TripleMania XXV, CMLL weekend results

AAA TV (SAT) 08/26/2017 Arena Ciudad de México, Ciudad de México, Distrito Federal [AAA]
TripleMania XXV
1) Ashley, Dragón Solar, Pardux, Solaris b Bronco González Jr., Chicano, Fetiche, Hahastary [La Llave a la Gloria]
6:41. First of two final matches (and easily the worst of the two, with many people looking nervous. Dragon Solar pinned Fetiche.
2) Angelikal, Hijo Del Vikingo, The Tigger b Ángel Mortal Jr., Tiger Boy, Villano III Jr. [La Llave a La Gloria]
7:28. All three tecnico hit top rope moves on all three rudos at the same time. After the Reina de Reinas match, all 14 participants returned. Vikingo, Angelikal and Ashley were announced as winners, but everyone in the group would be part of a new AAA school.
3) Hernandez, La Hiedra, Mamba, Mini Psycho Clown b Big Mami, Dinastía, Estrella Divina, Máscara de Bronce
6:42. Hiedra hit Mami with a chair from outside and Mamba – suddenly with a short blond hair cut – got the win.
4) Sexy Star © b Lady Shani, Ayako Hamada, Rosemary [Reina De Reinas]
9:55. Lady Shani won a spot in the match via a contenders match in Aguascalientes. Hamada & Rosemary (GFW) were added on 08/18. First TV defense, 2nd overall. Terrible match, with Sexy Star submitting Rosemary by armbar, then putting it back on and apparently pulling Rosemary’s arm out. Martha Villalobos presented the title to Sexy Star.
5) Monsther Clown & Murder Clown b Dark Cuervo & Dark Scoria and Aerostar & Drago and Andrew Everett & DJZ [AAA TAG]
13:23. Secta fall on their 3rd defense, Murder splashed both of them. During the match, Aerostar used the ropes and Murder Clown to climb to the hanging light platform. The platform had been lowered so Aerostar could reach it, and was raised all the way back up before Aerostar leaped off onto everyone. Poder del Norte ran in to attack everyone (not just Drago & Aerostar, but others for no reason.) Raptor made the save for his friends. Dave the Clown returned to TV to help his fellow clowns and Marty the Moth, in clown makeup, also came out to help them.
6) La Parka b Argenis, Bengala, Australian Suicide, Faby Apache, Pimpinela Escarlata, Averno, Chessman, Súper Fly, Bobby Lashley, Jeff Jarrett, Moose, Decnnis, Scorpió Jr., Zumbido, Histeria, Maniaco, Psicosis, Halloween, Mr. Águila, X-Fly, Crazy Boy, Joe Lider, Niño Hamburguesa, Heavy Metal, Lanzeloth, Ricky Marvin, Blue Demon Jr., El Cobarde, Pirata Morgan [Torneo Triplemania]
26:14. Trios entered together in 90 seconds interval, but the match turned out to be everyone for themselves with one winner. Some teams (OGT, Vipers, Guapos, Mexican Powers) entered thru the crowd for no explained reasons. Joe Lider entered as a Mexican Power, instead of as a Perros del Mal as had been advertised days before. (X-Fly replaced him and Kahn-Del Mal seconded them.) However, Lider turned on the Mexican Powers mid match to join the Perros del Mal, in one of a million things going on once. Cobrade Jr. was the mystery man. Sangre Chicana, Cobarde, May Flowers, Los Vatos Locos, Los Payasos and Mascarita Sagrada were lumberjacks in a match with over the top elimination rules. Intocable didn’t appear and was replaced by Ricky Marvin. The GFW team entered individually for no explained reason. La Parka survived a three on one against the OGT to win. Latin Lover presented Parka with the belt.
7) Pagano NF El Mesías [street fight]
16:41, though the action had stopped about two minutes before the match was officially waved off. Moved down a spot. Match went to a no finish when medics checked on Mesias after Pagano hit Mesias with the barbed wire bat to the side of the leg. Rey Escorpion returned to AAA to attack both men, with the idea he was more extreme then both of them.
8) Johnny Mundo © b Texano Jr., Hijo del Fantasma [TLC, AAA HEAVY, AAA CRUISER, AAA LA]
22:04. Moved up a spot. Third defense for Cruiserweight/Heavyweight, fifth defense for Latin American title. Kevin Kross, Mascara de Bronce and Henrandez all got involved, though Mundo won long after interference.
9) Psycho Clown b Dr. Wagner Jr. [mask]
28:42. Wagner was cleanly beaten and unmasked as Juan Manuel Gonzalez Barron, 52, from Torreon.

Wagner apparently let a Japanese photographer take a photo of him unmasked when he was there in May, so this was no last minute call and probably the plan from last year. Maybe before last year, because AAA did start down the Wagner/Psycho and Pagano/Pentagon paths for TripleMania 24 before switching those around, perhaps thinking they needed one more year to set it up.

I don’t know what the deal was with Meisas’ injury. The finish of the match was really flat, as if it really had been cut short by an injury and Mesias was supposed to win and they had no idea what to do. Still, the match and the show had been so long at that point, it seems crazy to think they were going a lot longer and Mesias ended up walking with help to the back. Rey Escorpion’s run-in was totally downplayed by everyone in the ring, to the point where he went over the top even for the usual lucha bit of attacking in injured guy, as if he knew this sucked but had to get himself over.

Jeff Jarrett looked like he had no business being in a ring, but he was treated like a huge deal to set up Parka beating him – and then they played the music because whoever was running it knew Parka was winning and figured beating Jarrett must’ve been it. The match went on for a few more minutes.

Maybe Marty is allied with the Clowns going forward, but it also felt like they were just checking off appearances for regulars with all the people running in. Ricky Marvin got Intocable’s spot in the Torneo TripleMania. Elegido appeared before the show for a giveaway. I think that leaves Gronda and the lesser minis.

I haven’t watched any of the matches again complete – this is time 3 of 5 I’ll be writing about this show, so I’ll be doing it eventually – but it’s so obvious something happened with Lady Shani and Sexy Star that I should’ve picked up the first time; the Mexican announcers seemed to. Lady Shani lands a sliding kick to Sexy Star’s head about 2:30 in, Sexy takes a moment to recover, then stops selling all of Shani’s offense, and Shani starts swinging and Sexy goes for her hair. Piero tried to pull them apart and still needed Ayako’s help to do it. It might have started before that, and Sexy was weird all match leading to her pulling Rosemary’s arm out. I’ve not been on Twitter today, but Rosemary apparently praised Shani, Ayako and Vampiro for calming down the situation while ripping Sexy Star for her actions. Rosemary says Sexy Star didn’t apologize and is trying to tell people it was an angle.

Any other promotion in the world would fire Sexy Star after this – but recall, AAA never has fired Sexy Star. They didn’t last time either, she just told them she was retiring and they thought that was good enough. And even if they did fire her, this is on AAA for enabling Sexy Star all this time. You could see something like this coming after Sexy Star ripped the other AAA women and Lady Shani ripped her back on +Lucha’s podcast, except apparently AAA didn’t see enough to put a stop to it. Really, you could see this coming from the moment they rehired Sexy Star and gave her the title the first night back – that was inviting an ego driven disaster and it took two matches to get one. Dorian & Marisela made that call, not Vamp, and that’s the strongest reason nothing will get done – getting rid of Sexy Star would be admission they screwed up, and they’re not going to take that L. They’re not even going to take a smaller L – it sticks out that Rosemary mentions an apology from Vamp but did not mention the owners of AAA offering the same.

(Sometimes I think Vampiro’s given so much freedom to do whatever he wants – like chokeslam the heavyweight champion as the semimain underneath their biggest title match of the year to set up no match – because the Roldan’s know how many messes he has to clean up and they figure letting Vamp putting himself over will keep him happy, or at least keep him going. It hurts the onscreen product for the fans, but the fans aren’t the priority.)

I have no proof, no one’s told me anything, but if I got to put money on it, I would bet that Hijo del Vikingo was planned to win the La Llave a la Gloria competition from day 1. He’s the only one of the three winners who didn’t even go thru a tryout, and with them instead putting him on TV right away (like how Daga was put on TV before he actually won that competition.) I think AAA was happy to find Angelikal, and maybe have discovered Ashley thru these tryouts, but I believe this was a bit of a storyline. Which is fine, if you want to tell a story about a guy winning it, fixing it so a guy the caliber Hijo del Vikingo wins is good and it still gave other people a chance they wouldn’t have gotten.

It’s too bad that second Llave match happened with about 15% of the crowd in the building. It would a much better experience for everyone if AAA took a page from WWE and NJPW, had a fan fest the day before the show some place, and ran minor matches the level of the La Llave a La Gloria ones so these shows wouldn’t be five hours long. They could even run last minute angles there or interviews. But, the only thing AAA takes from NJPW & WWE is storyline ideas without understanding them, so understanding a fan fest or pacing is unlikely.

Mascara 2000 Jr. wants a hair vs hair match with Dr. Wagner now that they’re both unmasked. Or he just wants an easy payday.

CMLL (SAT) 08/26/2017 Arena Coliseo [CMLL]
1) Pequeño Nitro & Pequeño Olímpico b Eléctrico & Stukita
2) Arkángel de la Muerte, Cancerbero, Metálico b Oro Jr., Pegasso, Starman
Oro replaced Astral and hurt a leg. Cancerbero replaced Nitro.
3) Blue Panther, Blue Panther Jr., The Panther b Puma, Tiger, Virus
4) Johnny Idol, Titán, Valiente b Felino, Mr. Niebla, Negro Casas
5) Marco Corleone, Matt Taven, Michael Elgin b Rey Bucanero, Terrible, Vangellys
Foreigners won falls 2/3.
6) Juice Robinson b Shocker
Juice took falls 1/3. Foreigners remain undefeated.

It happened. Everyone lived.

CMLL (SUN) 08/27/2017 Arena México
1) Disturbio & Espíritu Negro b Fiero & Magia Blanca
Disturbio replaced Cholo.
2) Canelo Casas, Hijo del Signo, Inquisidor b Flyer, Oro Jr., Príncipe Diamante
Rudos took 1/3
3) Rey Cometa, Soberano Jr., Stuka Jr. b Misterioso Jr., Nitro, Sagrado
Nitro replaced Morphosis (may now officially be gone). Tecnicos took 1/3.
4) Ángel de Oro, Mistico, Valiente b Kráneo, Rey Bucanero, Vangellys
Angel de Oro replaced Niebla Roja. Tencicos took 1/3.
5) Juice Robinson, Marco Corleone, Michael Elgin b Ephesto, Luciferno, Mephisto
Foreigners took 1/3.
6) Matt Taven b Euforia
Taven took 1/3. Foreginers remain undefeated.

The booking of this feud has become very obvious: I think you can figure out the outcome of every match until 09/01, and then the outcome in the Gran Prix. Still, it’ll probably be a fun time. I just hope Taven puts in a good word for Euforia.

Team International also went mini golfing.

Niebla Roja missing a show is not a positive sign but it’s too far out to matter. He’s booked the next couple days and so we’ll quickly know if it’s a pattern.

The Crash will have a press conference on Tuesday to talk about the Rush signing, Penta’s travels, and upcoming plans. Fenix is among those listed as appearing, but he hasn’t been appearing as scheduled of late. He’s got a big week of a mask vs title match in AAW and BOLA in PWG, and you should sound the alarms if he’s not at this press conference on Tuesday at 2pm.

In typical cynical indie action, Mantra defeated Jason X in the main event Pleu’sports debut show in Arena Azteca Budokan in the finals of a cage match. Jason X said he was 40 with 5 years of experience. I only have a record of him wrestling twice before and he was easily the least known person in the match.

DoradaFan has a Soberano Jr. music video.

Segunda Caida finds joy in an Arkangel, Metalico and Policeman team.

Noticas del Sol de Laguna has an interview with Torreon luchadora Linda Llamarada.

Lineups

CMLL (SAT) 09/02/2017 Arena Coliseo
1) Kairos vs Demasiado
2) Príncipe Diamante & Sensei vs Warrior Steel & Yago
3) La Vaquerita, Lady Maravilla, Sanely vs La Comandante, La Seductora, Tiffany
4) Blue Panther vs Vangellys [lightning]
5) Soberano Jr., Stuka Jr., Titán vs Dragón Rojo Jr., Hechicero, Pólvora
6) Carístico, Kenny King, Valiente vs Kojima, Shocker, Terrible

Kenny King joins Kojima as at least hanging around for the weekend. I’d assume this lineup means all the other foreigners are finishing up on 09/01.

I don’t have a painless way to search for singles matches that are opener, so I don’t know if that hasn’t happened in a long time or just plain hasn’t happened ever. It’s exceedingly strange; it’s obviously a tryout match and almost a dark match, but it’s strange they didn’t bump two of the guys from the “segunda” to give them their spot. That 1v1 combination doesn’t seem to make any sense: the only Kairos I know is a guy working indie shows in Puebla who’s never faced Demasiado and never wrestled in Arena Puebla. I guess he must be in CMLL’s school somewhere.

LI (SUN) 09/17/2017 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara
1) Magic Girl & Tarahumara vs Eva Bernal & Guerrera Isis
2) Flash I, Hijo del Pantera, Súper Astro Jr. vs Ángel Negro, Hijo Del Villano III, Villano III Jr.
3) Pantera, Solar I, Súper Astro vs Heddi Karaoui, Rocky Casas, Veneno
4) El Fantasma, Rayman, Villano IV vs Hijo de Máscara Año 2000, Máscara Año 2000, Universo 2000 Jr.
5) Rayo de Jalisco Jr. vs Canek
Cien Caras will second Canek

Legends Inmortales continues to drift away from “Legends” with the names involved, but it was always just an excuse to book Canek and, for Guadalajara, any Rayos or Dinamitas who wanted to be involved. The poster makes it seem like Rayo’s facing both Canek & Cien Caras.