Day: December 7, 2012

CMLL (WED) 12/05/2012 Arena Xalapa [En Contacto]
5) Rush & Shocker b Mr. Niebla & Negro Casas
Crowd supported the rudos strongly during the match. Rush explained to the reporter that it doesn’t matter if the crowd is booing him, he’s a natural rudo who just can’t stand the other rudos. He isn’t going to change sides, but only rudos can be idols so he’s going to keep acting this way. Rush said he wanted masks not hairs and his only rivals are in Japan.
6) Último Guerrero & Volador Jr. b Diamante Azul & La Sombra
Mistico appeared, with the claim ‘he was injured a few days ago’. Diamante Azul replaced him. Fans were very unhappy. The luchadors were more interested in talking back and forth on the microphone then wrestling. Volador stole Sombra’s mask to pin him.

CMLL was promoting this show on TV strongly this weekend, and local newspaper articles promoted the show around Mistico appearing. None even hinted Mistico might be a question mark, even though it was obviously a possibility since he hasn’t wrestled since his injury to anyone’s knowledge. He was also booked in a show this weekend in Acapulco, but I can’t find results from that show. I guess it’s possible Mistico might have wrestled that show and got hurt there or sometime before Wednesday, but it seems more likely people involved knew Mistico wouldn’t be ready for this date and decided to advertise him anyway. (CMLL not advertising Mistico for any of their own shows yet is an obvious clue.) The new Mistico has gotten CMLL to places they’re not running regularly, but they’re not going to be returning to those places pulling stunts like this.

IWRG (THU) 12/06/2012 Arena Naucalpan [Black Terry Jr. (flickr), IWRG]
1) Araña de Plata Jr. b Matrix Jr.
2) Galaxy & Saruman b Epidemia & Imposible
3) Alan Extreme, Eita, Eterno b Cerebro Negro, Dr. Cerebro, La Cobra
Cerebros fell apart again, lost in straight falls.
4) Canis Lupus, Oficial 911, Oficial AK47 b el Ángel, Trauma I, Trauma II
Angel & Trauma II could not get along, lost in straight falls. They made mask match challenges, which 911 demanded to be part of as well.
5) Black Terry, Negro Navarro, Pirata Morgan b Bestia 666, Damián 666, Fuerza Guerrera
Tecnicos (Terry’s team) took 1/3. Fuerza tossed his mask to Terry to draw the second fall DQ. Terry paid him back with a foul in the third for the win. They agreed to a super libre match.

Tonight is IWRG’s annual year end banquet/awards dinner/dance. They’ve been promoting guys like Negro Casas, Felino and Dr. Wagner Jr. will be in attendance.

Tonight’s CMLL show goes on, including the Sombra vs Ultimo Guerrero match for a Trofeo Sin Nombre. In other action, Dragon Rojo says he’d like to win this block, and then repeat as Copa Junior next week, as an early Christmas present. He feels this would be a great way to end his year, winning a tournament and being double champion, and then he can settle things with Ultimo Guerrero. Rojo is probably the second favorite, with Tama Tonga everyone’s best bet as winner.

An interesting side note from the Dragon Rojo Jr. interview is the CMLL article happens to mention him as “the grandson of Leonel Rivas”. I’d never seen the real name of the original Dragon Rojo before. That name (+Google) leads us to find out the original Dragon Rojo was actually a Guatemalan luchador who had long ago lost his mask as Barbaro when he came to Mexico and was remasked for a feud with Sangre Chicana. Dragon Rojo Original peculiarly vanishes from history outside his one Anniversary main event, but that’s probably because we’ve been looking in the wrong place.

Today is also the show in Merida with Blue Demon, Dr. Wagner Jr., and various ex-WWE wrestlers. There was an autograph signing yesterday. Blue Demon Jr., doing an interview to promote the show, mentions he lived in a hotel in Merida for the first two years of his life with his biological mother, until he was adopted by Blue Demon Senior. He’s usually reluctant to mention he’s an adopted son, but here it leads to a discussion of being accepted by his new brothers and finding out his new father is actually a luchador.

This week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter had more details about Llaves y Canados trying to bring in Hulk Hogan. As they said in their press release, they really did go to Orlando and have a meeting with Hulk Hogan. As you’d expect if you’ve followed Hogan’s recent career, he said money was not the issue but he’s physically incapable of having a match or even just standing in the ring and having people run into his punches. There was talk that they still could bring Hogan to Monterrey just for autographs or some similar appearance. I still don’t see the way you make money bringing him in for an event at Arena Coliseo Monterrey prices, but I do concede there could be value of having photos of your luchadors with Hogan, or a endorsement promo he could do that they could show forever; this might be plausible if you look at it as a loss leader doubling as long term marketing.

The same newsletter mentions TNA has interest in bringing in ex-WWE trainee Hijo del Medico Asesino. I’ve never heard a bad word about Hijo del Medico Asesino and I hope he gets more opportunities. However, there’s dozens if not hundreds of more sensible candidates, many of whom work for the AAA promotion they’re supposedly working with. Maybe it’s just easier because immigration paperwork is already handled for him, but if he really was going to be a big star for Mexicans in the United States, it’d seem like he at first need to be a big star for Mexicans in Mexico. Medico Asesino is working in Arena Aficion shows in from of 50 or less people right now.

Canek, holding a training seminar in Tabasco, explained lucha libre is down in Mexico because there’s not enough technical preparation and the quality of wrestling has plummeted. In his view, Vampiro, Konnan and Mistico could not stay popular because they just didn’t put in enough time in the gym. Canek says he took “Killer” [Murder] Clown from not knowing anything about lucha libre to AAA in 15 days with his training. I guess Canek taught Killer Clown how to be tall?

El Luchador has more of it’s short interviews with people from the show. Hombre de Negro explains he started off related to Panico and leader of the Black Syndicate, but he’s changed as CMLL has needed to him. His greatest enemies are apathy, laziness and anything that gets in the way of success in CMLL. No wonder he seems angry, his enemies always seem to be winning. (He’s also been on the show for about 2 minutes this year, as if the guy playing the role had other things to do this year.) Magnus explains his name comes from a Roman emperor who was better than everyone else, just like he is, his music (Keep Rolling) happened to play the first time he went to the gym and his brother got it for him but he’d prefer to use the old Mistico music and his ego is his biggest enemy.

Bill has highlights of first half of August 2012 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara.

Links

• AAA post the schedule of events for the long weekend of Quien Pinta Por La Corona contest finalists.
• Xtreme Tiger wants to face anyone from CZW, in a match that would take place on the same show as Daga vs Matt Cross.
• Super Nova, who hasn’t been around Mexico since September, reveals he’s been in Rome training wrestlers for NWE. He’d like to bring some of his best students to Mexico.
• Another Lucha Libre photo/art exhibit opened last night in Mexico City. They held a Horuz & Guerrero Maya Jr. vs Sangre Azteca & Namajague tag match to celebrate the opening. That sounds fun.
• R de Rudo interviews Sick Boy
• Brief bio of Sonora luchador Ave Dragon.
• Perros del Mal posted bank account info to help out Hector Garza as he battles with cancer.
• AAA has the second part of their interview with the the Octagons, where one says he wants a mask match with Fuerza Guerrera.
• Super X will have a press conference Wednesday for the January show.
• Rompe Huesos looks back at Pierroth vs Supremo from 20 years ago. He says it was one of the greatest matches of 1992, though it received a * star rating in the Lucha Libre Weekly at a time. Opinions on lucha libre can vary!

The British Embassy and Fundación John Langdon Down have issues a press release withdrawing support for tonight’s scheduled British Night themed show at Arena Mexico. The foundation helps children with special needs, and the show was supposed to be British themed, but all of those themed bits will not be happening. The specfic paragraph

El Comité de Caridad de la Embajada Británica entiende que la Fundación John Langdon Down A.C ha retirado su apoyo debido a lo que la Fundación considera una la falta de seriedad y cumplimiento por parte del Consejo Mundial de la Lucha Libre de beneficiar a la Fundación John Langdon Down A.C. con un porcentaje específico del total de la venta de boletos de la función.

The foundation pulled out because they wanted to know the specific percentage of the tickets they would be given, and CMLL was either evasive about the answer or it wasn’t the answer they wanted to hear. The press release ends with a guilt line of “it’s up to CMLL to decide if they will donate any money or none at all”, and then saying they’ll have nothing more to say about this. You may notice the press release includes a “fail” tag, and the original twitter message uses #CMLLFail tag, not seen since CMLL’s last dumb booking move. Safe to say there are harsh feelings from the charity to CMLL on this one.

A charity organization saying they’d rather withdraw support for you than take any money makes anyone look horrible. Still, we don’t know the actual details here and maybe shouldn’t be in a hurry to assign blame until we do. Both sides probably share some blame. We can assume they thought they agreed to some amount of money being donated prior to this event being announced (or it wouldn’t have got this far), but we don’t know if they mistakenly agreed to different things, or which side tried to change the agreement after that fact. It really could be either.

The bottom line is a fun theme night is out the window (maybe with whatever trophy Sombra or Ultimo Guerrero was going to win) and a charity has decided it’d rather get no money rather than whatever it was being offered. The actual CMLL Friday night show at Arena Mexico will still go on, but with a lot less pomp and circumstances.

We’re still getting a Sombra vs Ultimo Guerrero match CMLL probably wouldn’t have bothered to do otherwise. If you were going to spend money on a ticket and you”d still like to thank the Foundacion for it, you can donate directly on their website.

CMLL hasn’t responded yet. I hope they do, but there’s no guarantee they will.