need to see. It amazes me how the Indestructibles have gelled as a team. They’re not the old Diabolicos in terms of making people look great, but they’re can help people look good and that’s far more than I would’ve expected out of that crew a year ago. They’ve figured out their roles in a way they never would’ve done without this team. The minis feud is clearly going somewhere – maybe Homenaje a Dos Leyendas – though it’s hard to believe either Pierrothito or Pequeno Olimpico would lose their mask in tag title match after being prominent characters in that division for over thirty years.

Stream worked fine. That’s a relief.

CMLL (SAT) 02/10/2024 Arena Coliseo [CMLL, La Tijera]
1) Eléctrico & Retro DQ Inquisidor & Príncipe Odín Jr.
Retro replaced Leono. Odin unmasked Retro. Challenges followed.
2) Felino Jr., Pólvora, Vegas b Capitán Suicida, Diamond, El Audaz
Polvora replaced Misterioso Jr.
3) Felino b Panterita del Ring [lightning]
Panterita suffered a leg injury (or sold one)
4) Hera, Olympia, Tessa Blanchard b Andrómeda, Marcela, Skadi
5) Fugaz, Star Black, Valiente b Gemelo Diablo I, Gemelo Diablo II, Kráneo
6) Ángel de Oro, Gran Guerrero, Niebla Roja b Atlantis, Blue Panther, Flip Gordon

Tessa is back winning her matches.

Female fans grabbed certain parts of Flip Gordon leaving Arena Coliseo last week (according to his very displeased wife on Instagram.) This week, a female fan tried to grab Flip during the match; security got involved but didn’t completely cut her off.

CMLL (SUN) 02/11/2024 Arena México [CMLL]
1) Dr. Karonte I & Enfermero Jr. b Robin & Valiente Jr.
2) Crixus & Raider b Fuego & Volcano
3) Akuma, Dark Magic, Espanto Jr. b Cancerbero, Luciferno, Virus
Ola Negra cheated to beat Los Cancerberos (again), which annoyed Virus into attacking them (again)
4) Metálica, Stephanie Vaquer, Zeuxis b Amapola, Hera, Tessa Blanchard
5) Hijo del Villano III, Villano III Jr., Zandokan Jr. b Futuro, Hombre Bala Jr., Neón
6) Atlantis, Flip Gordon, Star Jr. b Bárbaro Cavernario, Dragón Rojo Jr., Terrible

This show drew terribly from the photos, the worst attended CMLL show in quite a while. Not sure if it was a star power issue or if the Super Bowl is really starting to have an affect in Mexico City.

Not as sure the Ola Negra/Cancerberos bit is going anywhere, but they should definitely keep doing it.

CMLL keeps calling Zandokan Jr. and Los Villanos variations of El Triangulo. Most CMLL luchadors would go along with the plan. What makes Zandokan and Los Villanos fun is they never seem to go along with anyone else’s plan, and so they continue to call themselves El Escuadra in promos. They also brought chairs into their promo to sit on and threw out a random challenge to the Blackpool Combat Club. That match would be fun and is unlikely to happen. Sometimes these antics can get grating; it did eventually with Los Ingobernables. It’s fun right now.

CMLL (TUE) 02/13/2024 Arena México
1) Fantasy, Kaligua, Pequeño Magía vs Full Metal, Minos, Pequeño Polvora
2) Capitán Suicida, Fuego, Valiente Jr. vs Dr. Karonte I, Enfermero Jr., Inquisidor
3) El Audaz vs El Coyote [lightning]
4) Blue Panther, Blue Panther Jr., El Hijo De Blue Panther vs Gemelo Diablo I, Gemelo Diablo II, Kráneo
5) Bárbaro Cavernario, Dragón Rojo Jr., Terrible vs Averno, Euforia, Mephisto
6) La Catalina, Lady Frost, Tessa Blanchard vs Dark Silueta, Stephanie Vaquer, Zeuxis

That’s a statement main event. CMLL could just as easily flipped the two matches, and they’re instead pointedly putting the women in a main event. That doesn’t happen in Arena Mexico outside the one month they celebrate women’s wrestling. (The August 5, 2012 Marcela/Tiffany hair match that went up against a TripleMania is always my go to ‘this is the last time it happened’ for this bits but I guess it’s now officially retired.) It really doesn’t matter what main events, these Tuesday shows usually draw the same, but it’s definitely an interesting choice.

FantasticaMania season means a lot of acts who haven’t been on streaming much lately (Gemelos Diablos and Enfermero Jr. come to mind) get a chance.

CMLL (FRI) 02/16/2024 Arena México
1) Hombre Bala Jr. vs Felino Jr. [lightning]
2) Dulce Gardenia, Espíritu Negro, Rey Cometa vs Cancerbero, Luciferno, Virus
3) Flip Gordon & Star Jr. vs Ángel de Oro & Niebla Roja
4) Stephanie Vaquer & Zeuxis © vs Lady Frost & Tessa Blanchard [CMLL WOMEN]
second defense
5) Adrenalina, Barboza (Jalisco), Calavera Jr. I (Jalisco), Calavera Jr. II (Jalisco), Fantástico, Persa (Jalisco) vs El Hijo De Centella Roja, El Malayo, El Novato (Puebla), Rayo Metálico (Guanajuato), Rey Apocalipsis, Xelhua

Puebla versus Guadalajara this time around. Guadalajara won last year over Mexico City and that looks like the final match up again (though maybe a different outcome.) Rayo Metalico is very thin, Novato is very much a novato. Centella Roja & El Malayo never stood out when Puebla was being streamed. Rey Apocalipsis has his moments and Xelhua gets good reviews. The Guadalajara team is a mix of the guys who’ve taken over El Gallo’s role as the heroic local tecnicos (Adrenalina & Fantastico) and a bunch of a guys who rarely make it out of the openers.

It seems notable the team was Blancard/Isis last week and now it’s Blanchard/Frost this week. However, whenever CMLL brings in a foreigner, they’re going to book them as many times as possible and that was just the spot to use both of them here.

CMLL keeps programming Flip Gordon and Angel de Oro together. I don’t think they can do another hair match with Angel de Oro this soon so it may not be leading anywhere, but CMLL may have decided Angel de Oro was the guy to get Gordon used to wrestling in CMLL.

CMLL put up the first Saturday matches on the higher tier. They’re from the week prior (02/03). It was the opener (minis tag) and the third match (Dulce Gardenia/Disturbio.) CMLL tapes this Arena Coliseo show to air on Heraldo TV. I never get to see the show – the channel has a live stream, but only streams programming it owns – but others who’ve watched say it has the same three match format as all CMLL’s one hour shows. It looks like the CMLL strategy, at least for week one, is that they’ll put a couple of the matches that don’t make the El Heraldo TV cut on YouTube. We’ll give it a few weeks (and at least one title match) to see how it goes, but it’s a very tiny offering. The two matches they aired this week are nothing worth going out of your way to see.

CMLL also put up the 02/05 Puebla show. It was not much better. The undercard was forgettable or worse. The title match was Good in that they kept going longer than a normal trios between these two random teams, but it never felt like they put more thought in than that. They just did a lot of stuff until they got the finish.

Futuro, in an interview with La Razon, said there was a moment two years ago where he thought about quitting wrestling and focusing on school entirely. He just didn’t think he’d ever get a chance to debut in CMLL. Even after he did, when he appeared in the schools tournament last year and had something go wrong, he thought he was doomed. He feels those moments helped him build character and toughness.

Arena Coliseo Guadalajara congratulated indie arena Arena Jalisco on turning 50 years old. That’s another “things are different in Guadalajara” moment; Mexico City wouldn’t acknowledge the existence of other buildings if possible. The Guadalajara scene is a bit closer; there’s been an irregular amount of government sponsored free shows over the last year in small venues where various promotions contribute one match, so I’d guess everyone’s gotten to know each other better.

While I’m at it, that Arena Jalisco 50th Anniverasry show saw Reycko defeat Marvailla Azteca for his mask in the final of a four way. (You may remember Reycko as Chik Tormenta’s husband, who made some AAA cameos the last couple of years.) Reycko Maravilla Azteca is Francisco Javier Ramelero Ramírez, 37 years old, 15 years a wrestler. Metalik & Rey Triton defeated Penta & Makabre in the semi-main. Penta left with a shoulder injury, though others pointed out Penta sometimes works an injury to get away from crowds after matches. This show sold out that building, which looks around a 1000 person capacity.

MLW announced Star Jr. versus Magnus for their 02/29 show. That’s in addition to the Mistico/Rocky Romero match already announced.

FantasticaMania

The first show took place Monday morning Mexico City time.

CMLL, NJPW (MON) 02/12/2024 Osaka Prefectural Gym 2, Osaka, Japan [CMLL, Fuego ene l Ring, NJPW (English), NJPW (Japanese)]
1) Difunto & Douki b Bone Solider Jr. & Gedo
6:14. Bone Solider Jr. is Taiji Ishimori under a mask claiming to be a distant relative.
2) Tiger Mask TLDRAW Magnus [lightning]
Magnus wore a Black Tiger mask and unmasked Tiger Mask after the draw.
3) Bushi, Kamaitachi, Tetsuya Naito, Titán b Brillante Jr., Desperado, Ryusuke Taguchi, Stigma
12:50. Kamaitachi claims to be a second Kamaitachi, with a “Mr. Takahasha” doing his post-match interviews. He pinned Taguchi.
4) Okumura, Strong Machine J, YOH b Dark Panther, Pegasso, Súper Kokeshi Machine [Relevos Increíbles]
10:57. Okumura beat Pegasso. Strong Machine J replaced Master Wato (knee injury) on 01/25. Tomoaki Honma replaced Satoshi Kojima on 02/08 (knee injury). Honma wrestled as the second Super Kokeshi Machine. His mask came off the match and Strong Machine J pointed it was Honma under the mask (a likely reference to the original Strong Machine’s identity being revealed by another wrestler while he was still masked.)
5) Hechicero, Rocky Romero, Soberano Jr. b Atlantis Jr., Templario, Volador Jr.
14:36. Rocky Romero beat Volador Jr. with a Dude Buster to build to their title match. Soberano gifted Rocky Romero with a new Black Tiger mask.
6) Hiroshi Tanahashi, Máscara Dorada, Místico b Francesco Akira, Stuka Jr., Último Guerrero
14:53. Mascara Dorada beat Stuka Jr. via shooting star press, then thanked the fans (briefly in Japanese.)

I haven’t seen this, but it sounds like it what you’d expect from the first night of the tournament. The second and third shows are not taped for TV. They’re back early Friday morning.

Okumura took fellow CMLL wrestlers on a tour through his hometown of Osaka on Sunday. It is sad how much I could recognized solely through a series of video games. “I’ve thrown many people off that bridge” was a real thought I’ll leave with no further explanation.

La Jarochita & Lluvia won their first match in Japan.

The 02/25 Lady’s Ring Lucha Festival will have a five way match of young wrestlers where the winner “will get a chance to study wrestling in Mexico.” I assume that means they’ll end up in CMLL for a bit. The names are Zones, Sumika Yanagawa, Misa Kagura, Honoka and Kizuna Tanaka. I will look up information on the winner and only on the winner after there is a winner.

CMLL/AEW

Mistico beat Matt Sydal on AEW Rampage, and CMLL wrestlers again challenged the BCC to come to Arena Mexico. Jon Moxley and Claudio Castagnoli defeated Star Jr. & Esfinge on AEW Collision on Saturday. I watched part of that one on my phone while at another wrestling show, normal person behavior, and it seemed to alright on the sliding scale of putting Star Jr. and Esfinge on live TV with unfamiliar opponents. Moxley & Castagnoli did another post match interview talking about that challenge. Castagnoli mentioned studying to CMLL, coming to CMLL, getting rejected, and turning himself into the best luchador possible. Castagnoli and Chris Hero did come to Mexico in 2006 in hopes of wrestling in CMLL, had meeting, but never got anywhere with them.

There is an unusual opening in AEW’s schedule this week – there is no Collision on Saturday due to the NBA All Star game – but it wouldn’t make a lot of sense to do the AEW invasion when the top guys aren’t around. Friday the 23rd still is the better fit as an appearance. Homenaje a Dos Leyendas remains the most likely place for a big match.

CMLL is back at vague emoji tweets. It is probably a hint CMLL will be part of Forbidden Door 3, given the last time they were teasing things with those same emojis it was the AEW deal. I’m so unexcited for it. It’ll probably be a good show and a good opportunity. It’s also probably in June, there are exciting things happening now that I’d rather talk about.

I think it’s the repetitive of it; I can explain to one person why AEW is not running a PPV in Arena Mexico (they’d be forfeiting literal millions of dollars), have that person tell me thanks but they don’t care they still believe it’s absolutely happening, and then have another person roll up to ask the same question and this dismiss the answers a few hours later. It’s the never ending “explain to me how to watch CMLL because I can’t be bothered to find out on my own” tweets but for something I don’t even care that much about. This is one of those times where I just need to close up the Twitter window a little bit more because it’s really only a few people who are driving me mad and they only exist to me when that window is open.

Sussy Love did end up wrestling on Saturday’s ROH taping as part of their TV tapings, wrestling Taya in the first round of a tournament for a Women’s TV championship. The match sounded like it went well.

AAA

Luchatitlan is no more. The website is still active but the links to book tickets no longer work. People who’ve bought tickets for upcoming dates have received cancellation notices. Luchadors were told Friday that the show would not continue (and so they needed to move out of their company-provided Acapulco living arrangements ASAP.) Mexico City luchadora Miss Delicious, who had been playing the character Adelita in Luchatitlan, posted a farewell to the character on Instagram. El Fiscal, the son of Abismo Negro who wrestled as el Bastardo, did the same on Facebook. I assume there’s more of those around social media. There’s no official word from Luchatitlan or AAA, but every other indication is Luchatitlan is done.

Luchatitlan was a project funded by AAA and other investors: Puno (who own the mall it took place in), Cocolab (production company) and Ventura Entertainment (operated the show). AAA started work on the project as early as Fall of 2020. AAA’s role was to provide the wrestling knowledge; they scouted and selected the wrestlers, who acted out the same show every night. Luchatitlan had a lot of hype before it opened, with other partners discussing franchising out the idea immediately – their debate wasn’t about success or failure, but which US/European tourism destination in Mexico should get the next one. (Dorian Roldan said it was those outside investors who convinced him to place it in Cancun instead of his original plan for Mexico City, which may have been a pivotal decision.) The show launched on April 3rd (after being pushed back a month), and appeared to do well at first. By summer, attendees posting social media clips from Luchatitlan showed they were playing to some very small audiences. Luchatitlan tried to boost attendance – there was a sellout that just happened to take place the same weekend as a tourist expo, AAA wrestlers started to pop in more frequently – but it doesn’t appear the idea ever caught in. My guess is that annual contracts renewals and leases started to get close and that cause one or more of the parties to give up rather than commit any more money to the project. Luchador Alkymia says he wrestled on 256 shows, and that’s probably close to the total number of events before shutting down.

I didn’t even attend Luchatitlan, so it’s hard for me to put completely sure why it failed. I’ve had a guess though. Those who went said the show was good. It just didn’t appear enough people were persuaded to go. I don’t believe AAA did a good job of using their outlets to promote the show, but I’m not sure if that would’ve made the difference. The thing that stuck out about Luchatitlan from the start was the high prices to attend. CMLL does well with tourists at Arena Mexico, but those tickets are cheap for a foreigner to impulse buy while in Mexico City. Luchatitlan was a pricey upscale ticket. It was a upscale event, you can see the money being used on the staging and the production, but they couldn’t get tourists to take a chance on it at those prices they needed to maintain the business.

Luchatitlan being shut down short of a year is a big issue for the business of AAA, bigger than booking or TV or whatever complaints people have with the product. Dorian Roldan, in previous interviews, said this was ten million project and AAA put down 50% of amount. It’s extremely painful for a company AAA’s size to blow five million dollars in a year. It sure seems like something that would have major consequences for the promotion going forward, economically and otherwise. It’s also AAA getting into bed with another big name partner and coming out scarred with little to show for it. In a big picture, Luchatitlan was supposed to be a possible future for AAA – an authentic lucha libre experience they could provide in a form and on a level that was WWE-proof. Luchatitlan is now clearly not the future – so what does AAA’s future look like now? There’s not a lot of great answers to that question.

AAA’s present is AAA’s Rey de Reyes TV, which continued this Saturday. I should’ve put this together earlier: five unaired matches meant AAA is going to stretch this taping out over three weeks. Every decision AAA makes this year has to now be seen through the lens of AAA losing a bunch of money and has to be risk-adverse. Ideally, the normal wrestling business would be hot enough to make up for the issues elsewhere. AAA’s limited schedule suggests they don’t believe the wrestling is that hot, and “stretching out tapings over more weeks” is the go to strategy of wrestling promotions who are just trying to get through. AAA ran 33 tapings in 2019. They could cut that down to 20 tapings this year if they stretch out all the major shows to three weeks.

The matches, those happened too. The Texano, Cibernetico, Electroshock match was bad. Cibernetico looked terrible, even by Cibernetico standards. He’s worse than Vampiro. Naturally, AAA ran an angle teasing them teaming up against Sam Adonis and whomever. (Adonis still had his sponsored Sexmex shirt, so at least one person is getting value out of his TV time.) Cibernetico was unconvinced of this idea and I’m unsure if he’s a tecnico or face at this point.

The other two three way matches – Laredo/Argenis/Aerostar and Vikingo/Adonis/Psycho – were fine and probably good if watching live. Psycho’s broomstick broke Adonis’ hand in their match – it happened when Psycho was hitting Vikingo to break up a pin on Adonis, a freak thing – and then either that or a knee injury caused a Spanish Fly spot to go badly. Adonis got stretchered out of the match after that, which meant both Vikingo matches included one of the participants being taken away early. They got home fine both times, though I suspect the original finish wasn’t Vikingo beating Psycho clean. Aerostar’s injury was not his fault; Laredo’s stacked up 450 splash ended up being 360 double stomp to Aerostar’s ribs. Aerostar was in visible discomfort but did finish the match.

AAA will presumably air a third week of TV with nothing more than the two women’s qualifying matches. They’ll tape more TV this weekend (though they have at least three unaired episodes.)

IWRG

IWRG (SUN) 02/11/2024 Arena Naucalpan [IWRG]
1) Histeriosis b Ajolotl
2) Kali & Lolita b Bengalee & Zuzu Divine
Kali replaced Dehynna
3) Águila Roja, Rey Halcón, Sádika b Fussion, Keira, Tornado
Sadika challenged Keira to a IWRG WOMEN title match
4) Asterboy, Noisy Boy, Spider Fly b Abigor, Puma de Oro, Yorvak
Puma and Aster talked about a title match, while the Vipers (Arez included) showed up to challenge the Mexaboys again
5) Hijo de Canis Lupus, Jessy Queen, Mamba, Tonalli b Cerebro Negro, Hijo del Fishman, Hijo del Pirata Morgan, Wesley Pipes
Wesley Pipes was a special invitee
6) Ivan Rokov b Hell Boy © [AIWF CHAMP]
was a special invitee. The masked fake DMT Azul helped Rokov and revealed himself to be Vangellys (though no one seemed to recognize him)

The only thing I saw from this show is the clip of the announcers not being able to recognize Vangellys. The fans didn’t. I didn’t either! He had a very set look for many years with the dyed hair and has given up trying. Some of these matches make me think this promotion has also given up trying. On the other hand, there’s a much better chance of seeing a good Vipers match in IWRG than AAA nowadays.

Something is up here with foreign wrestlers. Saturday, IWRG posted a note to Instagram stating they would not use Shocko (who is from Chile) going forward until his immigration and visa paperwork is completed. (Shocko worked in IWRG in January.) They stated they would be happy to consider using Shocko once he’s legally allowed to work in Mexico, but it had been up to him to take care of that part. IWRG also quietly updated their poster for this week to list Ivan Rokov and Wesley Pipes as “special invitees”, and were careful to use that term in the results as well.

I suspect that almost foreign wrestlers who wrestle outside of AAA/CMLL are doing so without getting formal permission from a work visa or similar. They’re probably getting paid less the than cost of getting one and hoping they’re underneath the radar. I’d assume instead that anyone coming in for a weekend or a week is doing it on a tourist visa and skirting the laws that way. It may be for people longer than that; IWRG listing Rokov and Pipes as “special invitees” certainly suggest they’re trying to get around those guys ‘working’ for them by treating them as guests. Shocko hasn’t said anything on Facebook (and his IG is private) so it’s hard to know if this is an issue that started with him and spread to IWRG, or if someone noticed IWRG was running a contest last year to bring in wrestlers from around the world and started to ask questions. If I had to guess, this probably is a Shocko issue – he’s seemingly been living in Mexico for years, and doing so without a valid work visa is going to eventually catch up to him. I don’t know of any current bookings Shocko has, but I’m about a week behind on posters. Still, if this leads to a better crackdown on foreign wrestlers coming to Mexico, it’s going to cause headaches for lots of people.

No lineup for Sunday yet, but there is one a Thursday Lucha Libre Boom show coming up.

IWRG , LLB (THU) 02/29/2024 Arena Naucalpan
1) Basurologo I & Basurologo II vs ? & Demencia
2) Cometa & Príncipe Centauro vs Hijo De Sparta & Papaleito and Argus & Gaius
3) Noisy Boy, Sol, Spider Fly vs Águila Oriental Jr., Visionario, X-Devil
4) Puma vs Tonalli, Hell Boy, Carta Brava, Hijo de Canis Lupus, ?
5) Carnicero, Granjero, Lendaor vs Rhino Ciborg, Rhino Extreme, Rhino Killer
6) Desalmado Ibarra, Hijo de LA Park, LA Park vs Pig Destroyer, Pig Destructor, Pig Pool

The LA Park kids (but not the dad), the Pigs and the other gimmick teams (the Rhinos and the horror characters) seems like one of the weaker Lucha Libre Boom lineups.

Big Lucha

Big Lucha World (FRI) 02/09/2024 Arena Big Lucha, Iztapalapa, Distrito Federal [thecubsfan]
1) Nordico b Sangre Nueva, Shere Khan 
No Demon Boy, so a 2v2 changed to a three way
2) Bendito b Atómico Jr. 
3) Elipse, Iku, Orbita b Hijo De Thor (Costa Rica), Pegaso (Costa Rica), Quimera Jr. (Costa Rica) 
4) Limbo b Emperador Azteca, Vengador 
5) El Potro de Oro & Flamita b Hijo del Pirata Morgan & Jack Evans 
Potro beat Pirata with a spear. All three challenged Pirata after the match, setting up a #1 contender three way for next week.

This was one of the better Big Lucha shows n this run. Bendito/Atomico Jr. had some iffy moments but it was great when it was going great. The opener was fun for the people involved. The last two matches were technically OK if too long. Still no sign of when they might be running a normal show again. The Costa Rica matches continue to be a struggle.

Other

I went to Dreamwave Wrestling on Saturday. It was OK. The one lucah libre related match was a Penta, Mustafa Ali, Gringo Loco and Hijo del Vikingo for the Alternativa title. Ali has lots of history with the promotion so it made sense the promotion wanted to put a title on him now that he’s available again. No one can beat Vikingo, so they did a fourway where Penta took out Vikingo (and himself) with a package piledriver on the apron and Ali went onto beat Gringo. That match was good. It was a hot crowd and a very packed building; not all the stuff interested me but Dreamwave have clearly figured something out. Those guys and some of the indie names were over, but also people I was totally unfamiliar with. The semi-main was a woman’s title match between Brittnie Brooks and Maggie Lee. It’s a very small world: Brooks appears to be the same person who faced Zeuxis in a dark match at least week’s AEW Collision. This was a better match than that and that crowd (with lots of women and young fans) was very into supporting Brooks; there was a much different level of reaction to that match than to the two other women’s matches on that show.

ESTO interviews Golden Power, who talks about his young career and doing both the IWRG and AAA tryouts. (He felt the AAA guys had their favorites going into the competition.)

Cicero Independent has a story about the history of wrestling there locally, interviewing Konnan and Samuray del Sol at last year’s TNA taping.

Segunda Caida reviews more 1991 Monterrey.

CMLL

Tonight’s show

CMLL (FRI) 02/09/2024 Arena México
1) Acero & Pierrothito vs Angelito & Pequeño Olímpico [Relevos Increíbles]
rematch
2) Dulce Gardenia, Espíritu Negro, Rey Cometa vs Apocalipsis, Cholo, Disturbio
3) Marcela & Skadi vs Reyna Isis & Tessa Blanchard
4) Max Star, Rugido, Volador Jr. vs Averno, Euforia, Mephisto
5) Alom, Astro Boy Jr., Dragón de Fuego, Forneo, Hunter, Legendario vs Emperador Jr., Infarto (Laguna), Misterio Blanco, Misterio Negro, Platino Kid (Laguna), Viento Negro [Torneo de Escuelas, semifinal]

CMLL’s effectively working with split rosters for the next two weeks. Volador’s the only FantasticaMania guy left working this show, and that crew won’t be back until time for the 02/23 Arena Mexico show. (They will be back in this hemisphere by the 02/21 AEW Dynamite show, in case that proves relevant.) CMLL’s heavier focus on fewer names means these cards will feel a lot different when those important names are out of town.

That’s a lot of pressure on the youngsters in the main event. They’ve no doubt been going through that match for some time, but doing it in the first Arena Mexico appearance for most of those names is going to be tough. It’s also going to be a test for the audience. A previous Arena Mexico crowd would’ve treated it like a prelim match and taken off early (or not even showed up.) The tourists may not know better. I think the Comarca Lagunera team is the slight favorite, but this is as much about figuring out who’s actually good as the outcome.

Everything else is just getting through the first Friday with (most of) the FantasticaMania roster not present. Match four could be good, match two is a frequent rematch, and match one may be setting something up. It’s not a strong lineup for star power and there’s a lot of variance in that main event.

This will stream live for the 25 USD tier. It’ll go up for the 9 USD tier on 02/18 (or around then.)

CMLL announced Tony Salazar will be the wrestler honored this year at Homenaje a Dos Leyendas. Salazar has been with CMLL for fifty years, as a start in the late 70s/80s, and then a trainer and staff member since leaving the ring. There was some fan push back because other big names haven’t gotten their moment, but Salazar is deserving. Salvador Lutteroth noted that Salazar has been loyal to CMLL all these years, never went anywhere else, and I’m guessing that played a role in the pick.

CMLL uploaded the fixed Reyes del Aire on Wednesdays right before Informa. (I’m traveling this week and haven’t had a chance to watch it yet.) They very briefly mentioned the issue on Inform and moved on. CMLL also announced they’d upload Monday’s Arena Puebla show on Thursday night for all levels. It appeared this was a one off – due to holiday and the title change – and not a ongoing feature.

CMLL (SUN) 02/11/2024 Arena México
1) Robin & Valiente Jr. vs Dr. Karonte I & Enfermero Jr.
2) Fuego & Volcano vs Crixus & Raider
3) Cancerbero, Luciferno, Virus vs Akuma, Dark Magic, Espanto Jr.
4) Amapola, Hera, Tessa Blanchard vs Metálica, Stephanie Vaquer, Zeuxis
5) Futuro, Hombre Bala Jr., Neón vs Hijo del Villano III, Villano III Jr., Zandokan Jr.
6) Atlantis, Flip Gordon, Star Jr. vs Bárbaro Cavernario, Dragón Rojo Jr., Terrible

Informa pushed the idea of Futuro, Neon and Hombre Bala as a team, though it may be a one week idea. That could be a good match.

CMLL (MON) 02/12/2024 Arena Puebla
1) Centella Roja & Hijo de Centella Roja vs Dreyko & Fénix SO
2) El Novato vs El Perverso [lightning]
3) La Catalina & Stephanie Vaquer vs Lady Frost & Tessa Blanchard
4) Dulce Gardenia, Espíritu Negro, Rey Cometa vs El Malayo, Rey Apocalipsis, Siky Ozama
5) Esfinge, Fugaz, Star Black vs Hijo del Villano III, Villano III Jr., Zandokan Jr.
6) Atlantis, Flip Gordon, Star Jr. vs Bárbaro Cavernario, Dragón Rojo Jr., Terrible

Lady Frost returns. She did well in her previous run (October to December 2022), and seemed to be liked well by CMLL. Frost then worked on a US indie show with AAA wrestlers and it seems like CMLL went cold on her. She’s been active on AEW/ROH this past year. This wasn’t billed as Frost coming in from AEW, but obviously the relationship between CMLL and AEW make it smoother. CMLL having a couple of open spots with no Lluvia and Jarochita for a month also helps.

CMLL (TUE) 02/13/2024 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara
1) Demonio Maya & Mandala vs Amenanza Negra Jr. & Minotauro
2) Abigor La Pesadilla & Cris Skin vs Guerrero de la Muerte & Shezmu
3) Johnny Dinamo & Princ Drago vs Canalla & Principe Daniel
4) Black Boy, Thunder Boy, Yaky Boy vs Astro Oriental, Calavera Jr. I, Calavera Jr. II
5) Gallo Jr., Ráfaga, Rafaga Jr. vs Misterio Blanco, Misterio Negro, Misterioso Jr.
6) Satánico & Trono vs Halcón Suriano & Halcón Suriano Jr.
7) Lady Amazona, Sexy Sol, Skadi vs Andrómeda, La Maligna, Persephone
8) Dulce Gardenia & La Fashion vs Bestia Negra & Furia Roja

The three undercard matches are more Gran Alternativa preview matches. The concept, explaining on Tuesday’s broadcast, is a league style tournament. There will be two groups of six in a round robin matches and a final. The winner gets a trophy. That format, assuming three matches a show, means the tournament will run 11 weeks. It’ll be around for quite a while.

CMLL/FantasticaMania

Satoshi Kojima is off the FantasticaMania tour. He picked up a knee injury in MLW and will miss the next run of shows. Tomoaki Honma picks up some of the dates, with Ryusuke Taguchi filling in on the final.

That FantasticaMania tour actually starts before the next news post. They’ll be airing a show early Monday morning

CMLL, NJPW (MON) 02/12/2024 Osaka Prefectural Gym 2, Osaka, Japan
1) Difunto & Douki vs Gedo & Taiji Ishimori
2) Tiger Mask vs Magnus [lightning]
3) Brillante Jr., Desperado, Ryusuke Taguchi, Stigma vs Bushi, Kamaitachi, Tetsuya Naito, Titán
4) Dark Panther, Pegasso, Tomoaki Honma vs Okumura, Strong Machine J, YOH [Relevos Increíbles]
Strong Machine J replaced Master Wato (knee injury) on 01/25. Tomoaki Honma replaced Satoshi Kojima on 02/08 (knee injury)
5) Atlantis Jr., Templario, Volador Jr. vs Hechicero, Rocky Romero, Soberano Jr.
6) Hiroshi Tanahashi, Máscara Dorada, Místico vs Francesco Akira, Stuka Jr., Último Guerrero

Magnus wore a Tiger Mask style mask on Informa; he’s going in to this lightning match with respect. The rest is the usual tag matches building up the tour ending singles match.

As a reminder, Monday’s show air on NJPW World. Tuesday and Wednesday’s shows do not air at all. They’re back streaming on Friday (and Saturday, Sunday and Monday.) All shows start at either 1 AM CT or 1:30 AM CT. NJPW puts VOD up after the show, though it may be a little bit of time.

Stardom’s Starlight Kid and Ruaka will be Lluvia and La Jarochita’s opponents on the 02/17 FantasticaMania show.

CMLL wrestlers and Salvador Lutteroth attended a party at the Japanese embassy on Thursday.

I guess this goes in this section? The Wrestling Observer Newsletter reports Stephanie Vaquer was slated to win the IWGP Women’s Championship from Giulia at the April NJPW US show in Chicago, but that’s not happening now. Giulia is finishing up with Stardom in March, is going to WWE sometime after, and is highly unlikely to be working for NJPW US in between. I wrote here at the time that it appeared NJPW US was setting up Vaquer as the next challenger on the January show, so the idea it was supposed to happen in April seems plausible. It’s unknown what the plan is now – if Vaquer will end up going to Japan, or if someone else will defeat Giuila or if the title will just be vacant. (Stardom fans would obviously prefer a title win by someone on their roster if Guilia is going to do one more big loss on the way out, but figuring out who’s staying on the Stardom roster in a month’s time as a related mess.) It’s strange NJPW US didn’t do any title change in January, since it appears people behind the curtain knew Giuila wasn’t going to be around by April; perhaps that means there is a contingency plan.

CMLL/AEW

Jon Moxley, Claudio Castagnoli, and Bryan Danielson defeated Hechicero, Mascara Dorada and Volador Jr. on AEW Dynamite. I still think the CMLL team needs to get a win on one of the bigger AEW TV shows, but AEW decided to keep it going by having that win come via unseen foul. Star Jr., Mistico and Esfinge watched the match from ringside and jumped the rail in objection to the manner of winning. More AEW wrestlers ran out to count them.

This all leads to Mistico versus Matt Sydal tonight on AEW Rampage, as well as Star Jr. & Esfinge versus Claudio Castagnoli & Jon Moxley on AEW Collision Saturday. Danielson and the other CMLL wrestlers are all headed to NJPW for shows this weekend. Star Jr. & Esfinge were picked from among the CMLL luchadors who aren’t going to FantasticaMania and do have US visa. I think I would’ve picked Barbaro Cavernario over either Star or Esfinge, but I’m not sure what his status is and it’s possible he has some other commitment on Saturday; he’s not on the Coliseo card.

CMLL being stretchered all over the place is probably a big reason that Coliseo main event is Atlantis, Blue Panther and Flip Gordon against the Hermanos Chavez & Gran Guerrero. There’s obviously an eagerness on AEW’s side to keep this feud going but it may be tough for the next couple of weeks.

Zeuxis wrestled on a dark match on Wednesday’s AEW taping; it sounds like it wasn’t taped for ROH. (It also sounds like it didn’t go well.) Sussy Love was also there and was scheduled to wrestle at one point; it’s possible she’ll turn up Saturday. This is not directly related to the main AEW/CMLL story; I believe the idea is AEW/ROH is casting a wide net for people to include it’s upcoming (or maybe ongoing) Ring of Honor TV tournament.

I know people want to see Stephanie Vaquer also in this mix – either part of Ring of Honor or the greater CMLL/AEW feud. If CMLL has a title on her and NJPW is planning on putting a title on her, it just doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense for her to show up in AEW TV to have well received matches and lose most of them. If the plan is for her still be eventually to be the IWGP women’s champ, it would take an unlikely change in booking philosophy for her to make sense on AEW TV.

AAA

AAA this week will have the second part of Rey de Reyes, where they air all the matches that led to the matched you’ve already seen. They’ll also air vignettes teasing directions for wrestlers that they’ll never actually move on. It should be fantastic.

(I’m going to the Dreamwave wrestling show Saturday night so I’m not sure I’ll be able to record this.)

The first part of Rey de Reyes will go up on YouTube on Sunday night and it’s worth checking out at least the main event.

I don’t want to keep harping on this point but – whatever you think of Esfinge and Star Jr., they’re not big CMLL names. They’re not in the top dozen CMLL stars, they may not crack the top twenty. They likely wouldn’t have been the picks if everyone was available, but whatever, they’re going to be on US TV on Saturday and that’s a huge career achievement they may talk about the rest of their lives. I’m a little anxious how that’s going to go – Star Jr. is up and down even in Arena Mexico – but they’re getting that chance to work US TV. AAA has many names who are as big of a stars as those two and better wrestlers, and they didn’t make it to AEW TV. I tried to be clear that the AAA/AEW relationship was never as much a relationship as it was portrayed externally (and internally) once AEW TV got rolling, and you can see the difference in how the CMLL/AEW relationship has worked out. I’m confident there are AAA wrestlers who were convinced to remain AAA wrestlers with a promise that AAA would get them to US TV – be it AAA on their own, or with Impact or AEW or even MLW back when that was a thing. MLW wasn’t a thing for long and didn’t work out for those involved. For whatever reason, Impact has not worked out great for those involved – it’s easy paydays but not much more. Those same guys are watch (or more likely seeing bits on Instagram) guys like Star Jr. and Esfinge get a shot they believed was promised to them, and I’m sure they’re unhappy about it. Those same kind of guy are the cannon fodder of the Origines crew this year, and that’s not going to be a fun experience either. I think Aramis leaving was an effect of that – maybe AAA’s good work but expectations and promises weren’t met and so he thought he might as well see what he can do on his own for a while. No idea if anyone else will make the same move – it’s one thing to talk to friends about doing it, it’s another far scarier thing to actually make that move – but I’m certain that discussion is happening right now.

Big Lucha

They’re back on Friday

Big Lucha World (FRI) 02/09/2024 Arena Big Lucha, Iztapalapa, Distrito Federal
1) Nordico & Sangre Nueva vs Demon Boy & Shere Khan
2) Bendito vs Atómico Jr.
3) Elipse, Iku, Orbita vs Hijo De Thor (Costa Rica), Pegaso (Costa Rica), Quimera Jr. (Costa Rica)
4) Emperador Azteca vs Limbo vs Vengador
5) El Potro de Oro & Flamita vs Hijo del Pirata Morgan & Jack Evans

The main event plays off last week’s title change and post match happenings. Bendito and Atomico could be great, though those two might work better as allies.

Other News

El Hijo del Dr. Wagner Jr. held a press conference Thursday to talk about his GHC Heavyweight Championship win. Wagner 3G felt he had to wrestle outside of Mexico if he ever wanted to escape his father’s shadow. He and Galeno del Mal have both wondered if they’ll ever be able to surpass him; Dr. Wagner Jr. is a superstar and still is one. Wagner 3G feels he could’ve stayed in Mexico and been in main events but he had to go elsewhere if he ever wanted to make his mark. That place was NOAH, where he’s been for the last four years , leading him to becoming champion. Wagner talked about the win being bittersweet; he was champion but his family wasn’t there to share in the moment, he was celebrating alone. Wagner pushed back at social media criticism of this title belt “being like Naucalpan” (of no importance), telling those people to look at the list of those who’ve held this title and the value it’s had. Wagner says he’s signed with NOAH through 12/29, but his contract allows him four months away from Japan. He’s now headed to Europe for a month – to France, London and Germany. His first title defense will be on 03/31.

El Sol del Cordoba has a profile of 16 year old luchadora Diosa del Sol.

AAA EMW Tijuana’s main event on their 02/17 show is Laredo Kid, Octagon Jr., and Pentagon Jr. against Marty Scurll, Matt Cardona, QT Marshall. At one point, this would lead to people being upset with Marshall and Cardona for weeks. No one cares much more past than an angry quote tweet nowadays; there’s not going to be any meaningful pressure on the other wrestlers or the promotion for using them. The volume will be turned up when Scurll is announced for a TripleMania. (Though the difference there is these EMW cards seem more Konnan’s vision and Dorian Roldan seems to have bigger influence on the crucial TripleMania decisions.)

RIOT announced Travis Banks versus Rene Rocks for their 03/02 show. Rocks is the Morelia luchador who works a hard hitting Japanese junior heavyweight style, Banks wrestles similarly. The two had matches in Rocks’ home promotion of SCW, then for DTU, and now they’re taking the bit to RIOT. Travis Banks is getting booked more often again, and RIOT is a pretty high profile place.

Travis Banks also recently appeared on the Cosas de Vestidores podcast. The hosts of the show are also promoting a show with Banks on it, and the podcast was billed as Travis Banks “finally telling his side of the story.” It’s a Spanish language podcast though Banks does the interview in English. Both Banks and the hosts assume the listener has some vague impression of Banks being canceled but never explain that situation, instead focusing on the aftermath from Banks’ perspective. Banks feels like he was added to a list of people who did much worse thing than he did, and he doesn’t think it’s right that he’s treated as if he was as bad at them. Banks also believes fans should separate the personal and professional life, and that fans should leave the outside the ring stuff alone. He had invested his life in wrestling, his money in wrestling, and it was the only thing he wanted to do – he didn’t know what his life would be without wrestling. He felt that Banks says he had to leave the UK after being fired from NXT UK “for various reasons” and his visa expiring. He wanted to go to Japan, but they weren’t taking him for reasons and it was hard to get a visa at that time anyway. “Flamita and others I knew from Progress wrestling suggested I go to Mexico.” Banks pushes back at the idea that he only came to Mexico because he couldn’t go elsewhere; he says that’s partially true, but he also wanted to learn lucha libre and be part of it’s history in some way. He wanted to show that he could add value to a show, that he would be professional and not be a problem, and all the bad stuff he did was in his past. Banks credits his hard hitting matches with Los Golpeadors in IWRG – and Black Terry Jr. posting a highlight video of the stiff exchanges – in getting him over with the Mexican fans. He feels like something’s happened in the last few months that’s gotten him more bookings suddenly and he excited about it.

There’s a lot that seems left out. It’s obviously a choice not mention what Travis Banks did to be put on that list, or the “various reasons” he was fired from NXT UK. Banks was accused of using his position as trainer to manipulate an underage wrestler into a relationship with him, then emotionally abused her throughout the relationship and continued to harass her after she tried to break it off. She also alleged other women had similar experiences. WWE parted ways with Banks after those allegations came to light. Banks did not discuss why he would need to travel to Japan or Mexico to continue his wrestling career instead of being able to do it in his home area of New Zealand and Australia. When Banks came up previously, a prominent member of that Oceania wrestling scene reached out to me to let me know they’d also had issues with Banks there, and implied Banks was unwelcome in wrestling in that part of the world. (Banks hasn’t wrestled in Australia or New Zealand since being fired from NXT UK.) Banks talks about the allegations only in terms of how it affected him: that’s it nearly cost him the one thing he wanted most of all, that the unfairness lies in how hard he’s been punished, that he’s a changed guy, and that he shouldn’t have to continue to pay for a mistake he made six years ago. At no point are the words “I did something wrong” or anything like it come out of his mouth. The only remorse shown is for how being on a Speaking Out list has hurt him.

Travis Banks credit girlfriend Jesse Jackson for being the most supportive figure in his life and in convincing him to continue on wrestling. Banks appears to be in a healthier relationship than in the past. He also still appears to have the same manipulative tendencies. His big point if that wrestling fans should only pay attention to the professional life of a wrestler and have no opinion on their personal life. He’s saying this on a podcast where he’s opening up on his personal life – not just about Speaking Out, but attempting to tell charming stories about the adventures he’s had in Mexico. They wrap up the show talking about his podcast and his Instagram and his TikTok, where you can see the real Travis Banks. He’s no different from most every other wrestler; he want to sell you a filtered view of his real life so you’ll bug RIOT to book him for a months or that you’ll buy his shirts at shows. That’s fine, that’s what wrestling is in 2024 and has been some time. It’s also hypocritical to start complaining about people paying attention to your real life when you no longer control the filter. Banks is fine with making that tradeoff until something negative comes out of it.

The point of that interview was to showcase Travis Banks as a friendly guy you should have no problem watching and rooting for it, be it for CVW or for RIOT or forever. It’s a podcast as a permissions structure. I, someone who was heavily skeptical of Banks to begin with, just found more stuff to dislike. Even stuff that was meant to be endearing like Banks talking about how he wanted to be learn lucha libre and the culture felt so fake – how much do you really want to be part of this if you’re doing interviews in English and doing the same UK indie style you’ve been doing all along after two years on this shows? Any case to write off one wrestler in Mexico will inevitably be responded three times over with ‘whatabout’ response; “if you’re canceling him, why aren’t you doing the same to [X]?” In this once case, the answer is easier for me: I just don’t find much to like about him. The more he wants to sell everyone on what a great guy he really is, the faker he seems. I also know my position on all of this is close to immaterial; Mexican fans already generally had no problems with Travis Banks on their shows. This podcast existed just for the few people who had questions and wanted gentle assurances there was nothing to think about here, be it the people watching or the people booking him.