Santo retirement tour, Titan/Villano III, Soberano, AAA TV schedule

CMLL

CMLL (FRI) 09/20/2024 Arena México [CMLL, El Grafico, Kaiser Sports, The Gladiatores, The Gladiatores (Video), thecubsfan]
1) Legendario & Rayo Metálico b Alom & Infarto
7:02
2) Blue Panther Jr., Dark Panther, El Hijo De Blue Panther b Dark Magic, Espanto Jr., Raider
15:45.
3) Magnus, Rugido, Vegas b Flip Gordon, Neón, Pelon Encapuchado
15:27.
4) Atlantis Jr., Templario, Titán b Gran Guerrero, Stuka Jr., Último Guerrero
5) Místico b Averno [lightning]
9:28.
6) Bárbaro Cavernario, Hechicero, Valiente DQ Esfinge, Euforia, Soberano Jr. [Relevos Increíbles]
12:19. Straight falls, Euforia unmasking Hechicero for the DQ.

Friday’s show was a good show, if a little inconsequential following week. They worked hard in the main event, even it was the destination was pretty obvious. Mistico and Averno did a nine minute version of their classic match, something far more comfortable than last week. Match four was the super professional match between regular teams, really peaking in the third fall. Match two was all third fall, I didn’t think much of the rest. The tecnicos were fun in match three.

Ultimo Guerrero dropkicked KeMalito off the apron in that match four, a moment intended to evoke UG doing the same to KeMonito two decades ago. (KeMalito didn’t do the flip, but Ultimo Guerrero didn’t hit him the same angle.) The documentary on KeMonito came out on Wednesday and got a fair bit of attention, and it’s probably not a coincidence they did the famous spot a couple of days later.

You’d have to be really paying to notice (or care), but CMLL’s moving on as if the Jericho/Mistico match didn’t happen. There’s a sort of pre-show for the Friday streams where CMLL airs in-house ads and highlights from last week. They didn’t show any highlights from the Jericho/Mistico match, which is very unusual for a main event. Later, during Mistico’s match, the announcers talked about his big weekend – in MLW, not mentioning Aniversario at all. Jericho’s face is still up in Arena Coliseo at least.

CMLL (SAT) 09/21/2024 Arena Coliseo [CMLL, Kaiser Sports, The Gladiatores, thecubsfan]
1) KeMalito & Mije b Chamuel & Tengu
13:56. Tengu replaced Atomo
2) Pierrothito b Angelito [lightning]
7:44
3) Persephone, Reyna Isis, Zeuxis b Kira, La Catalina, Lluvia
12:19.
4) Neón & Star Jr. b Hijo del Villano III & Villano III Jr.
18:29.
5) Atlantis, Blue Panther, Felino, Panterita del Ring b Negro Navarro, Octagón, Pantera, Satánico [Relevos Increíbles]
12:11.
6) Atlantis Jr., Místico, Último Guerrero b Averno, Soberano Jr., Templario [Relevos Increíbles]
16:34. Mistico thanked the fans for supporting lucha libre and luchadors (this day is Dia de Lucha Libre.)

I didn’t think much of this one. Villanos/Neon/Star was fun in a vacuum but underwhelming for both teams – they were on different pages, there were some bad spot misses, they could’ve done better. The main event was good and the rest can safely be skipped.

CMLL wrestlers were also at the Mexico City horsetrack, as a part of a cross promotion for Dia de Luchador.

CMLL (SUN) 09/22/2024 Arena México [CMLL, thecubsfan]
1) Hijo del Pantera & Hombre Bala Jr. b Espanto Jr. & Felino Jr.
10:26
2) India Sioux, Skadi, Tessa Blanchard b Dark Silueta, Hera, Reyna Isis
16:01
3) Difunto, Kráneo, Zandokan Jr. b Akuma, Gemelo Diablo I, Gemelo Diablo II
16:03
4) Titán © b Villano III Jr. [CMLL WELTER]
17:52 9th defense
5) Dragón Rojo Jr., Flip Gordon, Neón b Bárbaro Cavernario, Star Jr., Terrible [Relevos Increíbles]
17:13
6) Euforia, Místico, Soberano Jr. b Esfinge, Valiente, Volador Jr.
11:33. Mistico’s partners weren’t much help but he won anyway.

CMLL aired this one live too, free for everyone. It was billed as Dia de Luchador present to the fans. It is interesting that CMLL choose to do a live free stream against the Todo x el Todo show, though CMLL announced they were doing this so late in the day that I’m not sure anyone really picked one or the other.

The CMLL stream ended with Mistico celebrating, but he apparently came back to the ring, got unmasked, then fought Soberano until he got beat up again.

Titan/Villano III Jr. was a much better night for Villano. Everything hung together well, and he was in their with a steadier wrestler. The match was more about Villano surviving for a long time than putting Titan in convincing danger of losing the title, but it was still the most complete singles match I think Villano’s had since jumping over.

CMLL (TUE) 09/24/2024 Arena México
1) Shockercito vs Galaxy [lightning]
2) Capitán Suicida, Dragón de Fuego, Valiente Jr. vs Apocalipsis, Cholo, Disturbio
3) Guerrero Maya Jr., Pegasso, Stigma vs Dark Magic, Espanto Jr., Raider
4) Tessa Blanchard vs Sanely
5) Blue Panther, Flip Gordon, Neón vs Stuka Jr., Terrible, Valiente
6) Esfinge, Templario, Titán vs Difunto, Hechicero, Zandokan Jr.

Main event could be fun; unusual to see Difunto and Zandokan above those other rudos. Women’s match is a normal match, opener is a lightning match.

Again, no Friday lineup until Wednesday night.

CMLL (SAT) 09/28/2024 Arena Coliseo
1) Acero & Aéreo vs Full Metal & Pequeño Polvora
2) Astral, Eléctrico, Emperador Jr. vs Dr. Karonte I, Dr. Karonte II, Enfermero Jr.
3) India Sioux vs Reyna Isis [lightning]
4) Guerrero Maya Jr., Pegasso, Xelhua vs Barboza, Crixus, Rey Bucanero
5) Explosivo, Fugaz, Star Black vs Akuma, Dragón Rojo Jr., Valiente
6) Esfinge, Místico, Star Jr. vs Gran Guerrero, Stuka Jr., Último Guerrero

Sioux mostly worked with Isis in her return match on Sunday, so that’ll probably be a comfortable match. Explosivo, Barboza and Emperador Jr. are in for at least the Saturday.

Barbaro Cavernario is over in the UK for RevPro this weekend. He’ll be in their British J Cup on Saturday (first round opponent TBD) and he’ll wrestle Zozaya on Sunday.

Add Titan to Lluiva and Mistico to the 11/09 MLW taping in Cicero.

Persephone says she has a degree in sports medicine but has put aside that career to wrestle CMLL.

CMLL Puebla matches this week

Atlantis and Octagon aren’t good but the crowd still pops the first time they’re in the ring against each other in any match. That would be a big money feud if they could ever do it (they could not.)

Soberano Jr. on CMLL’s podcast

I caught Soberano Jr’s appearance on CMLL’s podcast. It’s just part 1. I don’t think they went in intended to make a multipart podcast, it is just Soberano gives detailed and thoughtful answers. He also bounces around on the timeline, doesn’t really hold back much, and isn’t afraid to say anyone’s name. (The only people not named are “that referee” Tirantes and “the guy who used to wrestle here as Semental”, and that one may only be because Soberano isn’t sure what his name is right now.) I started to take notes and my notes turned a very long mess. I cut them down and they still seem too much.

Soberano Jr. grew up in a wrestling family, with his grandfather (Soberano) and his uncle (Hijo del Soberano) being major influences in his life after his father (Euforia) moved to Mexico City. He would watch Galavision every Saturday and cites a a Dr. X/La Mascara match as getting him into wrestling (and into the national welterweight championship specifically.)
Soberano Jr. identifies the behavior of his family members, and some of the people he’d later train with and learn from, would be called “bullying” by some people. He insists it was the best way for him to learn, to be tough and to figure out solutions from hardship. Soberano speaks very positively about guys like Super Comando, Artillero, Mesala, and Caligula as those who had all these old tricks that he made sure to learn from. He talks about realizing he was supposed to wrestle Arkangel de la Muerte on an early Sabado Clasico card (when they were doing a lot of singles matches and, as Soberano points out, not drawing at all) and having no idea how he’d get through it, but learning a lot from doing it. He even talked about getting an exhibition match with Halcon Suriano Jr. turning into a shoot, and his grandfather taking him aside to teach him little ways to hurt his opponent a lot in case he ever need to protect himself again.
Soberano Jr. was told by his father to not come to Mexico City as a teenager – life was going to be hard and he wasn’t going to be ready. Soberano Jr. did not listen, and skipped his middle school graduation (15) to get on a bus to Mexico City. Turned out life was hard and he was not ready – he didn’t know how to cook an egg or do laundry or get around, got mocked for his accent in high school, and hadn’t held a real job. Euforia also wasn’t making money, and there were times were they were struggling to pay for food. Fabian el Gitano and La Sombra get name-checked as helping the family a bit during those times.
- There’s a side discussion here where Soberano noted he was recently talking with someone who was a stand-by wrestler in Pubela (someone who’d only wrestle if there was a no-show), and was blown away about how much they were getting paid. He remembered CMLL paying him not enough to pay for a meal when he was in that role. He notes there are shows now where the prelim wrestlers are getting paid more than what the main eventers were getting when he was starting out. They’re remarkably forthcoming with the fact that CMLL wasn’t paying people much money (and then something’s changed more recently.)
Soberano Jr. also had his struggles in CMLL’s system. They put him with Arturo Beristan, and Soberano Jr. said he learned nothing – less than he was getting in Torreon. He complained to his father, who got him in Satanico’s class – which was good until Satanico decided to move to Guadalajara. CMLL had Virus take over, but they also split the class between the guys working at the top of the card and the prelim ones. Soberano got put with the prelim guys, which turned out to be a blessing – that’s where he trained with all the old guys and Virus, who would be hard on him but make him learn and he learned a lot. Soberano Jr. started got moved to Franco Colombo’s class when the Generacion 2012 idea came about, and noted a lot of the wrestlers in that group didn’t last long – a lot of the new people in 2011/2012/2013 couldn’t handle the down time and left.
Soberano Jr. won the 2013 Sangre Nueva tournament, though he didn’t know it – he remembers nothing from taking a Hombre Bala Spanish Fly to the floor until talking with his girlfriend in a restaurant after the show. It was a surprise to him to find the trophy in his bag after. Still, he was frustrated about failing in the Gran Alternativa year after year, and then not even being included it. He saw people like Dragon Lee passing him and thought he’d end up being a new Bengala guy, in the openers forever. (He was 21.) Soberano says he noticed it start turning around for him in September 2016, getting moved up slightly. A couple of month later, referee Edgar pulled him aside, asked him if he was ready, and started to make plane motions and noises. Soberano had no idea what this was about, then woke up a few days later to see on social media that he was going to FantasticaMania.
There’s some talk about the En Busca de Un Idolo, though most of it focuses on the judging element. There was an incident where “that referee” Tirantes pointed out Soberano Jr. was wrestling with a hole at the toe of his boot (and they showed the clip.) Soberano said he didn’t have much money, it was like picking between rent or new gear, but grew to understand CMLL wrestlers are expected to look like stars and you can’t do that with a broken boot. “There’s a difference between Arena Mexico and Naucalpan.” It’s informed his Luxury Of Lucha Libre personality.
A lot of talk about the Soberano/Star vs Cholo/Ramstein mask match. He was scared of Cholo after he knocked the wind out of him once. Soberano couldn’t afford to go home and buy a plane ticket back to Mexico City, so he had a very sad New Year’s utterly convinced he was going to lose his mask. (He is only the person who thought this. People familiar with the match will appreciate CMLL cutting out pretty much everything that Ramstein did in that match when showing clips; he was terrible.)
Soberano Jr. says that many years later, when he was on a tour of NJPW, he got a phone call from Dark Angel. He says he’s never revealed this story before, but Dark Angel put on a hard sell for him to get to the WWE tryouts in Chile. Soberano eventually made up an excuse as to why he couldn’t make that date, and she offered him instead to come to Flordia for a tryout. Soberano doesn’t actually say if he went or didn’t, but talks about instead about that going to WWE for a Mexican wrestler means you become wealthy. He also talks about the struggles there – Andrade explained it to him as “they make you do what you’re not good at doing.” Soberano ultimately decided that while having more money would be nice, he’s pretty happy with how he’s doing now and what he really wants is to be face of CMLL, he wants to be who people think about when they think of luchadors, he wants to be the new Atlantis as the icon of the promotion. His first job was CMLL and he hopes it’s his last job as well.
Soberano talks about his matches with Templario as being magic – like seeing fireworks go off in your head. Soberano didn’t think he’d make the anniversary show this year – “the promotion has slowed me down, with reason” – and Alexis suggests the Soberano/Templario lightning match got Soberano onto the show. Still, Soberano is no longer interested in Templario’s mask. He feels Templario ducked him by going with Dragon Rojo but, more so, feels Templario’s mask is not as valuable to him now that they’ve switched sides. Soberano calls every mask match a coin toss, a big risk, and figures he might as well risk it against a legendary name like Mistico or Atlantis (Jr.) if those are now available him – it’s a much bigger deal if he beats them than Templario.

Part 2 should go up next Thursday.

AAA

There’s an ugly situation this weekend between two current and former AAA wrestlers. Myzteziz Jr. and Keyra were a couple, had a son together, and later split. The child is now three years old and appears to live with Keyra only. Keyra took the boy to the hospital this week for undisclosed reasons, where he stayed for a couple of days and needed a blood transfusion. Myzteziz came to visit while he was in the hospital. Keyra said that visit surprised her, as Myzteziz had not been in the child’s life in the last two years. Keyra came to the hospital to check out her son on Sunday, only to find out Myzteziz had already checked him out. Myzteziz and his family also stopped responding to Keyra’s phone calls. Myzteziz’s side is telling people that the reason the child was hospitalized was Keyra – he was malnourished because of her poor parenting among other issues she’s having; that side sees themselves as rescuing the child from improper living conditions. At any rate, there’s an amber alert in Mexico for information about the child to return him to Keyra, her friends are pushing AAA to get involved somehow, and I hope this works out the best for the kid. I have no idea what that would mean, though.

I still haven’t watching AAA TV. The CMLL extra show threw me! I’ll do it today (maybe.)

AAA’s episode on Space announced a bunch of upcoming tapings. The remaining 2024 taping schedule

09/29 in Monterrey
10/06 in Guadalajara (Heroes Inmortales, will air live)
10/26 in Mexico City – new
11/03 in Monterrey (Showcenter)
11/17 in Juarez – new (Guerra de Titanes, will air live)
12/07 in Mexico City – new

Those will be tapings five and six in Gimnasio Juan de la Barrera this year. They’ve only been there more in 1993 – and in 1993, they had a lot more original TV and misguided belief they could end CMLL by running weekly Friday shows in Mexico City. (They definitely wounded CMLL, but CMLL is hard to end.) The attendance has held up well in Mexico City so far, but running that venue so often is a risk they wouldn’t take in other years – it would be safer to sell a taping to a local promoter.

The 11/03 Showcenter isn’t confirmed to be a taping, but AAA needs two more weeks of tapings somewhere in Monterrey and they’ve announced no other cities. If I’m right, that means AAA will run only 19 TV tapings this year.. They will travel to eight metro areas (Mexico City, Queretaro, Monterrey, Saltillo, Ciudad Juarez, Tijuana, Aguascalientes, and Guadalajara.) In 2019, they ran 33 TV tapings in 26 different metro areas. The original business case for AAA is that they would tour the country, bringing top-class wrestling to all the places CMLL doesn’t go. That was not the plan this year.

The side effect of AAA repeating so many towns is that Vampiro’s already had his retirement show. It’s just Guadalajara and Juarez as the remaining stops. In theory, and I can’t underline in theory enough, Vampiro’s Mexican retirement tour ends on November 17th in Ciudad Juarez. There has been no advertising thus far pushing that will be Vampiro’s last match (though no one in Juarez was promoting anything beyond their lucha libre festival this past weekend.) Vampiro lived in Guadalajara for a number of years, that would make more sense as a final stop for him and he’d get to do it in front of a bigger crowd. Maybe Heroes Inmortal will end up being the Vampiro last match, and the hold up to AAA announcing that lineup is that they also want Vampiro to announce that final show news. Grasping at straws here.

The Vampiro retirement stop in Tampico on Friday seems to have drawn very well. Not the biggest room, but it appears to be a sell-out. Vampiro did an interview to talk about his future plans – he’s going to work Italy’s NWE, expecting to turn it in to take over Europe. The NWE had a moment a couple of decades ago, fueled by WWE getting on TV in the country and becoming a big thing for a short time. Vampiro says he lived in Europe for six years, understands the market, and will try to combine styles from all the countries.

Mas Lucha caught up with El Hijo del Vikingo. These AAA interviews seem to have been taped Wednesday, since Jose Manuel Guillen talked about seeing him about a day earlier in Arena Aficion. Vikingo says his doctor saw the lineup for that show and gave him the business about returning too soon, so no return. The extra couple of weeks might be for the best mentally too; Vikingo came off as nervous and unsure about his return. He talks about having eight people catch the first dive he tried, and about changing some things up with his style and presentation. It does seem like he’s relatively sure he’ll actually return on 09/29, and he’s very excited for the GLEAT matches. JMG reveals Vikingo’s previous trip to Japan with GCW was such a disaster that he never thought he’d go back – Vikingo missed his first flight out of Mexico City, almost missed his second flight, then got pulled in a security room at a layover in Canada. They thought he must be trafficking something, since he was only going to Japan for a few days. Vikingo explained he was a wrestler, showed him his gear, and then could hear them watch his AAA matches from outside the room. Vikingo knew what they were doing because he could hear JMG’s commentary/yelling, which is how it all tied together. Vikingo had a two hour walk to get where he was going in Japan after he got there; it was just not a good travel experience.

AAA and INJUVE announced they’ll have another edition of their Lucha X el Barrio talent search in the near future. The last one took place in January, with the new Taurus, the new Bengala and the not-seen-again Lady Wind finding top 3. INJUVE also honored various Luchadors and Jose Manuel Guillen from Mas Lucha for their participation in their campaigns.

DTU is promoting an upcoming appearance as “Sexy Star from AAA”, so everyone seems to think she hasn’t left. Selfishly, I hope she doesn’t so I don’t have to try to explain a third Sexy Star to Twitter. That may finally get me to leave the site.

Flammer defended the Reina de Reinas championship in Melbourne, Australia.

AAA will have a mass to honor Antonio Pena on 10/01.

Todo x el Todo

TXT (SUN) 09/22/2024 Arena Ciudad de Mexico, Azcapotzalco, Distrito Federal [Apolo Valdes, ESTO, MedioTiempo, SuperLuchas]
1) Heddi Karaoui b Cerebro Negro
2) Lady Apache, Shamila, Therius b Hija de Fuerza Guerrera, Ludark Shaitan, Vanilla Vargas
Ludark replaced Keyra (personal)
3) Solar I & Texano Jr. b Ciclón Ramírez Jr. & Misterioso Jr. [ruleta de la muerte, 8f]
4) Bobby Lee Jr. & Cinta de Oro b Hijo de Máscara Año 2000 & Rayman [ruleta de la muerte, 8f]
Hijo de Máscara Año 2000 replaced Cien Caras Jr.
5) Dr. Wagner Jr. & LA Park b El Hijo Del Santo & Fuerza Guerrera [ruleta de la muerte, 8f]
6) Canek Jr. & Súper Nova vs Hijo del Fishman & Máscara Sagrada Ng [ruleta de la muerte, 8f]
7) Ciclón Ramírez Jr. & Misterioso Jr. b Hijo de Máscara Año 2000 & Rayman [ruleta de la muerte, quarterfinal]
8) Hijo del Fishman & Máscara Sagrada Ng DQ El Hijo Del Santo & Fuerza Guerrera [ruleta de la muerte, quarterfinal]
9) El Hijo Del Santo & Fuerza Guerrera b Hijo de Máscara Año 2000 & Rayman [ruleta de la muerte, semifinal]
10) Hijo de Máscara Año 2000 b Rayman [ruleta de la muerte, hair]
Máscara saved his mask, Rayman lost his hair. Fuerza Guerrera, Mascara 2000, and Angel Blanco Jr. attacked Hijo del Santo after the match, with Santo Jr. making the save

Mas Lucha says they’ll air this show next Saturday for members only.

The early photos of this building looked pretty poor, but it filled up decently as the night went on. Not TripleMania full, and there’s probably a decent gap between “tickets distributed” and “tickets actually paid for”, but the photos are going to look nice enough. (AS calls it was “just over 10,000” in one article and “15,000” in another article these may not be serious numbers.) Rayman taking the loss is no big surprise. Neither really is Santo Jr.’s return – Hijo del Santo has been teasing it in his interviews and the Monterrey lineup telegraphs it. Santo’s Jr. offense lacked, uh, quality but he was also trying to beat up some old men who couldn’t really do much.

The other planned surprise was Angel Blanco Jr. showing up, one of el Hijo del Santo’s old TxT rivals. Blanco said he was angry Santo didn’t invite him for the the show, Santo said he did but Blanco said he was working for CMLL. I have no idea what Santo is talking about. Santo also explains he was going to defend his WBC championship against a foreign opponent to be named, but now he and Santo Jr. will team in the tag tournament. (He was always listed in the tag tournament.) Santo sends a shout out to Dr. Lucha for coming and says he wants to do a show in Korakuen Hall in March or April.

The real surprise is the promotion announcing a return date for April 6th in Arena Ciudad de Mexico. El Hijo del Santo had pitched this retirement tour as the final visit for every city. It never made much sense – why would he have burned off Mexico City first? Where else was he going to go if he wasn’t going to retire in June. Santo’s tried to walk that back for Mexico City in recent interviews, probably because he knew they were going to do at least one more show here. It does mean Santo’s adhering to his own retirement even less than Vampiro. The difference is I tend to believe Santo will actually be done when this tour ends, and I expect Vampiro to just try to get around his retirement as soon as it becomes inconvenient. I still struggle to figure what Santo is going to put on for an April 6th show. It’s a long time away, but I don’t think people are coming back to say goodbye again without something more than this. Maybe Angel Blanco showing up means they’ll be the ones doing the apuesta match next time.

Mascara 2000 Jr. dedicated his win to Cuatrero, “wherever he is.” The idea is that Cuatrero started the feud with Rayman to get revenge for the Rayo/Cien Caras match and Mascara finished it for him.

Other News

Penta made a surprise appearance as a bonus match on the Ciudad Juarez lucha libre festival, wrestling DMT Azul. This was a twelve hour marathon and there’s few people who could be added to a card that would make fans want to see more wrestling at that point, but Penta did. Thunder Rosa was scheduled on the show but is still out recovering from a concussion.

Mas Lucha’s Torneo Suprema, the women’s tournament, will take place 10/19 in Arena Lopez Mateos. That will also be a member’s only show.

Wrestlers and promoters in Oaxaca are throwing a benefit show for local lucha libre reporter/photographer Julio Sanchez Garcia. He’s battling an illness (“he knows his illness has no cure.) and recently had his right leg amputated.

Arena Union in Veracruz revealed they were moving to a new location, which some people had guessed based on their announcement.

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