There are new details about CMLL’s eventually return, though not much of a strict timeline. The explanation came about five minutes into this week’s CMLL Informa. Julio Cesar Rivera and La Jarochita were talking about questions from fans. The most common issue is naturally, “when are we getting shows again?” JCR said CMLL is waiting to get two approvals: from the Mexico City government and the Mexico Lucha Libre commission (Fantasma.) No shows until both sign-off. JCR did say CMLL is planning on running empty arena shows at first. JCR also quickly made mention of COVID testing for everyone, which may be a first for Mexican wrestling. CMLL is currently doing temperature checks and a health questionnaire for those visiting Arena Mexico, similar to what WWE had been doing.
El Universal followed up with El Fantasma, who says he did receive a request to run CMLL shows from Salvador Lutteroth. He, in turn, went to the medical authorities to see what they were recommending. That’s changed. Orange health conditions were the bar to reach to allow lucha libre shows. That’s now officially pushed to yellow. (Fantasma also took a moment to criticize people who’ve been running secret shows during this time.) We’re all just waiting and watching the Friday night calendar updates.
Mexico City will stay in orange health conditions next week. They’re delaying the opening of shopping malls until Wednesday in fear of getting an uptick of cases. There had been a rumor Mexico City would skip right to green, but that never made sense: one of the requirements to get green is basically “stay safely yellow for four weeks.” We can work off that; if Mexico City doesn’t get to yellow by the July 20th update, they won’t be in green by the day of TripleMania (August 22nd), and it’ll be challenging for AAA to run. I’ve already been assuming TripleMania won’t happen on August 22nd, barring a miracle or a rash decision. July 20th is a soft deadline to when they’ll need to make a decision and maybe announce something.
Mexico State is allowing small stores to re-open starting Monday. The state remains at red health color, which means no lucha libre shows will be approved.
Mexico’s baseball league (Lige Mexicana de Beisbol) canceled its 2020 season. They had previously announced a plan to return, even eventually to have fans there. That plan fell through.
Ultimo Guerrero & Rey Bucanero (video) talked about their tag team. Ultimo Guerrero still wants wins over Ciber, Diamante Azul, and Gilbert el Boricua. Let’s not. Guerrero & Bucanero talked about reuniting the Nuevo Infernales with Satanico for the legends show. They were together because CMLL will be re-airing a 2003 tag title match versus Negro Casas & Perro Aguayo Jr. this weekend.
Negro Casas & Dalys (video) talked about adapting to a pandemic. It reads like finding a way to keep working out helped.
Stuka Jr. (video) said his goals include an apuesta match with Ultimo Guerrero and to form a trio to beat Los Guerreros Laguneros for those titles. Star Jr., Flyer, Diamante Azul, Soberano Jr., Atlantis Jr. are all suggested as possible partners. Stuka is open to giving Hechicero another title match, but he wants his mask. Stuka would turn rudo if he lost his mask. Stuka also mentioned he once asked Okumura to write the name of his son in Japanese so he could get a tattoo. Okumura instead wrote the word “ankle” in Japanese. Stuka hates Okumura forever for this.
Thunder passed away four years ago Tuesday. Polvora remembered him in an interview with Ovaciones, saying they were good friends. Thunder was diagnosis with cancer in early 2016, told to return home to Australia, and passed away later that year. Polvora remembers Thunder being in severe pain during a conversation, Thunder asking out to rest and then never seeing him again. CMLL scheduled Thunder and Ultimo Guerrero for a mask match in 2016, and Polvora feels Thunder would’ve won either way. Either he would’ve unmasked Guerrero, or the fans would win to get to see Thunder’s “not-ugly” face. Edit: Ultimo Guerrero was already unmasked by then, so maybe Polvora may be mistaken.
Lucha Time aired another show on Facebook Thursday:
Lucha Time (THU) 07/02/2020 Arena Lucha Time, Monterrey, Nuevo León [+LuchaTV, Lucha Time (video)]
1) Infierno b Saizo
The Invisible Man did a run in.
2) Muerte Extreme & Sick Boy b Alex Black & Punk Clown
3) Baby Xtreme b Medico Brujo
4) Azrael & Hijo Del Espectro Jr. b Epydemius & The Mummy
I had trouble believing that opening match result, but, sure enough, they did a goofy Invisible Man bit in the opener. It came off as someone saw the Vanguardia show and wanted to do the same thing for their amusement.
Lucha Time claimed in a post that they’re sanitizing the building and running COVID-19 testing. They posted a video of the sanitization, which appears to be a man with leafblower blowing air through the ring. I’m skeptical their COVID testing was any more serious.
Drago feels he was on an upward slope before the pandemic hit and hopes to continue that (and his feud with Blue Demon) once he returns. He praises AAA for how they’ve supported their luchadors.
Box y Lucha also has an interview with Big Mami. The summary mentions she’s looking to win the Reina de Reinas title next.
AAA’s is part of a sports charity auction to raise money for COVID-19 release starting Monday. Lucha libre items on sale are a Blue Demon mask, a yellow Lady Shani mask, a black Lady Shani mask, a La Parka mask and outfit, a Psycho Clown mask, and a second Psycho Clown mask. All equipment appears professional equipment, signed, and with authentication information. You can pay via Paypal, and it seems they’re doing international shipping, though you may want to check in on that given the prices.
NJPW translated a recent interview with BUSHI about joining Los Ingobernables de Japon and the early days of that faction. There was a debate if they should be Los Ingobernables de Japon or Los Ingobernables en Japon. There’s also a bit where BUSHI suggests he and Mascara Dorada were to be a regular pair in 2015. BUSHI suffered an injury late in 2014 and then re-injured himself during training, not returning to the ring until the formation of LIJ. He and Dorada did go onto feud at the end of that year and the start of the next. Maybe the reason Dorada didn’t get much to do in NJPW before it because he was supposed to be teaming with BUSHI at that point, and NJPW just decided to keep Dorada in a holding pattern until then. I have a strange feeling this is old news, and I’ve already forgotten it; maybe it’ll sink in this time.
Post Wrestling wrote about an interview with John Brody, a WWE Executive Vice President, and the company’s plan for Latin America. It’s worth clicking through to get the exact quote. The big takeaway is he seems high on the idea of running a “special live event in the short-to-medium term.” That’d generally sound like something aimed for this year, but COVID may change those plans. It reads like maybe a special for the WWE network more than a regular TV show. WWE has not taped a TV show in Mexico since 2011 and has only run one event in the last two years. I may be jumping the gun by thinking about Mexico; the interview sticks with “Latin America,” which could mean anywhere.
More information came out about Anubis Black’s death. On the positive side, we know he was also a fake Barba Roja. On the negative side, we know this because he was a suspect in another double homicide, then shot and murdered. The media outlet wrote about Barba Roja as his primary identity instead of Anubis Black. C4 Noticias MX has the story. Francisco Javier Lizárraga Meza, 31, was a suspect in the shooting death of a man and a woman eating at a Wings Burger in the Alvaro Obregon area of Mexico City on March 25th. A person matching his description walked up to the couple and fired his gun. There was no talking or proceeding incident; it appeared to pre-mediated. Lizárraga shot at them again while they lay on the floor. People on the scene identified Lizárraga, but the police couldn’t find him. On June 20th, in the same Alvaro Obregon area of Mexico City, Lizárraga was with his girlfriend when a man approached and shot him at least eight times. The police realized Lizárraga’s tattoo matched the man they had been looking for on the March 25th murder, and witnesses confirmed it was the same person. A second attacker was part of the March shooting and still hasn’t been found or identified.
DTU 07/17 “A Cielo Abierto” iPPV
- Brazo de Oro Jr. & Brazo Celestial vs Fight Panther & Aero Panther vs Moria & Drolux
- Diosa Quetzal, Tiburon, Kevin vs Princesa Azul, Samuray Jr., Black Fire
- Shun Skywalker vs Pesadilla vs Yoshioka vs Blaze vs Gran Cobra vs Dragon Suicida vs Brazo Cibernetico
- Avorto & Chaneke vs Crazy King & Crazy Boy – new
- Stuka Jr. & Camuflaje vs Kaleth & Negro Navarro – new
Such a weird main event; Negro Navarro on your “fun at the beach” show is an odd fit. Crazy King in the semi-main is more notable. His surprise appearance on sorta-rival Vanguardia promotion hasn’t ended his time in DTU. There doesn’t seem to be concern about him going either since there’s no DTU title defense scheduled on this show. Not the DTU’s title seems like great importance to the promotion.
Lucha Libre Vanguardia and Independent Wrestling TV announced the Hidalgo based promotion will now start appearing on the streaming service. Their first show will go up this upcoming Thursday; it’s the October 3rd, 2019 show. Zona 23, Monterrey’s RIOT Lucha Libre, and Guadalajara’s Guanatos Hardcore Crew groups are all on there. Those two promotions are exclusively behind subscription services, filmed by themselves. Vanguardia has been a +LuchaTV produced promotion, which means all of the shows going to IWTV are already up on YouTube. Vanguardia’s press release seems to indicate that’ll be continuing. IWTV pays promotions based on how much time subscribers spend watching their content. Fewer people are going to go out of there way to watching Vanguardia with it already available free, but anyone who might already be using the IWTV service and flips over to watch some of them is free found money. There’s also a reality that, you can tell some people an international show is available for free a million times but, the only way they’re going to get around to sample is if it is surrounded by more familiar English language shows. IWTV has those and so it has an audience who might not see Vanguardia any other way.
Vanguardia seems to be on IWTV through their connections with brother promotion GCW. If there’s any money in this, I do wonder if opens the door to other +LuchaTV produced lucha libre promotions looking for the same; there’s a lot of following the leader in vaguely Mexico City area lucha libre promotions. I also wonder if +LuchaTV gets a cut of the IWTV money – or if Vanguardia gets a percentage of the +LuchaTV YouTube ad money. All of those are mysteries only known by the people involved.
No one asks me these things and probably for a good reason, but I’d suggest Vanguardia put up the June 2nd show with the Ciclope/Miedo Extremo explosive match next time they can get on the IWTV stream. That’ll get some attention.
A Psicosis Ripper led the show in Mexico State is going to try a drive-in wrestling show on August 1st. I know people have tried the same thing in the US, but I have no idea if it’s worked or not. Tickets will be 350/400, with a limit of four people per car. You can get in for 200 if you’re on a motorcycle.
Argentinan luchador Atila (Ruben Osvaldo Velázquez, 70) passed away Thursday He wrestled for the Titanes en el Ring show.
Segunda Caida reviews a Wotan/Diabolicos trios match from last year.
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