Perro Aguayo passed away Wednesday. He was 73. The news was released by the Perros del Mal Facebook page. A service was held for him Thursday morning. No cause of death was mentioned.
Perro Aguayo was the biggest Mexican wrestling star ever among those who did not wrestle in a mask. He was a bigger star than most anyone who wore a mask too. El Santo would be ahead of him. Everyone else is arguable. Aguayo’s run as a top star went from the 70s all the way until the first years of this decade. Aguayo was nominally a rudo for much of his career but also a beloved figure. Pedro Aguayo wrestled as “Perro” due to a simple misspelling of his name early in his career. He wasn’t really happy with it at first, but the “Perro” image association ended up fitting well. Aguayo fought with the aggressiveness and the viciousness of a mad dog lashing out and refusing to give up until he defeated or scared-off his opponent. The heart to never give up is what drew the fans into to love and support Aguayo for many years. Take a look at his luchawiki apuesta record and you’ll see him taking a lot of losses in the late 70s and early 80s. That seems to incongruously coincide with his big rise in stardom. As best I can tell, it happened because Aguayo fought so hard in those losses that the fans still believed in him. Aguayo won plenty in his career but he also seems like one of the greatest “winning even while losing” wrestling stories.
70s & 80s lucha libre was untelevised in Mexico City, which meant they could away with a lot that wouldn’t have flown on TV even in those days. His homebase of El Toreo/LLI/UWA featured a more violent style than seen today, with a lot of blood and a lot of brawling. Perro Aguayo ended up with one of the most deformed foreheads in wrestling due to years of blading. The damage was probably much worse underneath the skin. Aguayo’s last truly public appearance, as best as I can determine, was his induction in the AAA Hall of Fame at the 2012 TripleMania. Aguayo was physically present at his son’s funeral in 2015 but did not speak to the media. The public story was his silence was due to grief. The loosely held secret was Aguayo was suffering from dementia or something like it brought on from his years from matches, and his family didn’t want to expose him or his condition. (Ovaciones reports this now as Aguayo being diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2010.) Aguayo is a guy who would’ve been celebrated at every opportunity had he continued to be able to make appearances. Instead, no one had seen him for years. If Aguayo had been a US star, there no doubt would’ve been reporters investigating what had become of him. He was mostly spared that spotlight in Mexico, allowed to remain as he was in people’s memories.
There is at least a wire story on Aguayo in every Mexico website today, and plenty of latino leaning non-Mexico sites. It is recognized how huge a star he was, even though his last big run is now a generation removed. His son’s tragic death kept him in recent memory, I’m sure. Perro Jr. kept his father’s memory alive even after he had stop wrestling. The younger Aguayo’s transition into the personality he’s now most remembered as started when he broke an El Santo plaque while declaring his father Perro Aguayo was the true biggest legend of lucha libre. Publimetro recounts that angle. Razon has a summary of his career. El Hijo del Santo calls Perro Aguayo the greatest rudo ever, and credits a feud with Aguayo with establishing him as a star wrestler.
AAA remembered Perro Aguayo before their show. They might do it again before Saturday’s show. Aguayo is famously from Zacatecas but Jalisco became his homebase. CMLL will have remembrances at their own shows this weekend.
SuperLuchas has a celebration of Perro Aguayo’s life, saying Aguayo became more famous than the Beatles at one point. Segunda Caida writes about a 1990 Aguayo match.
AAA TV (WED) 07/03/2019 Auditorio Miguel Barragan, San Luis Potosí, San Luis Potosí [AAA, Lucha Central, thecubsfan]
1) Dinastía & Iron Kid b Arez & Látigo 
13:28. Dinastia submitted Latigo.
2) Eterno b Dave The Clown, Villano III Jr.
7:08. Eterno beat Villano III Jr. with Sueno Eterno (Styles Clash)
3) Drago © b Golden Magic, Chik Tormenta [AAA LA]
8:34. 4th defense. Chik Tormenta becomes the first women to challenge for this title (or any of the nominal-male titles.) Drago beat Golden Magic, then was attacked by Daga.
4) Daga & Keyra b Puma King & Star Fire
18:10. Daga used knucks to Puma to set up the win. Drago misted Daga after the match.
5) Aerostar, Lady Shani, Niño Hamburguesa b La Hiedra, Monsther Clown, Taurus
11:37. Aerostar pinned Monster Clown.
6) Averno, Chessman, Súper Fly b Hijo Del Vikingo, Laredo Kid, Myzteziz Jr.
14:49. Averno beat Myzteziz with a super devil’s wings, then asked for a trios title shot. Laredo Kid accepted.
7) Blue Demon Jr., Rey Escorpión, Texano Jr. b Dr. Wagner Jr., Pagano, Psycho Clown
16:12. Demon pinned Wagner after Wagner briefly left the match following a Demon piledriver. Wagner bled a lot. Demon and the rudos beat up both Wagner sons as well.
A good show, with matches 1/2/3/6 all fun and only 4 being really disappointing. OGTs vs Jinetes could happen in Guadalajara/Zapopan on Saturday but it wasn’t definitely said; AAA probably won’t say until the show starts. Drago/Daga definitely is happening on that show. That’s an 8 pm start on Saturday night. (It’s a 5pm start for the NJPW G1 show that night, so it is possible that show finishes up before AAA has their first match if you’re in the very small slice of the Venn diagram planning on watching both.)
Turnout out seemed very strong. The Demon/Wagner matches are not for me but they’re obviously working. There were plenty of tickets left for TripleMania when I was looking around Wednesday and Wagner’s hair is absurd, but I feel confident this one is going to work. The smaller building on Saturday means AAA should easily fill that one too, though they can’t have sold too many in advance if they could shift down like that.
No Taya or Jack. I’m completely uncertain if Jack Evans is still working with AAA. He hasn’t been on an AAA show since April, and isn’t on any AAA lineup I have. There definitely was a belief going around that Jack may not be all that motivated to continue working AAA shows once he got his AEW deal. Of course, the same could be said about Sammy Guevara and he’s still around. Every case is different, though I suspect we’ve seen the start and the end of the Guardian of Lucah Libre trio.
There were problems with the Spanish stream at the start of the show. It got restarted during a Wagner promo and they switched from streaming at 1080 to 720. There were few problems after that.
AAA’s taping after Guadalajara is in Aguascalienes. The local promoter posted the lineup last week. AAA posted the lineup today. That lineup changed.
AAA TV (THU) 07/18/2019 Palenque de la Feria, Aguascalientes, Aguascalientes [AAA]
1) Dark Finder, Discovery, Marvel vs Rey Sombra, Triham, Xtrem X
locals match, likely not shown on stream
2) Big Mami, Dinastía, Eclipse vs Lady Maravilla, Parka Negra, Último Maldito
Ultimo Maldito replaces Eterno (moved up)
3) Golden Magic & Lady Shani vs La Hiedra & Villano III Jr.
4) Faby Apache, Niño Hamburguesa, Taya vs Dave The Clown, Keyra, Tessa Blanchard
5) Aerostar, Laredo Kid, Puma King vs Averno, Chessman, Eterno
Eterno replaces Daga (moved up)
6) Cage vs Killer Kross
7) Daga & Taurus vs Cody Rhodes & MJF
Daga replaces Cage (moved to a singles match)
8) Dr. Wagner Jr., Pentagón Jr., Psycho Clown vs Blue Demon Jr., Rey Escorpión, Texano Jr.
Texano Jr. replaced Kross (moved to a singles match)
Cage being split off into his own in to his own match seem like not just AAA being random. The Wrestling Observer Newsletter has been charting some tension between AEW and Impact that might have spilled over into AAA. It has actually centered on Cage – AEW wanted to use him on their debut show, Impact didn’t want their champion to just be another guy in a battle royal – and maybe one or multiple sides decided they didn’t want to do a match with both sides involved. It got Texano and Ultimo Maldito (first AAA appearance this year, may have left the promotion at some point) on to this show, so I guess they can’t complain. Etereno has obviously impressed if he’s the guy being moved up from to replace Daga.
This is 8:30 pm on the poster but AAA’s said the stream starts at 9 (the locals match is not airing.) I’m all but sure this is the final TV taping before TripleMania, though it would take AAA doing something unusual with their schedule for it to make TV before that show.
AAA & local promoter Rosales has a show in Arena Naucalpan tonight. The main will be Pagano, Psycho Clown, and Pentagon in a no rules match. It will probably end with someone breaking a rule. Vikingo, Myzteziz and fill-in L guy Joe Lider face Poder del Norte. I wouldn’t bet on this streaming on Internetv but I suspect it’ll be on YouTube tomorrow.
It’s a rare day when an LA Park return to CMLL is this far down in a news update. LA Park and his sons sent in a video to CMLL Informa to announce he be coming back one more time. In usual LA Park form, this came a day after he was RT-ing the TripleMania poster to get people wondering if he would be the mystery luchador. LA Park will appear on the 07/19 Lyger retirement show, which now looks like
That match is going to start up the LA Park vs Rush rumors again. There’s plenty of possible ideas for the Aniversario show with no being overtly being set up. The answer to “is LA Park going to do a mask match” is “usually no” but there’s room to speculate until CMLL starts pushing another idea. If you look at the timing, CMLL ought to be pushing something by the. The Liger show is just 9/10 weeks from the Aniversario and will possibly have the most attention of any CMLL show this summer. CMLL’s build time to big matches has consistently shrunk so they might necessarily do anything on that show. It would just make a lot of sense to do it.
It is curious Dragon Lee is not involved. He’s got to be booked somewhere.
Informa also announced that the next edition of Mexico’s Lottery will feature the female wrestlers of CMLL as well the Natalia Vazquez (first female Mexican wrestler) and Irma Gonzalez (considered the most important luchadora; the Mexican Fabolous Moolah without that baggage.)
Satanico and Arena Coliseo Guadalajara’s gym will host a lucha olimpica demonstration for the public tomorrow. It’s a free deal
Marca did a Q&A with Alberto that leaned more towards WWE subjects. He notes he hasn’t watched American wrestling in years. It’s totally understandable he would want to spend his time on other things, but a lot of the Nacion Lucha Libre stuff he’s pushing comes off as if from a guy who’s not followed wrestling in many years. That’s a danger; by the time he figures out MVP & Chavo Guerrero aren’t the guys to building around top stars in 2019, everyone will have made their decision on the promotion. On another stop in his press tour, Alberto el Patron said there are about 100 wrestlers working for Nacion Lucha Libre and another 300 who would like to join. I guess “about” can have a lot of flexibility. They have planned 50 shows, including US ones in Texas, Los Angeles, and Phoenix. (No date past the first show has been announced though there really are scheduled dates.)
MexaWrestling on 07/14 in Arena Naucalpan
Tony Rivera won Peligro’s hair last Sunday at an Ice Killer tribute show.
Crixus, a new luchador who popped up in Arena Coliseo Guadalara’s Sunday midcard starting a couple months ago, says he’s the nephew of Mano Negra. That would make him Sanely’s cousin. They may have changed his name, since there’s a guy named Cris Skin on this Sunday’s show.
DTU has an interview with Aero Panther, who’s the brother of Fight Panther Jr. and son of Fight Panther.
Lineup
CMLL (MON) 07/08/2019 Arena Puebla
1) Astro & Meyer vs Black Tiger & Sombra Diabólika
2) Halcón Suriano Jr. & Sonic vs Espíritu Maligno & Rey Apocalipsis
3) Eléctrico, Millenium, Pegasso vs Cancerbero, Policeman, Raziel
4) King Jaguar vs El Perverso [lightning]
5) Dragón Lee, Místico, Soberano Jr. vs Euforia, Gran Guerrero, Negro Casas
6) La Bestia Del Ring, Rush, Terrible vs Cuatrero, Forastero, Sansón [Relevos Increíbles]
Fifth match is in that “should be good but Puebla?” territory. Jaguar/Perverso are having a hair match in a week or two.
