Month: May 2013

Starting off with the CMLL press conference. Video highlights are here.

Everything Not En Busca de un Idolo

Marco Corleone will be out due to an injury. The live coverage did not specify, but Marco later said  it was indeed the knee injury he suffered in the bad car accident a while back. CMLL is saying 9 months, while Marco says 3-9 months. He can walk without crutches, but he can’t wrestle on it. (If you watched his last matches, he had to cut out the springboard/leaping spots entirely.) Hope he’s back as soon as he’s ready. It’s a rough break.

The length of the absence has caused CMLL to declare the trios titles vacant. No tournament has been announced. It can not be a coincidence CMLL suddenly put Valiente, Mascara Dorada and Mistico together as the new top tecnico trio.

The new Comandante Pierroth was introduced. They’ve put together all the remaining people in the original Pierroth’s army – La Comadante, Pequeno Violencia and Pierrothito – and more recent Puerto Rician addition Zeuxis as the new Comando Caribeño. It’s nice, but it doesn’t give Pierroth any partners for actual matches so far. Unsure where leaves Comandante and TRT.

Gran Guerrero was formerly introduced. He is a Guerrero. He is Gran. Ultimo made it clear he’s not breaking up the Niebla Roja/Euforia/Ultimo Guerrero group, just adding on.

En Busca de un Idolo

Terra posted a press release on the tournament before the press conference. That was fun. Same format as last year, with the subhead “Ahora o Nunca!”

TECNICO TEAM
Fuego
Hijo del Fantasma
Stuka Jr.
Valiente

Director: Shocker – or that was the plan before he got cast for the reality show. Stepping in as replacement: RUSH.
Trainer: Negro Casas

RUDO TEAM
Misterioso Jr.
Sangre Azteca
Tiger
Vangelis

Director: Terrible (Tiger’s partner)
Trainer: Virus

(Guerrero Maya Jr & Delta were announced for this tournament in April, but are gone now.)

JUDGES
Tirantes (back from season 1)
Tony Salazar (trainer in season 1)
Ultimo Guerrero (director in season 1)
Brazo de Plata

The tournament will run from May 17th to July 12th, 9 weeks. The press release says matches will air live on Terra.com. I read that originally as Friday night shows, but it only says it starts Fridays; it could be multiple days. They appear to be following the same layout as last year, which would mean matches on Tuesdays & Fridays (so, three nights of Terra!)

Valiente is going to be great, but it’s a bit odd to have Valiente in a Now Or Never tournament when you’ve just put him in your great new main event tecnico trio. Left hand, right hand. I think he’s the closest thing to a favorite here, but it’s a balanced field. Tiger is another odd fit; he hasn’t worked out great with TRT, but he’s 26 and it doesn’t feel as now or never-y with him.

There’s no word if they’re doing the half hour shows which went along with the tournament (and aired many weeks later), so hopefully there’s plenty of Rush as coach during the actual matches.

Other News

AAA caught up with Billy el Malo to explain his injury. Two months ago, Billy was carjacked. He fought to keep his car and does not remember when he got his right wrist cut, but it was cut very deeply and he lost blood and consciousness. (I’ve linked to the R de Rudo site for the photos.) He remembers hallucinating a woman and a garden while a taxi driver rushed him to a hospital. He was operating on there, but does not have much positive to say about the person who did the doctor – they saved his hand but cut ligaments and tendons in the process. Billy lost feeling and movement in his right hand, and has only so far recovered 30% through physical therapy, able to feel and move his little finger, but has been told he’ll recover more and plans on returning to the ring. Billy mentions his benefit show, and also throws out threats to Fenix. If Billy’s able to return, and if the Fusion brand split is enforced, Billy is probably Fenix’s top non-Pentagon contender.

LA Park is saying if the TxT show doesn’t sell out on Saturday, they’re probably not doing the mask vs mask match. Well, if you can’t sell out a 6-8,000 seat building, you probably should not be running a 40,000 one. It’s not going to sell out, plenty of tickets were still available on Ticketmaster as of today, but this allows LA Park & Dr. Wagner to shift all the blame to the promotion instead of taking any themselves.

This week’s Tercera Caida included an interview with Heavy Metal, talking his match with Texano Jr. That TripleMania hasn’t been announced yet, but may be by the end of the weekend.

This week’s AAA Fusion is also up, with  matches from Cordoba and Chilpancingo.

LuchaWorld has KrisZ’s news update.

Links

• Porra Fresa notes an important detail I missed from Monday’s Arena Puebla show: Stigma replaced Averno in the main event.
• Super Crazy beat Veneno by DQ in Arena Aficion.
• IWL’s June show has 60 luchadors scheduled, claims to be a 3h30m show that’ll start promptly at 6.
• AULL almost matches that with a 27 tag team tournament this Saturday, with trainees from various schools facing off. Milanito Collection and Kenbai are already in to represent Negro Navarro.
• R de Rudo interviews Gran Markus Sr.
• LyC is posting messenger conversations to tease an upcoming Sabu appearance.
• Scraped Resin has new bloody El Carboncito figures.

Lineups

CMLL (TUE) 05/14/2013 Arena Mexico
1) Höruz & Oro Jr. vs Guerrero Negro Jr. & Zayco
2) Metálico, Soberano Jr., Stigma vs Artillero, Hijo del Signo, Súper Comando
3) Luna Mágica, Marcela, Silueta vs Mima Shimoda, Tiffany, Zeuxis
4) Hijo del Fantasma vs Shigeo Okumura [lightning]
5) Atlantis, Blue Panther, Titán vs Morphosis, Mr. Águila, Psicosis
6) Máscara Dorada, Mistico, Valiente vs Rey Bucanero, Terrible, Tiger

Mistico’s new trio takes on TRT. Fantasma, about to start a tournament of singles matches, has a random singles matches.

Note: There is a CMLL press conference today. Check luchablog on Twitter for RTs and sarcastic comments.

1. LA Park announced he was leaving AAA. Park and Dr. Wagner Jr. have resumed their multiyear feud, strongly suggesting they’ll be having a mask vs mask in June in the Plaza de Toros in Mexico City. They’re doing this feud in Todo x el Todo, a promotion who has struggled to fill up an 8,000 seat arena, so a 40,000 seat bullring seems unlikely. Wagner & Park face off in a singles match on this weekend’s Todo x el Todo show and have convinced many that this mask match is actually coming soon. That Todo x el Todo show is also the first not to include a Hijo del Santo match.
2. CMLL held a major show for the Arena Mexico 57th Anniversary show. This show was similar to the H2L shows last month, including a repeat apuesta match, but did not draw a similiar level crowd. Rey Cometa beat Namajague for his hair; the NJPW trainee lost his mask and his hair within weeks. Boby Zavala & Rey Escorpion won the Gran Alternativa tournament in another expected result. In a totally unexpected result, Averno cheated to beat Mistico and win the vacant Mexican welterweight championship. The title becoming vacant and the tournament leading up to the title match all seemed telegraphed to give Mistico a (needed) big win, but he ended up failing. Adding to the strangeness, the title match had been advertised as airing on TV the previous week, then left off TV with no explanation. Mistico would go on to be humiliated by Volador in a singles match between them two days later, and then was shunted into a new tecnico trio.
3. AAA held an ‘Evolucion’ TV taping in Chilpancingo. The only development on the show was Heavy Metal returning to TV (only one appearance this year) and being pushed as Texano’s title challenger for TripleMania. Nothing else new was directly suggested for TripleMania, though there are some vague hints of the usual rivalries. Despite the new Evolucion for tapings and promoted brand split, the Evolucion tapings are airing on the Fusion and Sin Limite TV shows, and there is no Evolucion show.
4. AAA announced who would be on each brand after it’s roster split. The split doesn’t take place for a month and a half, and doesn’t apply to the Sin Limite (and probably not to non-TV shows.) There’s been little to no reaction from the people involved, and none from the people who were strangely not put on either side. It’s unclear how much of an effect it will ultimately have, but it has had none at the moment.
5. Atlantis was honored last Friday for his 30th Anniversary. Atlantis night included a win over Averno (the same guy who beat Mistico the previous week) and a surprise present from Ultimo Guerrero: Gran Guerrero, Ultimo’s brother. Both Guerreros beat up Atlantis to continue to build towards their undated mask vs m mask match.
6. Lucha Libre USA abruptly canceled the last five shows of it’s United We Stand tour. No reason was given, but they said the shows would be rescheduled for some time down the road.

• Lady Apache also announced she was joining Todo x el Todo. She had been part of CMLL before leaving for a pregnancy. She said she was still on good terms with the people who own CMLL but did not agree with the programming decisions. Lady Apache will be part of an eight women relevos suicidas tournament on this weekend’s TxT show.
• Shocker will be out of CMLL for two months while taking part in TV Azteca reality show La Isla. Meanwhile, long time rival Mr. Niebla has been missing lots of shows with no explanation.
• AAA announced their lineups for Puebla and Tampico (including a Cibernetico vs Perro Aguayo Jr. match, to air just before their TripleMania match.)
• Rey Escorpion’s great win included both that Gran Alternativa win and a Light Heavyweight Title defense over Stuka Jr. on CMLL’s annual Kid’s Day show.
• Black Warrior told at least one person that he had retired. He’s taken long breaks from lucha libre in the past.
• Titan will be part of NJPW’s Best of Super Junior tournament this May. Nakamaura will be coming to CMLL from NJPW during the tournament. Mima Shimoda is also returning from Japan.
• Dinamic Black won the WWS Welterweight Championship, to go along with his IWRG IC Welterweight Championship.
• ChilangaMask is putting on a loaded indy show on 05/19. Negro Navarro vs Negro Casas is main eventing.