2008 IWRG and Major Indy Records

We close out this feature by looking at two intermixed categories: the wrestlers of IWRG, and significant wrestlers who are not regulars in any promotion.

I’ve tried to follow the formula of Puebla and Guadalajara and distill down the IWRG list to those who work they’re regularly and don’t disappear when the TV (and the money from TV) does. It’s a bit iffy, and I realized that I still haven’t matched up the Oficials to the previous gimmicks (here or the wiki, come to think of it.) And we have the problem of two guys using the name Eragon at the same time for no particular reason. Did I ever tell you that, should I ever become National Commissioner of Lucha Libre, my first act would be create a national registry of licensed wrestlers and immediately prohibit anyone new from using the same name as an active/recently active wrestler? (ACT 2: one Hijo/Jr./II per gimmick. EVER.)

Anyway, what I have is what I have and that’s what we’ll go with. The Oficials strong run thru the year has given them high win percentage, unusually so for rudos. Local rudos seem to much better than average here, and I think it might because the outsiders usually are brought in as tecnicos and there’s quite a bit of rudo wins. Plus, the more experienced regulars here are almost all on the rudos side.

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01/22: Naucalpan, Puebla, Wagner

IWRG (SUN) 01/18 Arena Naucalpan [the gladiatores]
1) Galactik b Comando Gama
2) Eragon & Goleador b Anticristo Jr. & Avisman
3) Black Terry, Cerebro Negro, Dr. Cerebro DQ Chico Che, Gemelo Fantastico I, Gemelo Fantastico II
4) Pendulo, Trauma I, Trauma II b Oficial 911, Oficial AK47, Oficial Fierro
5) Tetsuya, Toxico AAA, Veneno b Freelance, Fuerza Guerrera, Zumbido

Fuerza did not turn on his teammates, but appears to be done as a tecnico here. Tecnicos bumbled their way to a loss and Fuerza and Zumbdio fought each other after the match and talks about doing a title match. (Fuerza’s IWRG Welterweight champ, hard to remember.) I’m sure I’m not the only one who finds it weird that Freelance is back with no explanation. I know you have to go back and do it again so you don’t get scared of it, but I think I’d still take a week off after going into convulsions. This may be why I’m not a luchador!

Though Pendulo was announced as in the match, Zatura is supposed to be the Traumas third. He couldn’t be this week because the Oficials beat him so badly last match, and he came out before the match to apologize. So, the Oficials beat him up again. Tecnicos still won the match in two falls to set up the title match tonight. Ovaciones has an interview with the Oficials tonight, who say the Traumas & Zatura are skilled, but they’ll hold onto the title and hope to take the hairs of Black Terry & the Cerebros this year.

(fixed) Gemelo Fantasticos are having issues with referee Reyes Rosas. They tried to get him booted from the match before it started, but the commission would not allow it. One of the Gemelos hit Rosas by accident to get the first fall DQ. Second fall was also a rudo DQ win, when a Gemelo hit the other referee this time, Cerebro Negro fouled that twin, faked his own foul and got the win off the fake.

CMLL (MON) 01/19 Arena Puebla [hugo999 @ Box Y Lucha]
1) King Jaguar, Super Star, SWAT b Aguila Guerrera, Ares, Toro Bill Jr.
2) Karisma, Policeman, Toro Bill Sr. b Blue Center, Lestat, Tigre Rojo
3) Dark Angel, Lluvia, Marcela b Hiroka, Princesa Sujei, Rosa Negra
4) La Máscara, Místico, Valiente b Black Warrior, Dragon Rojo Jr., Sangre Azteca
5) La Sombra b Mephisto [NWA WELTER]

Mephisto had his father Kahoz as his cornerman. Didn’t help.

Dr. Wagner Jr. is listed as wrestling on the March 2 Arena Cuatro Caminos de Nuevo Laredo show. That’s an AAA spot show and he’s teaming with Silver King vs Zorro & Electroshock. That doesn’t necessarily mean he’s joining AAA – he can work spot shows without every being on TV – but there has been talk in that direction. The indy scene is not a fun way to make a living, but March 2nd is also a long way away.

(Reforma via Jazzo) Black Spider, as NWA-Mexico VP, adds more to what Blue Demon has been saying lately; they’re running a show in Japan in March as part of the Lucha Festival, celebrating the relationship between Mexico and Japan, invited their by NJPW. That’s going to be awkward. They also have been invited to the US by the NWA there in March, but dates aren’t set.

Also in Reforma, Villano 3 wants Blue Panther’s hair.

The Original Gronda is expected to be out a full year after suffering from acute pancreatitis. Basically, he felt sick, couldn’t keep any food down, and went to the hospital. They weren’t sure what was wrong until they did exploratory surgery and found kidney stones and a nearly exploded pancreas. Until some enzymes in his system go down to a much lower level, he can’t actually put anything in his stomach, so he’s stuck in the hospital on intravenous fluid until things get better and it’ll be a long recovery after that. Gronda mentions he was oh so close to return to a major company – there were talk of him going back to AAA (to work with the other Gronda) but it sounded like it fell apart on money. FWIW, here’s a link to the causes of acute pancreatits.

NWE is not running in February. They told SuperLuchas that it was economy issue, and they’re now planning on running 07/03 in Monterrey and 07/04 in Mexico City, and then elsewhere in Latin America in September. That’s a long way off.

Hiroka talks to Box Y Lucha about her career. When Pequeno Damian went to Japan for Dradtion, Hiroka went with so they could visit her family for the first time. Hiroka says her parents were upset when she moved to Mexico, but are now happy because she won a lot and took Lady Apache’s hair. Hiroka also says she’d like to be a mom this year.

Princesa Blanca explains the deal with her turn to Box Y Lucha – she was minding her own business, and Marcela would “accidentally” hit her every week, and then Lady Apache and Sahori started doing and Blanca was not going to stand for that. Blanca says she’s Marcela needs to accept that Blanca is the better wrestler. Plus, now Felino is teaching Princesa Blanca all sorts of helpful rudo tricks, so she’ll be even better.

Super Fly says “Fuerza Aerea” is an AAA owned concept so Pegasso & Rey Cometa can’t really be Fuerza Aerea in CMLL. Still, he knows they’ll be great there if given the opportunity. Super Fly wants a big match with Electroshock at TripleMania and to advance farther in Rey de Reyes.

Chessman explains he’s teaming with the Psycho Circus because they’re winners and he doesn’t team with losers. Fair enough.

Bam Bam says he’d be willing to fight Freelance to see who’s best, but they’ll have to do it in a gym some place because it’ll be a while before Freelance makes it to Arena Mexico. Bam Bam’s 2009 goals are Mr. Aguilita’s hair, a chance at the lightweight title, and a rematch with Pequeno Damian. He also wouldn’t mind being like Virus and getting a shot at being a full weight. 2008 was a good year – he won title, he won Pequeno Violencia’s hair, and his first daughter was bron.

Hector Garza’s responce to Alex Koslov accusing him of ripping him off? “Who is Alex Koslov?” Also, foreigners have ripped off everything from the Mexicans so it should be theirs to begin with. Garza’s goals for 2009 were revenge on Averno & Mephisto and getting back the trios titles. One down!

Villano III and Gran Cochisse talk about Aguila India. Super Muenco talks about his recently deceased father El Sanguinario.

AAA mentioned a whole bunch of foreign wrestling sites who cover AAA. Except, they don’t really.

Of them, powerwrestling.de, wrestlingcorner.de, kingdomofdesire.de, wrestlingferver.de don’t seem to have covered AAA recently. The Chinese site is just a reprint of the AAA/Warped Tour press release. wrestlingzone.ru does write about AAA and CMLL, but only as it comes up in the usual newsbites taken from the WrestlingObserver. swewrestling.com might have been covering AAA, but has switched to just being a wrestling forum. And mehr20dad.persianblog.ir is actually a (heavily WWE/TNA) match sharing site. It does have old AAA matches. wrestlingrevolution.de doesn’t seem to exist (or is a site to promote an indy now.)

WagnerMania looks at the Astro de Oro vs Dr. Wagner Jr. feud in Guatemala.

SuperLuchas is now selling offical Lizmark and Axxel gear.

LuchaWorld has Robert on the MVS shows from 08/18 and 08/19/07, CMLL 07/28/07 and 07/06/07, as well as KrisZ’s news update.

01/24-25 Lucha Times

The Wednesday night LATV airing of GdR turns out to be the same show on Saturday. Didn’t see the Sunday one, but since everyone says it was a Grey Shadow show, I have no idea what that means for week to week. Might as well tape it all and figure it out later.

LATV’s listings, at least the one they send out to cable companies, is still not updated. If you use a DVR that normally works by program name, you’ll have to set up a manual recording to catch these shows for the time being.

Saturday 7pm EST
Sunday 7pm EST
Wednesday 11pm EST

The Wednesday’s taping is listed as Ras de Lona on guide. That won’t air this week until tommorow afternoon, even then it may be a rerun or an episode 4 days late from Mexico. What would be neat is if I could let you watch the episode of that, right now, even if you didn’t have access to LATV.

Oh, wait, I can:

I didn’t know what blip.tv was until about an hour ago, when I was idly googling stuff to see what might turn up. What did turn up is someone uploading a lot of MVS shows on the site, complete and great quality. Looks like a legal upload, even! In usual form, no one’s gotten around to mention this (and they’ve been doing it for a couple months, by the looks of it.)

Checked for Guerreros del Ring. Sorry, no luck there.

chart

AAA-US: part 2 of best of.

52MX: Dos/Marco/Toscano vs Terrible/Texano/HOOLIGAN.

LATV/FOX: Blanca on the ruda side, Virus/Purpura and Mistico/Warrior?

CMLL: 1:45, so maybe top 3

AAA-MEX: first taping from ’09, with the Psycho Circus/Chessman vs Sect, Abismo/Parka/Mesias vs Abyss/Electro/Konnan

C3: Poder Mexica and not so much powerful Hijo del Avernos

01/31 AAA TV Lineup (Chalco)

AAA TV (SAT) 01/31 Plaza de Toros Joan Sebastian, Chalco, EdM [box y lucha]
1) Aerostar, Argenis, Gato Eveready vs Rio Bravo, Tigre Cota, Tito Santana II
2) El Alebrije, El Elegido, Pimpinela Escarlata vs Decnnis, El Brazo, Escorpion Negro Jr.
3) el Ángel, Laredo Kid, Súper Fly vs Electro Shock, Jack Evans, Teddy Hart
4) Abismo Negro, Alan Stone, Gronda II vs Black Abyss, Konnan, Zorro
5) Chessman vs Ozz
6) La Parka Jr., Mesias, Silver King vs Joe Lider, Kenzo Suzuki, Nicho el Millionario

2009 AAA TV Chart
Projected Air Date (#876)
Mexico: 02/08
US: 02/28

This is listed as the road to Rey de Reyes. A long road, I guess.

A lot of this should look familiar. Main event is the same as the 01/25 show, but with Electro in for Kenzo (which would seem to say either there’s a tag title match coming, or Nicho and Lider are getting killed by Mesias for an extended bit.) The 2/3/4 tecnico sides are essentially the same guys as the 01/25 taping (Gato and Aero drops to the opener and Alebrije & Alan are added.) The rudos are almost the same too, with the Clowns being dropped for Konnan, Jack and Escorpion Negro.

Based on the matchups, it looks like the Elegido/Pirata feud may be moved over to Elegido/Guapos (perhaps Guapito DID end up with Elegido?) There seems to be another try at the Teddy/Jack vs Air Force matches, which hopefully will be better than last year. And of course Black Abyss/Abismo Negro continues. I wonder if they have plans for Gronda II at the moment or if he’s just back to be back.

If you recall, when they did Ozz vs Chessman back in June, Ozz won. With lots of help from Mesias, which probably will not happen again.

2008 CMLL GDL/Puebla Records

Why not? I figured out the regulars and separated them out from the normal CMLL wrestlers.

First up is GDL.  There’s not the same separation between tecnicos and rudos you get in Mexico City. I did not realize what a ridicolous amount of shows Thunder Boy is on here.  He led with 65 appearance in 2008, with Malefico and Gallo also cracking the “once a week, every week” barrier.  Being a regular here means working 3 times a month.

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Guadalajara Lineups/Results (02/06 fan appreciation show)

CMLL (SUN) 01/18 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara
1) Principe Leon b Principe Dylan
2) Thunder Boy b Acertijo
3) Depredador (GDL) & Exterminador b Carlo Roggi & Ebola
4) Hijo del Faraon, Metal Blanco, Metatron b Mr. Trueno, Rey Trueno, Semental
5) Angel de Oro & Volador Jr. b Rey Bucanero & Satánico
6) Héctor Garza, Hijo de Fantasma, La Máscara b Atlantis, Negro Casas, Último Guerrero [CMLL TRIOS]

Nothing else much to note, except Roggi and Ebola are meant to be tecnicos. I thought they were rudos, shows what I know.

No Volador/Rey title match has been added to 01/25. Instead, Carlo Roggi vs Ebola in a hair match, the culmination of a rudo/rudo feud.

CMLL (TUE) 01/27 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara
1) Quazar vs Meteoro
2) Plata vs Samurai
3) Metatron vs Rafaga
4) Marcela & Sahori vs Amapola & Medussa
5) Dark Angel, Goddess, Lady Apache vs Hiroka, La Nazi, Princesa Blanca
6) Marco Corleone & Shocker vs Averno & Mephisto

Yes, two women’s matches. I may have to call for a wellness check on some of you after reading that. If it was me, I might change it up a little so we have one good->great match and also another match, but that’s not what’s going on here. The only women in the cage not in this is Mima, who’s back in Mexico soon but perhaps not this soon.

CMLL (FRI) 02/06 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara
1) Metal Blanco & Metatron vs Mr. Trueno & Rey Trueno
2) Boomerang, Meteoro, Virgo vs Mr. Aguilita, Pequeño Damian 666, Pequeño Halloween
3) Mascara Dorada & Stuka Jr. vs Ephesto & Mephisto
4) Máximo, Sagrado, Shocker vs Black Warrior, Dragon Rojo Jr., Sangre Azteca
5) Dark Angel vs Marcela, Lady Apache, Amapola, Mima Shimoda, Sahori, Princesa Blanca, Goddess, Hiroka, Medussa, La Nazi [cage, hair]

Date is correct. Echoing the plan in Puebla, GDL’s monthly special show will be on a special day, allowing them to keep running their normal schedule. Friday’s an odd day, given the normal show in Arena Mexico, but they also have Puebla’s special show on Saturday so that’s probably not a better option. Friday’s the farthest away from Sunday and Tuesday they can get as well, though they may want to look into not running all the Fan Appreciation shows on the same week.

Not really much going on in the undercard and I don’t know how well this will do. It is intersting that we’ve got GDL regulars against CMLL minis; I think Puebla guys have filled in minis matches there, but it’s not a regular thing.

They’ll be selling tickets in advance to this show at the 02/01 and 02/03 shows (lineups not announced), and it seems like you might only be able to get the cheaper tickets if you do buy in advance. Prices are 60 pesos ($4.37) for ringside (20 for kids), and 20 pesos everywhere else (10 for kids.) I would pay $4.50 to go to this show, but I’m not living in GDL.