Lucha promoter Rocky Roman passed away yesterday, according to Hijo del Santo on Facebook. So Cal Uncensored also has a quick note. Roman promoted FMLL in the US for years, mostly in California but also occasionally in Chicago, Texas and other locations. He was responsible for bringing guys like Santo and Blue Demon Jr. and LA Park other big names from Mexico, and being that connection to guys from Mexico for other promoters. The photos from earlier this year, with independent, CMLL and AAA luchadors in one locker room, came from one of Rocky’s FMLL show. FMLL had a show scheduled last week, but it was announced as canceled due to Roman being ill. It’s unknown what the future of FMLL promotion; the little I know, it seemed like it was completely Rocky Roman and there might not be anything left to go forward with.
Angel de Oro’s Facebook, via CFan Deportes, announced last night that Oro will be out ten weeks due to a right knee injury. He’s been visibly dealing with knee problems for some time. Ten weeks long sounds like surgery, but the post only mentions rehabbing the knee. Oro was listed as working Sunday in Guadalajara, but Super Porky will take his place. A 10 week absence would put Angel de Oro’s return around early August.
This week’s TerceraCaida is up. Rey Bucanero was on the show, announcing he’d be taking Rush’s place in the match with Masada. He seemed unfamiliar with Masada but promised a good match. Bucanero also promoted the CMLL vs Indy show coming up and Gimnasio Juan Barrera (which turns out to have less CMLL guys than you’d expect.) It’s concerning Rush is missing shows right after having that car accident on Monday, but Rush did work as scheduled Tuesday in Guadalajara. It’s just as possible CMLL pulled Rush off the show due to a more expensive sold show being run; CMLL seems to be running a lot of them (one last Saturday, one yesterday, both at Arena Mexico) and they even pulled Sombra off their own Arena Puebla show to work at a bigger fair show a few Mondays ago. Still, it’s worth keeping an eye on Rush and Mistico’s performance the next couple times out.
Billy el Malo, Aerostar and Crazy Boy were also on the show, promoting Billy el Malo’s benefit show. Billy said the doctors have told him he’ll be out one year, but he’s hoping to be back in 2 months. They gave credit to La Hechicera for organizing the show.
The highlights of the TxT show also include an offical explanation of the women’s tournament: Esther Moreno & La Chola were “disqualified by the commission after the match for excessive violence.” That’s a perfectly acceptable finish if they didn’t want that team to actually lose, but there was nothing like the usual excessive violence spots which usually lead to a DQ in what we saw, and the match ended with referee Mano Negra raising Esther & Chola’s hands. (And, also, the half a million times a commission could’ve overturned a finish for one reason or another and didn’t, including the main event on that same show.) The disqualification was never announced to the crowd, which suggests disorganization or no one coming up with the reason until everyone pointed out how silly it was later on. The controversy over the main event being one fall or three falls was skipped over, though you could briefly see the rest of the women being hustled out of the ring. Cadena3 is usually more causal about leaving these things in, so maybe it’ll make more sense when airs there, but at least they came up with a reason.
This week’s AAA Fusion already started airing matches from this past weekend’s Durango show. The main event and the opener of the taping aired, so the middle portion will be air on Televisa (and UTDN.) That means the Puebla show taped tomorrow will start airing next week and probably likewise be split between the two shows. I have not watched Fusion, but I was told that the opener – with IWRG regulars Carta Brava and Dr. Cerebro – had the announcers go out of their way not to mention IWRG or Naucalpan when talking about their background. Not sure what’s going on, but happened between IWRG and TVC Deportes.
LuchaMania Monterrey talked to WWL to clear up the June 16th date in Monterrey which had been mentioned by Llaves and Candados. WWL clarified they’re only coming in on the July 7 date, because WWL be appearing at TripleMania. AAA sent wrestlers to WWL’s debut show, and this is part of relations between the two company. WWL only has run that one show, with four dozen people, so it’s not easy to figure out who this would be (and if it’s a good or bad thing, except in the more general “anything that keeps AAA guys off TripleMania for outside guys who the crowd doesn’t know” bad thing.) It does fill AAA’s usual TripleMania bit of bringing in a foreign promotion without using TNA.
Babe Richard, with many retired wrestlers, announced a new association to support retired and injured wrestlers. It’s called Lucha AC. They’re supported by LEGEND promotions, the group running the benefit show for Lasser on 06/01, and some masks will be auctioned off to support the new group. This kind of group is always needed, but groups like it have had hard times gaining a lot of traction.
Nakamura told Ana Gutierrez @ R de Rudo that the big difference he’s found this trip to Mexico are guys who were novatos when he first came to Mexico are now the stars. He’d like to defend his NJPW IC title in Mexico, but he doesn’t know if he can find anyone worthy of a chance – he beat Sombra, and Rush is just not on his level.
Terrible is headed to Guatemala on Sunday.
LuchaWorld has KrisZ’s news update.
Rob has highlights of 04/16/2013 CMLL
Bill has highlights of 04/12/2012 IWRG
AAA (THU)