The big news coming out of the show
– Mistico & Santo are coming in as a team to the Congress Theatre on 09/24. No mention of opponents, ticket prices, start time, anything like that.
– Tarzan Boy has some abdomen injury which kept him from wrestling. He came to the ring, showed his taped ribs to the crowd, apologized for no wrestling, the usual thing.
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This time, “6:00 pm” turned out to be doors open time. Ticket situation was a bit crazy; you could either pay $5 for ringside or get in free, but either way, you had to have a ticket. The people keeping the line in order didn’t make it clear enough to everyone, so the people at the door were constantly arguing with people who thought they didn’t need a ticket to get in (and had to find someway to get back thru the mob trying to get to the door and into the mob trying to get to the ticket window.) The topper was the security at the door took your ticket, free or ringside, and left you with no wristband or whatever to indicate you were ringside. Once you got in, you could sit where you wanted, regardless of what you paid; the ringside cost was just a stupid tax.
Naturally, I paid the stupid tax.
Balcony was closed off; there were signs on it signing “broken ring”, which surely means something to someone. They need to get that fixed by September. The lower level ended up being about 80% filled; less than I was expecting for a free show. I think they were trying to make their money back this time on concessions – what was a $1 bottle of water was $3 this time, and other prices went up slightly less crazily.
Pre-show, they had a repeating 15 second commercial for Santo/Mistico on the stage’s big screen. Around 6:30, they introduced a male Mexican singer, who sung 6-7 songs. Reaction was “okay, but where’s the lucha.”
1: Mascara de Jade beat Silueta Azul in straight falls.
If you are either of these two men, please stop reading. This match was quite the opposite of good. My favorite blown spot was the awful backdrop, but there was some competition. Azul was the theoretical tecnico (he threw a stuffed animal to the crowd during his entrance), but Jade was doing more tecnico bits in the match, which led the crowd to cheer for him, which made Silueta Azul very sad. Azul’s (left?) leg got worked on during the match. Post match, he spent three minutes limping around in the ring, begging for some sympathy cheers. No luck. Azul then tried demanding a mask match to get the crowd behind him, and that didn’t work. (Despite this – and because he’s a guy in a cool blue mask at a lucha show with tons of kids – he was besieged with autograph requests when he finally left the ring.)
In between matches, they had someone who’d turn out to be a bandleader come out and do a long monologue. He might have been a comedian, he might have been a storyteller, I have no idea what was going on here. I do remember him telling the crowd they could laugh or applaud, which got them to do it a tiny bit.
2: PATO LOCO and Acero Dorado beat Gringo Loco and Guerrerito del Futuro in three falls
This was a nice surprise; no one but GdF was listed on this card. Gringo Loco not only brought out the tortillos (and stalks of corn) again, but new tights – with the international symbol for no over a Mexican flag on his butt. People would yell at him, he’d show them the crossed out flag on his backside, people will yell at him more. This was great, crowd very much was into booing him.
Match was a rudo showcase; Gringo Loco got in a tope con giro and 450 splash in the first fall to help win it for his team, and then they were taking nice bumps to make the tecnicos look good, even carrying them thru near blown spots. Futuro took the first ever top rope Duck Splash I’ve seen (looks a lot like a Frog Splash), but Loco got pinned when he tried to block a Dorado sunset flip and Crazy Duck pulled his tights down. Third fall was more the tecnicos getting flashy spots (this is where the rudos helped out a bit; this would’ve been a much lesser match with usual rudos) and the tecs getting simultaneous sunset flips for the win. Good match.
BTW, Pato Loco is over. Kids love the duck, and it’s awesome mask. But we were thinking he needs to take it to the next level, and start doing wacky duck-like things in the ring. Quacking on comebacks, waddling around, flapping his wings around on a dive – there’s some untapped potential here. (Pato Loco is also a great example of something that’s awesome live in audience with kids and families but I don’t know if it would play well on TV with a different audience.)
In between matches here, a marichi band played. I was actually going to pay attention to this, maybe, but they let the kids play around in the ring, and watching 60 kids jump around on the ropes and bump into each other is always entertaining. Lots more older kids getting in and fooling around for photos as well.
(Not that it matters much, but the whole thing with kids in the ring was weird the whole show – at parts it was okay, at parts it was not, at parts it wasn’t okay till five seconds later when it was cool. There seemed to be hired security who told people they’d be working till 111, but after this point in the show, they mostly vanished. After allowing the people in the first three matches to be mobbed after they left the ring, the impromptu building security yelled at people if they moved towards a wrestler any time they were out of the ring. Very fluid.)
Anyway, no one much paid attention to the band, and I felt a bit sorry for them. But the wackiness in the ring was quite awesome.
3: SWAT Kat & Lancer 2000 beat Coco Negro & Coco Verde
I think Coco Verde announced he was a new father (son) before the match.) The Payasos still worked rudo and the match was good though it slowed down a bit too much in the third, though I’m failing at remember details. It’s the usual match with these guys, with wacky evil clown bits and dives from the tecnicos and all that good stuff. It seems like SWAT Kat has been working against the Cocos for about a year straight, and they’ve got the match figured by this point. SWAT’s mask got untied during the match, and they teased (or screwed up) pulling it up for the finish, but the Clowns ended up winning by completely legal means in the end.
This reminds me – there was a guy taping the first three matches on a handheld camera, but then morphed into a security type after the paid security seemed to vanish. (I presume the taping was for the wrestlers and not for sale. Didn’t see the DVDs this time either, now that I think of it.) If there was someone taping the main event, I didn’t see it, and they weren’t allowing people to bring video cameras and the like inside.
This was the only match which took place as listed. Should’ve taken the under.
In between THESE matches, they brought out Tarzan Boy (in street clothes) and Blue Panther (in gear and t-shirt) to sell their merchandise and photos. Blue Panther got a lot more business, which sorta surprised me. The t-shirt he was selling looked great (half angry snarling feral Blue Panther, half angry snarling feral blue panther) and he had masks to sell, which Tarzan’s stuff didn’t look nearly as cool. The most attention Tarzan got was from some guy standing ten feet away and heckling him for five minutes straight, for no discernible reason. Tarzan did his best to ignore him, but then the heckler insisted on a “I’m just kidding, we’re good” handshake. Tarzan finally acknowledged the heckler to shake his hand and get him out of there, but the guy went right back to heckling. Overworked impromptu security got the heckler out of there (for a while.)
4: Principe Unlimited, Rayo Lasser, Atlas beat Septiembre Negro Jr., Aguila del America, “Starro”
I’m not sure the name of the giant white man wearing a big star mask and cape which read “Bumpin’ Uglies”, but I’m almost positive he was the guy who puked twice outside the ring. (I was lucky enough to see it, but was told about it and saw the after effects.) That was no cool. This was a lot crowd brawling and less in ring stuff, and I didn’t think it was quite as good as the previous two matches, though it was nice to get an actual trios match here. I believe the rudos took the first fall, the tecs the second, and the rules changed in the third to where everyone had to be eliminated for the fall to end. It came down to Principe Unlimited versus Aguila del America, Unlimted having a rollup, one rudo distracting the ref while the other rudo pulled Principe’s mask. Aguila got the pin, and they did two minutes of teases before overturning it and giving it to the tecnicos. Post match, everyone hit everyone else with a chair and then challenged them to a mask match.
Septiembre Negro Jr. (who, as a rudo, was wearing an Eddie Guerrero RIP shirt – actually, I’m sure we’ll be seeing that on WWE TV real soon) and Principe Unlimited came back to the ring for the single fall five minute mask/mask match, a bit people have done approximately a billion times here in the last two years, and like every single other time, the tecnico pins the rudo within 5 seconds with a sunset flip for a quick three count. Except, they forgot to inform the ref about it, and he had left to the back after the original match ended, so there was no one to make that quick three count. The wrestlers just kinda stayed there for a while, the fans counted, and Septiembre Negro Jr. left. That was funny.
In between these matches – wait, there actually might have no been anything really between these matches! It was past 9:30 at this point, for a show with 4 matches and listed start time of 6:30.
Actually, this is when Tarzan Boy came out, showed off his taped midsection, and introduced his replacement – CK3. I guess it could’ve been Danny Daniels. Apparently, most of this crew is going to LA to work a FMLL show with Santo, but Parka’s heading to Detroit for IWR (opposite CK3.) So, he was available and/or Parka’s ride, I figure.
5: Super Astro & La Parka beat Blue Panther & CK3
This was the usual good La Parka match. Everyone worked their traditional roles here, Panther as rudo and Parka as tecnico. They did a lot of mat stuff with Panther and Astro to start (Astro was wearing his mask) but the fans were really wanting to see La Parka do La Parka stuff. A lot of crowd brawling in the second and more comedy spots in the third (though I may have it in the wrong order; I’m pretty sure the Panther/Parka chop contest was here.) CK3 appeared to be a smart worker here; he realized the fans were here to see the other three and so he sold for their bits and didn’t try to get his stuff in, and he just grabbed a hold and took a break if there was action going on outside the ring, like during a lengthy Parka/Panther crowd brawling segment (where they went around half the building.) Super Astro was impressive for his size and age, and Panther was fun as a rudo and had a group of supporters. Third fall finish was Astro doing a dive on Panther, and Parka nailing CK3 with the top rope corkscrew moonsault.
Most people left after, but they brought back Panther, Astro, and finally Parka for $10 polaroids. Wait was long, but it was cool. I got over there around 10:45-11:00.
It was a long show, but very enjoyable.