AAA on Televisa: 2016-11-19 

Recapped: 11/12/2016

What happened: Pentagon Jr. beat Johnny Mundo and challenged to a singles match. The Piratas continue to have problems.

What was good: I liked the main event in spite of the usual things I didn’t like. There were parts of the opener I liked but it struggled early.

Where can I watch it: It’s on AAA’s channel.

Daga starts the show talking the crowd while Pentagon gestures nearby, summarizing the new alliances so far. Pentagon asks Daga if he’d be OK stepping aside so Pentagon can face Mundo himself today. Daga polls the crowd, who are OK with it, and Pentagon says he’ll teach the foreigners to respect Mexico.

Match 1: Dinastía, Octagoncito, Venum vs Mini Histeria, Mini Psycho Clown, Mocho Cota Jr.
Gimnasio Hermanos Carreon, Aguascalientes, Aguascalientes, 11/04/2016
Video: Lucha Libre AAA

Winner: Tecnicos (Venum Destroyer? Mocho Cota Jr.)
Match Time: 10:07

Review: [ok] There were timing issues all over the place during the rudos section; I’m not sure what the problem exactly was, but it was an extended period of bad wrestling which took away from a really good second half of the match. Dinastia felt backgrounded a bit, but that was still OK because Ludxor and Octagoncito both looked really good. The same rudos, especially Mocho Cota, who had problems working them over were right there to take the big spots. Octagoncito had what appeared to be a great top rope moonsault to the floor into an armdrag, but there was too much going on for the camera to catch it. The finish looked weird – like Ludxor though he was doing a flipping DDT and Cota thought Destroyer – but still sufficiently brutal.

Match 2:rgenis, Niño Hamburguesa, Pimpinela Escarlata vs Hijo de Pirata Morgan, Parka Negra, Pirata Morgan
Gimnasio Hermanos Carreon, Aguascalientes, Aguascalientes, 11/04/2016
Video: Lucha Libre AAA

Winner: rudos (Pirata Sr. senton Niño Hamburguesa)
Match Time: 9:03
Notes: Hijo del Pirata accidentally superkicks his father at one point, following up from issues they had back at Heroes Inmortales. Hijo del Pirata later has the win over Niño after a moonsault, but his father convinces him to go for another one, then steals the pin with his own senton. Hijo del Pirata walks out on his team after the match.

Review: [ok] The state of the 2016 AAA midcard is there’s matches where Argenis is the best guy in the match. Hijo del Pirata & Argenis are never going to have a singles, but the psuedo one they ahd for about two minutes whenever everyone else vanished was good. Pirata Morgan looked as excited to be there as I was to see him, but then again, he’s never much excited. Pirata didn’t look good, but looked better than Pimpi. Maybe it’s just the purple, but Parka Negra’s looks like he’s gotten heavy. Maybe it’s a required part of the gimmick, how many skinny La Parkas do we really know. Niño Hamburguesa’s dive was so not good.

Noti AAA

• Marisela Pena’s Twitter has 25K followed. And the YouTube has a 100K subscribers.

• Video feature celebrating La Parka reaching 20 years of wrestling. I like how they went to the pyramids but like only a few steps. La Parka ain’t climbing to the top. He talks about his career almost coming to the end in the car accident.

• El Apache recaps the reason issues with trapped indians and Hijo del Tirantes. He thinks Tirantes is not a good referee. I think we’re supposed to think Tirantes is the OGT’s helper?

Match 3: Pentagón Jr. vs Johnny Mundo
Gimnasio Hermanos Carreon, Aguascalientes, Aguascalientes, 11/04/2016
Video: Lucha Libre AAA

Winner: Pentagon Jr. (package piledriver)
Match Time: 9:10
Notes: Taya is with Mundo, and they exchange many kisses on the way to the ring. Daga is with Pentagon, though that’s not any good for him – Taya attacks Pentagon and Daga is unable to do anything but stand there, watch, and occasionally act threatening until they do their big dive. The twist is Daga does the dive onto Mundo, when Taya has Pentagon tied up. Pentagon drags Taya in the ring in the meantime, and gives her a chop. Taya is so thrown that the next spot is her puling Piero away from a pin. She’s back at it moments again, crotching Pentagon as he goes up. There’s no attempt to hide this from the referee, but Piero only chats with Taya for a while, and misses Daga taking off his shirt and giving Mundo a suplex into a backcracker. Piero turns around and counts a slow two count. (Crowd is very into it.) Pentagon avoids the Fin de Mundo and lands the Mexican Destroyer, but Taya runs in and grabs him. Daga finally superkicks her, and Pentagon gives Mundo the Package Piledriver. Crowd goes nuts for Pentagon win.

Pentagon taunts Taya and Mundo, using language that’s too rough for Televisa’s ears. Pentagon challenges for a title match, saying that title isn’t for the gringos. He also says Daga will take out the (not present) Brian Cage. Daga gets in the catch phrase.

Review: [good] I rewatched counted after watching the match once: this match had 7 Taya interference spots and 2 or 3 Daga spots. (Does it count if Daga only attacks Taya? I dunno.) Taya started out trying to do it behind the referee’s backs, but then didn’t bother by the end. It’s about the same as Garza/Mundo, and the steady stream of interference similarly hurt any flow the match might have had. This Aguascalientes crowd was so much more hyped for Pentagon than the Monterrey crowd was for Garza, which helped quite a bit and contributed to making this much more watchable than the Heroes Inmortales. This totally worked for the live crowd and the results – combined with the promos to start and end the show – felt like Pentagon ascending to a long awaited top position. The match itself, like so many of AAA’s big matches, felt like it could’ve been much better if they AAA would just lay back and let the two guy in the match take care of more of it by themselves. That doesn’t seem like it’s going to happen – they might have gotten the same reaction with normal nearfalls and one interference that they got with 10, but it definitely worked for them the way they did it so they’re unlikely to change it – but it does feel like it limits the ceiling of the matches. This was good, these guys can be better, but this is probably as good as it’ll get in the structure AAA uses for these matches. Maybe it’ll get a little bit better with more time and even more shenanigans if they do the title match, but you can see the limits as easily as you can see this being a success.