Day: December 9, 2020

Roldan interview, TripleMania notes, next Memes show

thecubsfan 4 Comments

CMLL Informa has Volador, Angel de Oro, Sanson, Atlantis Jr., and Star Jr. today. That seems a lot of Copa Junior focused.

Mas Lucha mentioned they’d have Dorian Roldan on their video podcast Monday. I presumed he’d kindly show up for about 15 minutes, promote TripleMania, and get out of there. He was there for about two and a half hours. I don’t think it is good idea to recap everything, but a few tidbits

  • Roldan emphasized the importance of ending a show well in how people view the whole show, feeling some past AAA shows had good matches underneath but got lesser reviews because the last match wasn’t what it was hoped to be. That does remind that there’s a bit of pressure on Chessman & Pagano to not be a disaster.
  • Roldan’s asked what he thinks of the AEW/Impact relationship, and says to ask him again in a month. He earlier mentions he’s expecting to talk to the AEW heads soon. (Maybe this weekend?)
  • the TV Azteca airing of TripleMania is going to be condescended highlights of the full show, not just picking up the live show at 10:30 AM. Roldan generally sounded positive about the current AAA/Azteca relationship and noted people who can’t watch the show at the current TV time slot have a lot of other options
  • Roldan was skeptical about bringing in more foreign stars to AAA as regulars. He felt they had a lot of great foreign wrestlers over the last five years but would always inevitably lose them once an American company came calling. Cain Velasquez was his key example there. He felt the current WWE/AEW battle would make it even harder to keep talent long enough to do something with them. He also said that while the Mas Lucha audience might know the foreign wrestlers and appreciate the quality of their one-off matches, the fans who come to the cities they run don’t know them as well. He cited the 2013 AJ Styles/Mesias match as one he believed was great but didn’t get that sort of reaction. He was more positive about how Kenny Omega’s worked out.
  • the AAA deal with Twitch was canceled at the start of the pandemic, and AAA feels they’ll reach more people on Facebook and YouTube especially for TripleMania. (Their known stats suggest this is accurate; we may have gotten used to Twitch but AAA gets more views for content on YouTube and far more for Facebook.)
  • Roldan’s asked running empty Arena Ciudad de Mexico rather than trying to have fans in one of the open Mexico State arenas. He explains all the technology needs they have for TripleMania are already present in Arena Ciudad de Mexico and he doesn’t feel they’d be able to securely run one of those buildings with fans. Promotions may be able to run in them now, but TripleMania would shine a bigger light on them and officials could shut them down at any time. They will look at running states who’ve gone to the green health code if it’s safe for the wrestlers and they can work with a local promoter.
  • The theme music changes are driven by streaming; the AAA channel would get strikes, videos would get de-monetized, “we were throwing money in the trash.” They know the fans like the old themes and hope they’ll get used to the new music over time.
  • The idea for a AAA Training Center (either standalone or partnering with Arena Naucalpan or Arena Lopez Mateos) went on hold due to the coronavirus but still exist as a long term plan.
  • The ticket refunds are totally in the hands of Superboletos. The ticket company has decided to automatically roll them over for next year’s TripleMania, but people waiting for refunds can contact them directly (best through Whatsapp) to request refunds.
  • Please no one interviewing Roldan ask if he would be interested in [insert wrestler name] wrestling for AAA. He is interested in anyone, even the people who have sued AAA in the past, if there is a good business reason for it. We found this out with many names.
    • Dorian Roldan said there’d be a lot of people from CMLL would have interesting matches in AAA, bringing up the Psycho Clown/Atlantis mask match idea, but the one person who AAA is missing is KeMonito.

AAA announced Charro Gonzalez – the dancing skeleton man from the Dia de Muertos show – will be back at TripleMania. Dorian Roldan said there would be other announcements during the week.

Milenio has the “Chessman was a second-generation soccer prospect who switched to wrestling” story that gets retold every few years. I’m always a little bit skeptical about parts of the story; the often retold bit of him hurting a foreign player in practice (costing his team money and getting the team angry with him) fits almost too nicely with his role as a feared rudo. It is a good reminder how much TripleMania might mean to him; Chessman’s father won championships and expected his son would too. Winning the main event of TripleMania is a close substitute.

There’s going to be so much merchandise of the Marvel Lucha Libre characters. AAA’s going to try hard to make this work, though it’s still dependent on anyone wanting to buy it. Hope so.

Daga keeps hinting about being on TripleMania, so either he’s a surprise (maybe a Marvel person?) or he’s really committed to a bit and I respect him for it.

Puma King is happy for his brother Tiger becoming Felino Jr.

CMLL has posted cut-out ornaments and holiday Whatsapp stickers on their website. I’m hoping to use the stickers to be kicked out of various Whatsapp conversations.

11/19 Kriminal Lucha Libre @ “Casa Kriminal”

Kriminal’s debut show at Giminasio Micktlan, which has since been shut down. They’re just not publically telling people where they’re running this time. Fly Star has apparently unretired. There is no real difference between many of those “styles” but they think they can get the fans to believe it.

IWRG says their New Year’s Day show will be an all cage match show.

Lucha Libre Boom says they’re running Arena Neza on New Year’s Day, which would be the first show in October.

LuchaWorld’s Podcast returns to talk about Bobby Lee and TripleMania.

Lucha Central has part two and part three of the TripleMania history.

San Juan del Rio, Queretaro formed it’s own Box Y Lucha libre commission.

Lineups

Lucha Memes (SUN) 12/20/2020 Coliseo Coacalco, Coacalco, Estado de México
1) Black Yaya, Milenario, Tanatos vs Águila Guerrera Jr., Cachorro De Guerra, Destino
2) Black Out, Genio Rojo, Intenso, Kaito vs Bagheera, Blue Monsther Jr., Ciclón Infernal, Taurino
3) Garrobo vs Impulso
4) Felino Jr. vs Justiciero Jr.
5) Calibus vs Iron Kid
6) Eterno vs Ricky Marvin
7) Aramis vs Skayde

Aramis versus Skayde will get me to sign up for IWTV when that goes up. Eterno/Marvin could be good, though I’m a little concerned there’s going to be some CMLL funkiness by booking Abismo Negro Jr. and ex-Tiger on the same card.