CMLL (SUN) 06/03/2018Arena México
1) Retro & Robin b El Coyote & Inquisidor Retro replaced Robin (injury?). Tecnicos took 2/3.
2) Estrellita, La Jarochita, Maligna b La Comandante, Reyna Isis, Tiffany Tecnicas took 2/3. Jarochita & Isis’ return from Japan.
3) Blue Panther Jr., Pegasso, The Panther b Misterioso Jr., Sagrado, Virus Tecnicos took 1/3.
4) Rey Cometa, Soberano Jr., Valiente DQ Dragón Rojo Jr., Pólvora, Shocker Tecnicos took 2/3, the last with Shocker desperately fouled Valiente.
5) Euforia, Gran Guerrero, Negro Casas b Ángel de Oro, Mistico, Niebla Roja Rudos took 1/3.
CMLL (SUN) 06/03/2018Arena Coliseo Guadalajara [CMLL]
1) Gran Kenut & León Blanco b El Divino & Neutrón
2) Principe Daniel, Rielero, Vaquero Jr. b Exterminador, Maléfico, Ráfaga
3) Perico Zacarías b Gallito Tapatío Zacarias won via casita.
4) Mágico b Mr. Apolo [mask, hair] Magicio took falls 2/3 to save his mask and take Mr. Apolo’s hair. Malefico was seconding Mr. Apolo, but was thrown out for interfering by commissioner Gran Cochisse in the third fall.
5) Cuatrero, Forastero, Sansón b Explosivo, Star Black, Tiburon official debut of Tiburon, who may be Atlantis Junior. NGD took 2/3.
6) Difunto, Hechicero, Sádico, Satánico b Blue Panther, Esfinge, Joker, Magnum Rudos took 1/3, Sadico using the ropes to beat former partner/current rival Joker. Hair match challenges followed.
The Guadalajara radio station that does audio of the shows also did video for this one on ACG Facebook page. The angle is good but the video quality is not so great. Still better than nothing. Weird they beat Gallito in his home building.
IWRG (SUN) 06/03/2018Arena Naucalpan [+LuchaTV, The Gladiatores]
1) Shaolin b Death Metal
2) Atomic Star & Gallo Frances b Alas de Acero & Mexica
3) Dragón Bane, Picudo Jr., Psycho Kid b Aramis, Chico Che, Freelance Dragon Bane & Freelance made challenged post match.
4) Eterno, Ovett, X-Fly b Danny Casas, Hijo de Canis Lupus, Veneno
5) Emperador Azteca & Imposible DCOR Cerebro Negro & Dr. Cerebro Bloody brawl that went into the crowd for the ocuntout.
6) Black Dragón b Lunatik Extreme [hair]
Not a lot of coverage of these show (or the Memes one) with the AAA show going in Monterrey. Azteca/Imposible versus the Cerebros seems like a very IWRG match.
Lucha Memes (SUN) 06/03/2018Coliseo Coacalco, Coacalco, Estado de México [+LuchaTV, Black Terry Jr.]
1) Chef Benito & Heronia ?? Chris Stone Jr. & Melissa
2) Alas de Acero b Demasiado
3) Iron Kid DQ Komander Komander was hurt during the match trying a SSP to the floor.
4) Toxin b Demonio Infernal
5) Hijo del Olímpico b Impulso, Karonte Jr. bonus match?
6) Fresero Jr. b Eragón
7) Aramis b Eterno very good match.
Aramis vs Eterno got cited as a good match else was said. Heronia dressed up kind of like a waitress to team with the chef, which made for some amusing photos.
There’s a CMLL show tonight in Arena Puebla. It’s delightfully normal following last night’s AAA craziness, though it also probably won’t have anything as good as the AAA opener.
The NGD defends the trios titles against Hijos del Infierno in the semimain, where a title match seems unlikely. On the other hand, the main event is a relevos increibles trios, where an unlikely singles match (Soberano/Titan? Titan/Volador?) could be set up. Zeuxis makes her CMLL farewell, appropriately teaming with the older lucahdoras Tiffany (45), Estrellita (40) and Marcela (47) she probably was tired of facing.
Guerrero Maya Jr., Stigma & Triton versus Kawato, Okumura and Puma looks like it could be good. The problem is few of the matches which look good have turned out that way. The show also includes Policeman and the Centella Rojas in the opening matches. It’ll air on CMLL’s YouTube channel at 9pm.
PWPondering’s recap of the ROH New York TV tapings mentions Ultimo Guerrero vowed to bring in some partners to take on the Kingdom for the ROH Trios titles. No date was announced.
CMLL (SAT) 06/09/2018Arena Coliseo
1) Stukita & Último Dragóncito vs Pequeño Olímpico & Pierrothito
2) Bengala, Eléctrico, Príncipe Diamante vs Arkángel de la Muerte, Kawato San, Sangre Azteca
3) Flyer, Guerrero Maya Jr., Stuka Jr. vs Misterioso Jr., Sagrado, Templario
4) Kráneo, Niebla Roja, Valiente vs Mephisto, Rey Bucanero, Shocker
5) Volador Jr. vs Rush
It was a lot easier for Volador to get his singles match with Rush than LA Park. Note that Kawato is in the segunda; at the last, Templario seems to have passed him in the depth chart.
Important cleanup note: Tirantes is innocent. And so really is Golden Magic. I’m told the five turned six way had problems. Drago’s injury threw things off and they finish changed during the match. The match was changed to end on Aerostar’s handspring cutter on Guevera and Tirantes was right to count three, but Golden Magic (and others) didn’t know the finish had changed. You could argue Tirantes shouldn’t have counted after the pin was broken up but it seems like just a wrestling mishap.
This show is a lot absorb. Let’s see if it makes sense subdivided into luchadors.
Rey Fenix
Rey Fenix did a series of media interviews (MedioTiempo, +LuchaTV, Estrellas del Ring) posted immediately after the show declaring himself “the most free person in lucha libre.” He framed his appearance in AAA as not coming back full time or under contract, but instead a demonstration that he has the freedom to go to any company at any time. Fenix avoided mentioning CMLL or The Crash by name, but the idea here is specifically that he’ll be able to still work there and anywhere else and not sign a contract with anyone.
In AAA, he’ll be going as his original name “Fenix”. He’ll still use “Rey Fenix” (and probably “The King”) elsewhere and, at least in theory, there’s an agreement than AAA will no longer go after Fenix and the people who use him for his name.
Fenix explained his leaving as wanting AAA to change and his return as AAA in the process of changing. The obvious big change is Konnan, Fenix’s mentor, is back in charge. Fenix was lingering around the midcard with no direction when he left AAA and when Konnan was out as booker. Konnan’s back as booker, and Fenix is now taking out all the members of the lead rudo group to end a show. Even if that changes, he’s not tied down to a contract; Fenix has the freedom to work anywhere, and he’s got the freedom not to work anywhere.
It appears Rey Fenix at the very least told CMLL he was going to appear in AAA. He may have even been told by people in CMLL would be OK for him to do so without risking his CMLL booking. I hope that is what happens. No one should feel 100% safe that is what will happen at the moment. If Rey Fenix makes an appearance on Informa, or is otherwise still on that Friday night lineup on Wednesday night, it’s probably fine.
The issue here is CMLL already this year gave a bigger rollout to a promotion (ELITE) and a TV partner (Azteca), then made them both vanish in a snap of a finger. They can not be fully trusted. CMLL is capable of going back on their word, to reverting to the way they’ve always done things because it always works well enough for them. CMLL must be at least open to change to bring in Fenix in the first place and to use LA Park but, even with LA Park there are people pushing back because he’s not sold out Arena Mexico like he said in promos, and pushing back on Fenix because he’s just some indie guy to people who don’t pay attention to anything out of CMLL. Parts of the CMLL may want to open up the promotion. Other people in the promotion, the people Miguel Reducindo refereed as not having the best interest of the promotion in mind in his letter quitting the promotion a couple months ago, haven’t suddenly disappeared. Rey Fenix, a Rey Fenix who just showed up in AAA, is the litmus test on actual change.
Dr. Wagner Jr.
That’s it. Dr. Wagner Jr. says he’ll take some AAA dates but he’ll be independent. If you’ve been checking out Wagner’s schedule of late, you can see he’s already been doing that for some time. This is really Wagner saying he’ll be open to working TripleMania or big TVs if they want to give him big TV paydays but he’s not going to be working regularly in AAA. Wagner was done with AAA after Verano de Escandalo no matter who beat him for the title. He can at least now leave pointing out he got cheated out of the title in a match that never should’ve been a three way match.
Dr. Wagner was quite clearly champion to do a title program with his son, to make his son a big TV star. It may have been part of the deal for him to lose his mask back at TripleMania. That Wagner/Wagner title program was dropped after the Tijuana taping, the moment Konnan fully took over the creative. Hijo del Wagner hasn’t been on TV or mentioned the three shows. There’s no other reason for Wagner to stick around and it was just a matter of how or who he’d lose the title too. Wagner/Wagner was already announced for 06/28 in Arena Aficion.
The AAA heavyweight title hasn’t gone too well of late.
Wagner quit the moment he lost the title
Mundo quit the moment he lost the title, and both were only around long enough to lose the title
Texano didn’t quit! but he lost the title without being pinned, “injured” in a match
Alberto left AAA and never lost the title
You have to go back to Texano’s first reign ending in December 2014 for someone to both lose the heavyweight title in the ring and also not quit immediately after. Which brings us to the new AAA champion…
Jeff Jarrett
Jarrett’s definitely continuing that streak, right? He’s either disappearing from AAA before he loses the title, or the title change will be his last night. Jarrett’s history here: multiple hair matches built up that were never paid off and a penchant for having travel problems causing him to miss those biggest shows.
Those defending the idea of Jeff Jarrett will point at those previous runs as missed opportunities, as something built up that can be finally be paid off here. That’s again hoping that they’ll get to that payoff. It’s not even the right guy if they get there. The announcers played Jarrett up huge, though it didn’t feel like the fans saw it that way. (The last time AAA fans saw Jarrett, he was explaining that this gimmick had been just a gimmick all along and he was really a nice businessman.) Translator Juventud Guerrera was the clear star of the Jeff Jarrett’s promo segment. Sam Adonis showed that plenty of other people can do the pro-USA/anti-Mexico bit and do it better than Jarrett. Mundo just did the same pro-USA/anti-Mexico bit; AAA’s pretty well run this well dry. Jarrett was the obvious worst wrestler in the title match, including Hijo del Tirantes. You have to believe Jarrett has a singular ability to draw and get a reaction and I didn’t see either demonstrated last night. AAA had multiple evil referees in the match to try and get it over, Jarrett could’ve been replaced by anyone for the same result.
I have never been “dunked on” (quote retweeted with people noting how stupid the original post is) on Twitter as many times for anything as much as I have for the post mentioning the title change. This was not heel heat of wanting to see someone beat Jarrett, this was “AAA is doing something dumb again and I’m glad I don’t watch them” heat. The people reacting negatively (and 99% of them are negative) are doing so in English. The WON explanation for Konnan’s return to as head of creative is a sense he’d be better at getting the product over internationally than Vampiro. Vampiro torched a lot of bridges with international fans, but this is also a pretty terrible first impression for the new WWE era. Fenix returning afterwards was clearly supposed to take some of the sting off of it, but it’s still Jeff Jarrett as champion of your promotion in 2018.
What do you even do with Jeff Jarrett as champion? Wagner’s gone. Mysterio’s not full time and didn’t seem to be a great fit last night. Rey Fenix seemed like he might be set up as a challenger, but they’d be dumbing down all the exciting stuff Fenix to fit into what Jeff Jarrett can still do at 51. Jarrett as Alberto’s opponent is probably the best fit, as terrible as that sounds. I have no interest in seeing Jeff Jarrett do Jeff Jarrett matches even without the title, and I don’t think most other people do either, but the big problem with making Jeff Jarrett champion is now you’re stuck booking a series of Jeff Jarrett title matches. All of which are going to be bad! In an era where having a good match seems to be more important than ever, AAA’s just put themselves in a spot where all their title matches will be bad for the foreseeable future. This is not ideal.
Jarrett coming back just as Konnan is back is no coincidence, though I can’t believe Konnan can be high on the idea of Jarrett as champion. The way they immediately moved on to other things – Konnan’s unmasking was treated as more important, Rey Fenix’s return was treated as more important – suggests they wanted to move on from that part of the story as quick as possible.
This has zero change of happening, but that AAA press conference for TripleMania should start with Dorian or Vampiro or whoever pointing out Konnan is not a legal referee, throwing out the finish of the title match, and restarting with a vacant title. It’d be a lame way to get the title off Jarrett, but any way he’s going to lose that title is going to be lame. They can move Jarrett right onto Alberto or whatever other sideshow feud he’s going to have, and move title onto people who are actually build something with it.
Konnan
Konnan returned onscreen to AAA and he’s no more than the fourth most important person from this show. Konnan’s previous regimes in AAA have been built around him leading a large group of rudos against the AAA establishment, and it appears they’re they’re setting up it once again. Konnan’s previous regimes have also included a lot of exciting wrestler in early matches, and it seems like that’s back again too. The same difficult in elevating these wrestlers into something meaningful will probably be there, but at least the quality of the show is better.
Jarrett really played up Konnan’s limp when doing the fake Konnan early in the show. Actual Konnan seemed in better condition when we saw him run-in for the main event. That seems great news for him.
Rey Mysterio Jr.
True story: he was in that main event. Did you see him? You did not see him do a 619 because Tirantes tripped him up the one time he did. Heroes of Lucha Libre might have given Rey Mysterio Jr. more to do this weekend than AAA.
Even with Mysterio advertised for this show (in a dream match that was not delivered), AAA did not sell out the arena. There were visible empty sections, and it seemed less than the 2014 show in the same venue.
Everyone else
On Facebook Vampiro is teasing that Kross’ back suplex seriously damaged his neck. That suplex seemed much safer than the one Kross gave to Maximo earlier, and so this is probably a storyline. I guess it’s possible this could be Vampiro’s write out of the promotion, but it seems unlikely – they need a tecnico symbol of AAA to face off with Jarrett & Konnan for promos, and they never put someone younger than 50 in that spot.
Golden Magic, Star Fire, Arez, Belial, Lady Maravilla, Keyra, Cage, Laredo Kid, Extreme Tiger, Sammy Guevera and Darby Allin all also debuted or returned on the show. A lot of these people did really good. None of these eleven people seemed to be involved in any storylines on this show. They may get something to do eventually but they were just names on this show.
MAD so far is Jeff Jarrett, Konnan, Killer Kross, Juventued Guerrera and maybe Teddy Hart. They got the heavyweight championship by disrupting the main event, so I think they’ve already won?
ELITE so far is Golden Magic, Laredo Kid, Extreme Tiger, Black Taurus (worked an indie Sunday) and maybe Teddy Hart? There’s no explanation of what this is supposed to mean and so it’s not registering as anything but strange. They can’t go another TV taping with no information about them, there has to be something coming soon.
What’s next?
TripleMania is scheduled for August 25th. That was the only upcoming show promoted on yesterday’s stream. They haven’t announced a next taping anywhere, unless it’s on the TV show they no longer post online.
All matches aired live from Plaza de Toros La Monumental, Monterrey, Nuevo León, 06/03/2018
Matches:
Arkángel Divino, Dinastía, Hijo Del Vikingo, Star Firebeat Arez, Belial, Lady Maravilla, Último Maldito
(9:00, Arkangel Divino tornado Mistica on Último Maldito, great)
Lady Shani, Mamba, Pimpinela Escarlatabeat Keyra, Black Danger , La Hiedra
(6:28, Lady Shani bridging cradle La Hiedra, ok)
Juventud Guerrera, Killer Kross, Texano Jr. beat La Máscara, Máximo, Pagano
(7:00, Kross back suplex Máximo, ok)
Aerostar beat Drago, Sammy Guevara, Australian Suicide, Darby Allin, Golden Magic
(8:28, Aerostar handspring cutter, Sammy Guevera, ok)
Brian Cage, Hijo del Fantasma, Rey Escorpión beat Extreme Tiger, Laredo Kid, Psycho Clown
(15:25, Cage Drill Claw on Laredo Kid, good)
Averno, Chessman, Súper Flybeat Carta Brava Jr., Mocho Cota Jr., Tito Santanain a triple hair match
(17:14, Super Fly pin Carta Brava, great)
A winding and at times confusing story ended the night with Jeff Jarrett returning to AAA become Mega Champion for the second time, Konnan (under a Parka mask) counting the pin, and Rey Fenix also appearing to attack the MAD folks.
The show included a lot of MAD related skits. As part of unannounced pre-show, Vampiro explained he thought the leader of MAD was (not named) Konnan, but was so upset at the thought that he didn’t want to actually say the name. Early in the show, Juventud Guerrera did a pro-MAD in-ring promo, only to be beaten up by Vampiro. La Parka later did his own speech saying he’d stopped people from taking 20+ years and would do the same again. Texano worked with MAD in their trios match without seemingly joining the group.
Midway during the show, Guerrera and Killer Kross lead out a third masked member of the group to Konnan’s music. The announcers were finally free to say Konnan’s name, with everyone being certain it was him under the mask. As everything needs to be a swerve, it of course wasn’t Konnan but actually the returning Jeff Jarrett declaring himself leader of the MAD group. Jarrett mentioned Teddy Hart as (still) in the group, but Hart was not seen on this show again. He called out Dr. Wagner Jr., and argued his way into being added into the main event. Hijo del Tirantes worked rudo/pro-Jarrett in the main event until he was finally taken out by Dr. Wagner. (Wagner immediately got a visual pinfall on Jarrett. It had been fairly likely Jarrett was going to win the title as soon as he showed up, but that spot totally gave it way.) A man in a La Parka mask and a referee shirt implied to be La Parka ran in to make the count for Wagner, but also held up instead of three. Wagner argued with “Parka”, Jarrett fouled Wagner, and quickly got the pin. Vampiro came out to confront the fake Parka, who unmasked as Konnan. Kross and Guerrera quickly came to the ring to take out Vampiro. It appeared Konnan was meant to be the true leader of MAD, but there was no time to find out – they cut to a Rey Fenix entrance video as he ran in as well, taking out Guerrera, Kross and Jarrett. Konnan and Fenix had a brief staredown, which seemed to end with them being closer to being on the same page than enemies. Fenix seemed happy to let Konnan walk away unhurt. The MAD team left the ring and the show ended before any of this could be resolved or explained.
I only bothered to make GIFs for match 1 for the rest of this recap, but it was a really good match
Piero, freshly bald, repeatedly tried to stop both OGT & Poder del Norte from using beer bottles in otherwise no DQ match. As it always seems to happen, Piero was taken out before the finish. Cota got the bottle, but hit Carta Brava by mistake, and Super Fly capitiliazed with a chair shot to win the brawl. Averno recognized the quality of the Poder del Norte team as they were getting their head shaved. This seems to be the end of the feud, though that’s been said before.
The Fantasma/Psycho match would’ve been the most chaotic match of pretty much any other show. Psycho Clown was limping even more than on Thursday and was announced as being unable to wrestle. That seemed like a good thing, as Fantasma appears to have firmly turned rudo and argued with Psycho before the match. Psycho & Fantasma ended up fighting, with Cage & Escorpión quickly taking Fantasma’s side. Extreme Tiger & Laredo Kid, wearing ELITE 2018 shirts, ran in for the save. It was never explained, but the match was changed to a trios match at that point and Psycho was allowed to wrestle after all. The power in the arena went out just a few minutes into the match. The two teams groped around in darkness for a couple minutes, and then tried to resume their match as the lights started to come back up in the following five minutes. Cage beat Laredo Kid for the win. The significance of the ELITE shirts was never explained (and mostly was forgotten) by the end of the night. Black Taurus never appeared during the show. Laredo & Tiger were definitely técnicos, so perhaps ELITE is not meant to be a strictly rudo invasion force – no one really knows what’s going on.
Likewise, Golden Magic was added to the five way match wearing an ELITE shirt. The ELITE shirt was noted but never really explained, and Golden Magic wrestled the same ways as always. The finish confused the fans: either Golden Magic broke up a pin he was not supposed to, or Tirantes counted three when on a spot that was not supposed to be the finish. Others also tried to break up the pin and looked confused at the match being over. It was not a spot Aerostar has ever won from before. Guevera at first shook hands with Aerostar and then attacked him, which turned into a very real looking brawl. Drago disappeared from the match after trying to catch a Guevera dive, which may have played into the strange ending.
welcome back to fun matches Maravilla
Pagano had a leg wrapped up to sell the beating of Thursday’s matches. He was sent awkwardly thru a table by Kross during the closing stretch of their match.
Keyra was the surprise luchadora in the segunda. She and Mamba had a standoff at the start of the match. The Twitch/Space brought up their social media based rivalry, but they didn’t do much together and it wasn’t a focus of the match. Keyra herself wasn’t much of an impact on the match. Shani pinned Hiedra, then confronted Faby Apache in the aisle. Faby easily beat her up, took Shani’s mask, and said that would happen again at TripleMania.
No storyline happened in the opener, thankfully.
The Twitch stream itself started nearly 15 minutes late, and started with an additional 15+ minute preshow. It was clear the real start time of the show was meant to be a little bit after 7pm and the people who made that decision hadn’t let the people running the stream know in adequate time. The pre-show came off as if it was a last minute time filler to get the stream started close to the announced time instead of having people annoyed for a half hour. The streaming went over 3.5 hours as a result, ending quickly after the main event like with Rey de Reyes (though it’s possible it may have been by design this time.)
Not a lot actually happened that mattered outside of that big angle. OGT defeated Poder del Norte in the three versus three hair match, a lot of people debuted,
Thoughts:
Star Fire has a brief moment of glory before being murdered
The main event was the same Jeff Jarrett match we get every time he comes in, full of stalling and rudo referee bits to cover up what he couldn’t do. It might have not just been that – the two técnicos versus one rudos structure didn’t make any sense and they were probably looking for a way to handle it – but it made this latest Jarrett run feel like all the same garbage we’ve got the last few times. If you do believe there’s value left in anti-Mexican Jeff Jarrett, then it’s hard to know why him winning the title (especially in such worthless circumstances) is going to get him any more heated up than the last few times this has been tried. If they had to give someone a title, it probably should’ve been Kross or Guerrera to justify their existence as more than goons for old men. I do not understand the big emphasis on Kross if he’s going to be (at best) the third man on the totem pole – third men on the totem pole don’t seem to have big matches in AAA.
The Mysterio/Wagner parts of the match had some promise, but Wagner not being able to do a tapatia was a sad sight. Mysterio was otherwise wasted on this, a big name completely forgotten by the end of the match when five other things had happened. The bait and switch of promising Wagner/Mysterio and then not delivering it – when making a change was probably the plan all along based on the original poster – sure isn’t a positive. Not being able to trust AAA to give you the main events they’re advertising is a bad spot to go in to the biggest show of the year.
The OGT/PdN match actually seemed to start slow, and the repeated bottles teases distracted at first. It all built into insanity, somehow topping the last brawl to be even more violent. They built to that big bottle shot as death in a match where everything else could cause great harm but not finish someone else. This was so unlike anything ever on the show and really stood out for it, with these guys destroying each other in a way unlike any spot fest. That was intensity bloody and the near falls seemed to mean something. Everyone contributed a lot, and it was neat to see the finish come down to Super Fly and Carta Brava rather than one of the more established guy. I didn’t have it quite as MOTYC level but can see other people having it there; I’m just happy the power didn’t go out during this match
this is just a thing they do
The Psycho/Fantasma trios was a confusing mess early made worse by the power outage, and a minor miracle that it turned it as well as it did. The power outage at least forced them to slow down to a near stop, giving everyone a moment to process what was meant to be going on. Once they started getting going again with the lights coming up as Cage & Laredo did spots, it started to improve into something enjoyable. Those two were really consistently good, Psycho & Tiger hit big spots, and they built towards a nice finish. It was definitely an event and maybe something not watchable on a replay but was an experience live. The effort was there, and they probably can have a better match if they just had a match instead of a strange voyage.
I think it’s probably possible to fashion the six way into a good highlight package. It certainly would take care some of the problems: the spots that took too long to set up can be edited into smoothness and the lack of crowd reaction can be overridden with a music track. It still wouldn’t fix the finish, which was an absolute mess that turned a crowd who was apathetic to this into hating it. We’ve seen this with the Lanzelot four way in Tijauna too: it’s really hard to get the fans to care about a multiman spot fest match with no clear story after the show has already led off with an ultimatum spot fest type of match. The closest thing to getting personalities is Guevera telling off everyone before the match and that’s not enough. This was not good – Golden Magic had a rough night by my eyes, up to going to the wrong apron to do a dive – but the crowd didn’t care much even at the good parts. Allin got in his Coffin Drop to the floor, which was good because he got just about nothing else; it felt like he got more time in the video packages leading up to the match than the actual match. There are worse matches but it was completely forgettable.
MAD versus Alvardos was the usual sort of lukewarm matches the Alvarados are becoming synonymous with AAA. The beatdown was not much, and the last portion of the match was not nearly good enough for the rest. MAD probably should be having dominating matches and they’re just having matches at this point; these were the opponents because there’s not many better alternatives but it produced an expected result. Pulling out the table so soon hurt the drama, but so did Kross trying to send Pagano thru it before Pagano was ready to go.
The second match was similarly forgettable, and seemed only to exist to spread out other segments. Keyra & Mamba did a couple of spots to play off their issue, but they didn’t build the match around it or Keyra was any big deal being in this match. It was a waste of a return if she’s meant to be a big deal, but maybe she’s not. Black Danger worked very hard to make Pimpinela look good. Match seemed to be either cut on time or just have an abrupt ending. It didn’t add up to a lot.
The opening matches continue to be a lot of fun. Star Fire has been wrestling for the last year, but really hasn’t been on anyone’s radar since blowing out her knee in Stardom almost three years ago. It’s hard to tell if anything that early in a long show is really going to be a star making performance, but Star Fire absolutely looked like the best luchadora on a show with Maravilla, Keyra and Shani on it. And she lived after Belial crushed her with a tope. It felt like this opener got a little less time, thought the clock differs with that – maybe it was a function of having more people than those other matches, leaving some (Arez?) not to be able to stand out as much. It was more indisputably a little more sloppy than the other ones: Dinastia was looking better and faster than he has in a while but he and Último Maldito had some awkward moments. Still, he and Dinasita showed that existing AAA guys fit right in with the indie guys in the high speed openers and there’s lot of possibilities if they mix them in. Arkangel Divino looks like every bit of the star they were pushing him as in The Crash, and it just remains to be seen if he’ll get over that same way in this suddenly jam packed AAA roster.
