CMLL Aniversario officially 09/16, AAA/Rush/Bandido, AAA TV notes

CMLL

CMLL (FRI) 06/16/2023 Arena México [AS, Excelsior, Kaiser Sports, Publimetro, R de Rudo, The Gladiatores, Titan Sport]
1) Galaxy, Shockercito, Último Dragóncito b Mercurio, Pequeño Polvora, Pierrothito 
2) El Coyote, Okumura, Pólvora b Fuego, Futuro, Volcano 
13:34. Futuro replaced Hombre Bala Jr. on Monday.
3) Zeuxis b La Jarochita  
10:38. Listed as a lightning match on the poster but turned out to be a three fall match.
4) Esfinge, Fugaz, Star Black b Difunto, Hijo del Villano III, Zandokan Jr.  
16:32.
5) Atlantis Jr., Star Jr., Volador Jr. b Ángel de Oro, Niebla Roja, Templario 
9:53
6) Místico b Titán  
16:41.

It didn’t click to me until that there were no angles on this show until putting in the results. It felt like a show with a happening based on the main event, an exciting match where Titan pulled Mistico a little bit out of his usual routine and created different dramatics in the closing kick. It’s worth checking out as it turns up later. It was a good way to finish Titan’s run of singles matches, even if he didn’t get the win.

This show had a huge crowd; my guess is they crossed the mythical 10,000 fan benchmark but I’m bad at guessing. It was Father’s Day weekend, maybe more people were out. It seems like the reason mostly was people wanted to see Mistico and Titan in a big match. Mistico isn’t hot hot, the Sunday with him as a headliner didn’t draw this well, but Mistico on a Friday night in big matches is underutilized. English-speaking people are going to be obsessed with how well a show marketed around CM Punk will draw (in tickets and ratings) over the next few weejs. If you wanted to pick a 2000s hero who has a tendency to get on people’s nerves and who left WWE on very bad terms to a build a show around, Mistico in Arena Mexico seems like he might be the slightly better bet (and will get 1% of the attention for doing it.)

Zeuxis pinning Jarochita seems like it should’ve set up a tag match and just didn’t. It was really odd that the lightning match became a three falls match and it didn’t help the match.

The opener didn’t air on the stream. Ticketmaster actually said “the stream isn’t working” which is a great improvement over previous issues when they’d say nothing at all. It still would’ve been nicer if Ticketmaster aired the match.

CMLL (SAT) 06/17/2023 Arena Coliseo [CMLL]
1) Minos, Pequeño Olímpico, Pequeño Violencia b Acero, Aéreo, Fantasy
2) Grako & Nitro b Robin & Sangre Imperial
3) El Audaz, Flyer, Valiente Jr. b Disturbio, Felino Jr., Raider
4) Lluvia b Reyna Isis [lightning]
5) Pegasso, Rey Samuray, Stigma b Cancerbero, Luciferno, Misterioso Jr.
6) Atlantis Jr., Místico, Valiente b Gran Guerrero, Rey Bucanero, Último Guerrero
Valiente suffered an injury but his team won anyway.

Didn’t see an update on Valiente’s socials about his injury. He’s booked Tuesday so we’ll find ou if it’s minor.

CMLL (SUN) 06/18/2023 Arena México [CMLL, Kaiser Sports, Mas Lucha]
1) Angelito, Kaligua, Pequeño Magía b Full Metal, Minos, Pequeño Olímpico
2) Capitán Suicida, Diamond, Neón b Brillante Jr., Histórico, Vegas
3) La Catalina, Stephanie Vaquer, Zeuxis b La Jarochita, Lluvia, Sanely
4) Guerrero Maya Jr. b Akuma [lightning]
5) Blue Panther, Octagón, Volador Jr. b Felino, Fuerza Guerrera, Virus
6) Dr. Karonte I & Místico b El Hijo de Stuka Jr. & Stuka Jr. [Copa Dinastia, final]
Dr. Karonte II celebrated with his brothers.

That was the expected main event outcome; Mistico gets two big wins in a weekend. There were seven father/son teams and the one brother/brother team won on Father’s Day.

CMLL posted Father’s Day promos from the tecnicos and the rudos. Blue Panther Jr. pops up in the tecnico one, so he’s still around while out due to his eye injury. Hijo de Stuka Jr. is in with the tecnicos video, for what it’s worth.

Sunday, CMLL announced the Aniversario show will take place on September 16th. That is a Saturday, with CMLL moving the show one day in the week later than usual to take place on Mexican Independence Day. (There will be no Friday Arena Mexico show that week, and probably no Arena Coliseo show.) The show will start at the holiday start time of 5 pm CT, which will the freedom to run longer than the 2h15m window they’ve been aiming for on most Fridays. Sunday was 90 days until September 16th, it’s the 90th Anniversary, that’s the reason for the timing. CMLL is now doing a daily countdown bit on social media.

(Dragon Rojo vs Soberano Jr. vs Templario in a mask match is still the expected main event.)

If you don’t pay attention to lucha libre but are writing for other wrestling sites and need a calendar of Mexican wrestling events you need to pay token attention to (or if you’re a lucha libre fan and want to put things on your calendar):

• 06/30: CMLL NJPW FantasticaMania
• 07/14: CMLL Atlantis 40th Aniversary
• 07/15: AAA TripleMania Tijuana
• 08/12: AAA TripleMania Mexico City
• 08/?18?: CMLL Men’s Gran Prix
• 09/16: CMLL 90th Aniversario
• 09/22: Cassandro bio pic hits Prime video (in movie theatres on 09/15)

07/21 AAA Verano de Escandalo will probably have stuff but isn’t airing live. CMLL will run a Blue Panther anniversary show at some point in August but we don’t know when; it may be batched with the Men’s Gran Prix show. The CMLL Women’s Gran Prix is happening in October but no idea when and the Dia de Muertos follows. We have no idea what AAA is doing past August. I think I’m writing VOW previews for all those shows but maybe not a movie review.

Sunday was also the unveiling of the new “Tunel Arena Mexico.” It’s an enclosed area next to Arena Mexico with CMLL information, artwork, and officially licensed merchandise. The tunnel doesn’t seem to lead into Arena Mexico, it’s just a hallway on the space adjacent to one side of the building. What’s going on here could be summed up by Sandra Cuevas, mayor of Mexico City’s Cuauhtémoc borough and on hand for the ribbon cutting, explaining that the tunnel will not replace the vendors who’ve been around Arena Mexico, they’re just adding a place for the wrestlers to sell their official merchandise. Replacing the vendors, or at least redirecting some of the money into CMLL pockets, is clearly the idea. Turiluchas and the other tourist services get a shinier (and likely English-speaking) spot to drop their patrons off. CMLL hopes those fans buy their merchandise in their tunnel rather than with the stands who’ve been there for decades. CMLL avoids the bad PR they’d get if they ever tried to get rid of those vendors, but this is going to make it harder for them in the long term.  The structure looks a bit temporary, but there’s an inauguration plaque with the day and year it opened as if it’s going to be a longterm plan. I wonder how much money the wrestlers are actually getting for their official merchandise, especially when most of the gimmicks are CMLL property.

CMLL (TUE) 06/20/2023 Arena México
1) Fantasy & Galaxy vs Full Metal & Pierrothito
2) La Magnifica, La Vaquerita, Skadi vs Hera, Metálica, Olympia
3) Pegasso, Rey Samuray, Stigma vs El Coyote, Okumura, Pólvora
4) Panterita del Ring vs Rey Bucanero [lightning]
5) Esfinge, Fugaz, Star Black vs Cancerbero, Luciferno, Virus
6) Atlantis Jr., Blue Panther, Valiente vs Ángel de Oro, Niebla Roja, Terrible

Terrible’s first match since November (knee surgery); he’s back with his Los Ingobernables buddies. Not much stands out here.

CMLL (FRI) 06/23/2023 Arena México
1) Astral vs Inquisidor [lightning]
2) Capitán Suicida, Fuego, Valiente Jr. vs Brillante Jr., Max Star, Neón
3) El Audaz vs Magnus [lightning]
4) Dulce Gardenia, Espíritu Negro, Rey Cometa vs Akuma, Dark Magic, Espanto Jr.
5) Bárbaro Cavernario, Euforia, Mephisto vs Gran Guerrero, Hechicero, Último Guerrero
6) Místico, Soberano Jr., Templario vs Dragón Rojo Jr., Titán, Volador Jr. [Relevos Increíbles]

The main event continues the Mistico/Titan rivalry, one before the other Los Ingobernables come to town. It also has the potential Anniversary main eventers; not sure when they’ll announce that. Semimain follows up on the Los Inferanles split. Those three are all not part of the Satanico anniversary celebration as is, but that seems like a situation that’ll be addressed on Informa this week or next. Match four builds to the hair match on 07/14. Match two could be great or a mess, no way of knowing. Match 1 is the two people who might be fighting for the vacant lightweight title, if and win CMLL gets around to handing it out again.

CMLL (SUN) 06/25/2023 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara
1) Odisis & Rav vs Barakai & Shezmu
2) Atilus, Maximus, Rey Urano vs Bello Antuan, Black Boy, Johnny Dinamo
3) Flash, Neutrón, Pepe Aguayo vs Exterminador, Javier Cruz Jr., León Blanco
4) Gallo Jr., Omar Brunetti, Ráfaga Jr. vs Gallero, Optimus, Trono
5) Crixus & Vegas vs Halcón Negro Jr. & Vaquero Jr.
6) Ángel Rebelde & Panterita del Ring Jr. vs Hijo del Villano III & Soberano Jr.

The weekly Sunday Guadalajara shows seem more to be monthly, but this should do fine.

AAA

AAA TV was probably the best episode of matches they’ve had this year. All three matches were watchable and the tag title match was pretty good. The same issues that I’ve complained about a hundred times did come up, but the effort in the matches outpaced the problems.

AAA did address some situations. Sort of.

• La Rebelion complained about not being involved in the tag title match, with Konnna claiming their tag match with Negro Casas & Aramis was too important for them to be involved in the tag title match and they’d get a shot if they win. It didn’t make a lick of sense and La Rebelion pointed that out again after the tag title match – and after beating up Komander and Arez and grabbing the tag titles.
  • By “La Rebelion” I actually mean Mecha Wolf. Bestia 666 never seems to get to talk on mic.
  • La Rebelion is not getting a tag title shot at any announced AAA taping
• Estrellita helped out La Rebelion; announcers seemed insistent this was all part of the new Pagano group even though we haven’t seen Pagano on TV for months.
• Octagon Jr. and Villano III Jr. fought and brawled for like the eighth million time.
  • they actually wrestle on future AAA tapings though there’s no chance this will go anywhere
• Puma King, in a pre-tape interview, pointed out the same thing others have: Fenix isn’t around AAA much despite being double champion. Fenix won the Latin America & Cruiserweight championship one year ago Sunday and has never defended it. (I noted the anniversary on Twitter, but it’s a thing fans have been complaining about to AAA in social media for the last few months.) Puma brought up how the same lack of defenses happened when Fenix was Mega champion, and that Penta, Laredo and Taurus are still wrestling in Mexico despite having steady US work. Puma wants Fenix to either vacate the titles, or to defend the cruiserweight title against himself.
  • this would seem to be setting up Fenix to return and defend his titles, but he is not announced for any upcoming cards.
• Jack Evans made the save for Negro Casas & Aramis after the main event. It’s the setup for Jack being involved in this feud, though there’s no real explanation of why he made the save or why he’s back. He just is.
• The show ended with a bloodied and battered Pentagon Jr. and a message that his mystery attacker will see him soon.
  • We know this is QT Marshall from social media, but TV hasn’t caught up.

It’s notable that there’s a segment for the Penta/QT feud just about every week, and usually something different. Even the Psycho/Adonis feud disappears from some tapings, though it’ll be back big over the next two shows. It’s so different from something like the Octagon/Villano feud, where it disappears for weeks if those guys aren’t on TV and then they do the same basic stuff they’ve done for 95% of the angle. I’m not sure if that’s AAA creative putting more focus on it because it’s match #3 (or maybe match #2) on TripleMania, or if it’s those two wrestlers themselves with their US TV experience understanding the importance of keeping a in front of the fans every week. Penta & QT are sending in promo videos, which is uncommon in Mexican wrestling. Chik Tormenta is the only person on the ‘normal’ roster who’s done something like that recently (and I guess she does have some US TV experience.)

AAA putting a graphic on screen with Konnan’s name spelled wrong is the latest evidence no one is watching these shows before they go out to Space. Can’t do much about that.

(My recording of the show is flawed; the opener has some issues. Maybe you’re better off waiting 3 or 4 weeks for it to make it to YouTube.)

There were no extraordinary weather or environmental issues in Puebla on Sunday; the Popocatépetl volcano remains active but no more so than it has been the last few weeks. The reasons AAA gave for canceling their TV taping did not come to be and are remain hard to believe. It would’ve been just as easy for AAA to declare the taping canceled due to “fuerza mayor” – forces outside of their control – without specifying climate. AAA didn’t have to be specific, making me think there must be a kernel of truth to it. On his podcast, Konnan said the taping was canceled because people in Puebla expected the Popocatépetl volcano to erupt on Sunday. I would really like to point to any news source to back that up, and I can’t find one. Maybe this was just something the local promoter was told privately but an impending volcanic eruption seems like something not to keep private. Maybe this was something the local promoter told AAA, AAA’s probably spending less time researching volcano facts than me this past week.

Konnan had lots to say on the lucha libre segment of his podcast this week. Bandido’s done with AAA for sure, and Konnan later briefly mentions Flamtia’s done as well. Konnan says he booked Bandido, was giving him a feud, was giving him “two things he asked for,” and then Bandido booked himself for the Crash without even telling Konnan in advance. Konnan says everyone knows you can’t work for the Crash and AAA, says Bandido wasn’t a man of his word, feels he’s another Mexican wrestler who got a big ego when he got to the US, and would never pick up Konnan’s calls when he was trying book him. Konnan feels like AAA helped Bandido out by booking him after ROH fell apart and AAA won’t be doing that again if Bandido gets cut from AEW.

Dinamico is still with AAA. “That was a huge misunderstanding.” Emperador Azteca didn’t come up.

Rush is still in play for TripleMania. Konnan likes Rush, but is unhappy with the way unprofessional way Rush handled things. Dorian Roldan is still talking to Rush to try to get him back into the match, and no alternate plan is mentioned for that match. Konnan says Rush was unhappy he wasn’t getting booked more in AAA. Konnan’s plan was to do a NGD/LFI feud following up on their match on the military base, but then Cuatrero got arrested. Konnan thought Cuatrero would be released quickly, so he’d just sideline Rush and Bestia until they were ready to pick that up. Cuatrero is instead still in jail months later. Rush also costs a lot to book – “1/4 of my budget” – it makes more sense to spend that on two or three guys than to book Rush just to book him. Konnan throws cold water on Rush’s Facebook claim that he wants to bring the LA Park hair/mask to “a serious promoter”, saying he’s been trying to get them to agree to that match with AAA “for three years” and they won’t do it. (It sounded like AAA/Konnan would be find with whatever outcome, if they could get either man to agree to losing.) Konnan doesn’t believe there’s a “serious promoter” out there who could give with LA Park & Rush wants besides themselves and CMLL, and CMLL is never working with those guys again. Konnan said the LA Park/Rush mask talk is fake talk, just like Octagon & Fuerza Guerrera, with the implication that they’re never going to do that match. Rush & LA Park were not under contract for these three TripleMania matches. Konnan believes guys in those positions should be under contract and hopes that changes in the future.

(So, I think we were correct to think there was a chance AAA would actually do Rush & LA Park this year because they were trying to do it, but it seems unlikely it’ll happen now even if AAA can get Rush to show up – the guys involved just don’t want to do it. I also think that when Rush says ‘a real promoter’, he actually means the exact opposite. Rush and LA Park wants thought he had in Federacion Wrestling: a guy with a lot of money who’s going to overpay what AAA or CMLL would ever offer because those companies are run like a business and an inexperience guy may just have no idea what a fair amount to offer is. It’s a lottery ticket but they might figure – like Octagon & Fuerza – that they can make plenty of money teasing fans into thinking the match is just around the corner in the meantime. If LA Park & Rush truly wanted the match to happen and just didn’t want to work with AAA or CMLL, they could always go The Elite style and promote it themselves, but that’s never ever going to happen.)

On the TripleMania card, Larry Dallas brings up the mystery woman in the Copa TripleMania and Konnan says it’s actually four women. Two of them are current AAA wrestlers, two of them are not. That would be five different foreign women including those in the trios matches.

Do you remember the short-lived time (early 2022) when Konnan said he’d be working with both The Crash and EMW? Konnan explained what derailed there on his podcast. There are two people who AAA will never work with again: Octagon and Hijo del Santo. The Crash booked both men on the first show when they were supposed to be working with AAA. Konnan was told about Santo in advance and told The Crash to figure something out to get him off the show. He found out about Octagon when the lineup came out. That was the end of that! A fair call. The Crash has never used Hijo del Santo again. They did try to use Octagon earlier this year but he got pulled for CMLL, so essentially The Crash cost themselves their relationship with AAA over two people they were never able to book again.

Bandido isn’t going to be wrestling much anyway right now, with AAA or the Crash. Flamita being done with AAA stinks because Flamita was great in the Big Lucha show last month and Flamita was great in his match on TV this week and I don’t know when we will get that Flamita again.

Sam Adonis did a social media bit inviting US Soccer’s Christian Pulisic to TripleMania following the latest US victory over Mexico. It’d be great for AAA to have Pulisic there but the goal of these things is to get a US site to pick it up as a wacky story and it does not seem to have worked yet for this one.

IWRG

IWRG (SUN) 06/18/2023 Arena Naucalpan [IWRG, Mas Lucha, Zona Ruda]
1) Rey Halcón b Águila Roja, Jhon Tito, Fussion [IWRG REY DEL AIRE, #1 Contenders] 
current champion Puma de Oro
2) Gran Pandemónium, Hijo de Pandemónium, Pandemónium Jr. b León Dorado, Mr. Leo, Relámpago 
3) Látigo & Toxin DQ Noisy Boy & Spider Fly 
Noisy Boy dove into the crowd to take out Toxin, referee went out to check on them, Spider Fly dived towards Latigo, Latigo moved and the referee got taken out. A second referee came out as the match continued, the referee counted three for a Spider Fly pin on Latigo, raised his hand, then raised Latigo’s hand to call a DQ for hitting the referee.
4) Cerebro Negro & Cerebro Negro Jr. © b Bombero Infernal & Mr. Mike [IWRG IC TAG]
first defense
5) Brazo de Oro, Hijo del Fishman, Rey Espectro b Hellboy, Puma de Oro, Tonalli
6) Último Legendario b Dante
7) Hijo de Canis Lupus © b Jessy Ventura [IWRG Rey del Ring]
first defense. Hijo del Alebrije asked for the next shot.
8) Bugambilia L Sagitarius, Bengalee, Diva Salvaje, Mamba, Ludark Shaitan, Satania, Demasiado, Bizhota, Zoy Raymunda, Lady Flammer, Lady Maravilla [cage, mask, hair]
Bugambilia lost to Diva Salvaje after Mamba and Jessy Ventura interfered to help their friend. The fans booed Las Shotas for this.
8) Demasiado L Sagitarius, Bengalee, Diva Salvaje, Mamba, Ludark Shaitan, Satania, Bugambilia, Bizhota, Zoy Raymunda, Lady Flammer, Lady Maravilla [cage, mask, hair]
Demasiado lost to Diva Salvaje after Mamba and Jessy Ventura interfered to help their friend. The fans booed Las Shotas for this.

I watched match 3. The finish was silly – even with that overturned finish, the referee is not supposed to raise the arm of the loser – but Los Mexa Boys benefited from working with good rudos as you’d expect. I had the match as Good, and the Spider Fly & Noisy Boy dives would get some good GIF reactions if posted on the social media.

Ultimo Legendario versus Dante was a bonus match, and probably will continue to pop up in some form on Mas Lucha shows every weekend until they have their mask match on the 07/01 Mas Lucha show. I don’t know it will make a difference but it does seem worth trying. Ultimo Legendario has won the two matches that have gone to a decision so far.

The show looked like a full house. I might not have had much interest in this (and turning Las Shotas rudas is odd) but there were plenty of other people who see these cage matches as big deals.

Other

Bandido announced Saturday that he had probably broken his left wrist in his match with Takeshita on Rampage. He’s getting a second opinion today but was told he’d need surgery soon. He did not say how long he’d be out, but normal recovery would mean he’s in serious danger of missing all the big shows this summer in both countries. There’s no obvious spot in the Takeshita match where Bandido got hurt, he didn’t even seem to be favoring it during the match.

Saturday, LA Park asked for well wished for Mesias/Ricky Banderas on Facebook, saying Mesias was dealing with a “grave” infection following surgery. No one seemed to know more about it until Sunday night, when Banderas’ Facebook page announced it would have an update about Mesias’ health on Monday afternoon. There was no update when I last checked. This sounds a lot like what Latin Lover was and is going through.

Rush announced the birth of his baby daughter Sunday. He hasn’t appeared on AEW in June so far and I think he’ll be gone for the rest of the month for that reason.

Andrade returned to AEW on Saturday. It went well, except for the part where he got beat up by three people and did not have friends. Rush is occupied. If you’re reading this blog, you already know who the friends are going to be. If you are following Mexican wrestling in the slightest you should be able to figure out. 99% of the people are not figuring out and/or not listening to me when I’m trying to lead to them to the answer. It’s mildly infuriating and will continue to be until AEW finally announces the thing that’s should be fairly obvious. What I need to do is to find that Lucha Underground Johnny Mundo GIF of him spinning around and giving middle fingers to everyone, just to have on hand when AEW finally does their reveal, and then I’ll start using it in quote tweets for a day or two. I need something happy to look forward to.

I didn’t get to watch Big Lucha and they didn’t post results, so I’ll just try to catch up later. I heard negative things about the show – both the quality and the stream issues – so it was not an urgent need to watch. (Guess I should note the dreaded Mas Lucha black screen only came up once briefly during the Vipers/MexaBoys match.) One of the things Mas Lucha has been doing for the last month or so is posting photos and results from Hip Hop Man’s tour of Japan. It feels a little bit goofy to be giving this much attention to shows which appear to be in front of very few people, with photos chosen to hide that as much as possible – they’re clearly doing it because Hip Hop Man is part of the Mas Lucha crew. HOWEVER, they’re doing this at all because Hip Hop Man is presumably tracking down the photos, putting the results, and sending the results in a package Mas Lucha could easily use. I wish everyone was more like Hip Hop Man, and sending in results. I would gladly take many more ‘here’s too much info about a show’ posts over having to spend fifteen minutes scrolling through video of an Arena Coliseo Guadalajara show to figure out who got replaced on the undercard, or a half hour trying to determine the finishes from an Arena San Juan based multiple Facebook accounts. Hip Hop Man is role model for all of Mexican wrestling. An unheeded one, but still.

Milenio has a nice interview with Psycho Clown about and with the various fathers in his life.

El Sol de Tampico has a father’s day interview with local referee Paco La Guayaba and his daughter Sexy Power. The article lists the very pregnant Sexy Power as 15 years old. Her Facebook lists her as 23 years old, which makes a lot more sense.

Daga & Chris Ridgeway challenge Yo-Hey and Tadasuke for the GHC Junior Tag Team championship on Thursday. The titles bounce around a lot there so Daga could reasonably win.