AAA apologizes (and says Sexy did), Sexy Star appears on TV to not apologize, Wagner payoff

IWRG (WED) 08/30/2017 Arena Naucalpan [+LuchaTV, The Gladiatores]
1) Power Bull b Ángel Oriental
2) Demonio Infernal & Toxin b Celestial Boy & Vórtize
3) Alas de Acero & Aramis b Glenn Calavera & Jerry Calavera
4) Diablo Jr., Freelance, Golden Magic b Fulgor I, Fulgor II, Mr. Leo
5) Arez, Fly Warrior, Séptimo Rayo b Dragón Fly, Emperador Azteca, Imposible
Indy Nation took 1/3 to win their only match of the night. Septimo pulled off Emperador’s mask and Arez pinned him for the win. Arez challenged Azteca to another title match.

Indy Nation went 1-2, but I guess they can say they won the match that mattered.

GFW quietly posted a statement about TripleMania on their Impact website. They write that both AAA & Sexy Star have apologized, and “appropriate measures are being taken in respect of this incident.” AAA has said nothing publicly and probably shouldn’t be expected to say anything now; if GFW has given them the opening, AAA will be happy to let this story fade away.

Sexy Star appeared on Multimedios’ Bailadmios. This is the the dance competition show she had been on but elimination from, but she appeared to talk about what happened at TripleMania in the most friendly situation possible. R de Rudo has a transcript, (Edit: SuperLuchas has a more complete one) and Sexy does not at all come off as apologetic – she instead describes herself as the victim, someone people are threatening to retire or finish, but she won’t let them stop her from fighting. She feels like she did what she had to do, and she says she doesn’t know if Rosemary is really injured. In no way does this fit with the above paragraph. If Sexy had be willing to admit the slightest bit of fault while shifting the blame, this crowd was willing to get fully behind her. There’s a bit in the end that doesn’t appear in the transcript where Sexy says she has the support of her daughter and her husband and the parents and that’s all that matters, and that was her play to get the crowd on the side. It did get applause, but it didn’t change anyone’s minds. It probably not a good idea to go on TV if this is what she had to say – it wasn’t good for her and it wasn’t good for AAA – but I guess we can fairly say it was not the worst decision she’s made this week.

None of it matters. It appears everyone’s going to go back to pretending everything fine, except Sexy won’t be working many US shows. That seems like something that’ll be a big problem later  – I don’t know how AAA uses Sexy Star with anyone at this point, because she and the other AAA women can’t be trusted to work with each other, and it’s going to be hard to get an outsider in, but AAA seems like they’ve been willing to ignore any issues here so far. We might just get more excitement later on. We’re going to get nothing that’ll lead to good wrestling matches or entertaining wrestling stuff that isn’t everything breaking down.

(One more thing: if we take Sexy Star’s side for a second, why is she still in AAA? If she really believes everyone was out to get her, shouldn’t she be angry with AAA for putting her in that match?)

The Wrestling Observer, citing “a source with knowledge of all the numbers of the show”, says Dr. Wagner was paid 4.5 million pesos ($255K USD) for losing his mask. Psycho had agreed to lose his mask for 500K pesos ($28K USD) but they decided it was worth keeping him mask over the savings. Psycho instead earned $4.5K USD for the match. The show itself drew 17,000 fans, 14,000 paid with a gate of $625K, which is much less than had been expected.

The WON says Wagner & Atlantis were each offered $37K USD to lose their mask in 2007, but both declined. Park & Wagner were looking for $77K USD to lose their mask in 2012 but couldn’t get it. Wagner ended up making 3x as much in AAA.

AAA’s put the complete TripleMania up on YouTube. There didn’t appear to be any editing in the woman’s match, it’s the same video that is on Twitch.

Keeping it 100 with Konnan has a discussion of TripleMania about 50 minutes in. Kevin Gill, one of the regulars on the show, was one of the English language announcers. Kevin Gill thought he did a great job, although he gets very angry when Konnan calls him on not knowing people’s names. Kevin did mention he never watched any AAA, but felt most of the blame should be on AAA for not giving them a format sheet with the participants and run-ins or putting up an onscreen graphic so they could be identified. Kevin doesn’t get a chance to say it, but he seems to believe he should be judged by his presentation and any lack of product knowledge is not his fault. That seem to echo AAA’s belief given how they run it.

Gill says they were only told they were doing the show 3 days in advance so they didn’t have enough time to prepare. 3 days advance warning is odd because it was out 10 days ahead of time that they were probably doing the show on Twitch.  It’s strange but not surprising that AAA would’ve only informed people at the last minute. This seems consistent with the work AAA didn’t do for Matt Striker in past years. The reality is, should you find yourself on an AAA show (or really any other event at all), you should be prepared to do the work as if you’re going to get no help – because you’re probably going to get no help, and because a professional should be able to get by without it. In the end, TripleMania was a small event and it didn’t matter to the announcers if they knew anything because they can still say they did it, and it didn’t matter to AAA because they probably only had English announcers to appease Twitch, so life goes on.

PW Insider (via WrestleZone) says Alberto and GFW were going to run an angle at TripleMania to build to his return to GFW, but it didn’t happen because Alberto was angry about AAA trademarked Alberto’s name. (That makes it sound like AAA just did that, but they trademarked it back in 2014 and Alberto’s been angry about it for years -it could be that Alberto wasn’t going to working the show until they transferred the name to him.) PW Insider says Alberto will work a different show to shoot the angle, which may be the 09/10 Championship Wrestling from Hollywood show he was just announced for.

CMLL’s put up it’s tutorial on how to buy the Gran Prix.

Kojima’s arrived in Mexico. I think they’re only missing Kenny King.

A video of the foreigners trip to the park.

+Lucha has an interview with Ultimo Guerrero, Euforia and Diamante Azul, and another with Juice Robinson and Matt Taven about the Gran Prix.

The Crash announced a bunch of November dates – 9 shows, including 7 straight days of them.

• 11/03 Guadalajara
• 11/04 Tijuana (Bestia/Jack)
• 11/05 Monterrey
• 11/06 Nuevo Laredo
• 11/07 San Luis Potosi
• 11/08 Aguascalientes
• 11/09 Toluca
• 11/11 Mexico City
• 11/14 Leon

This is their most ambitious schedule yet; they’d be in a great position if they do well on all these shows. The Mexico City one probably won’t be Mexico City proper.

Aeroboy promo for his match with Virus, which is already coming up this weekend.

Revolucha announced Chavo Guerrero & Matt Taven would be replacing MVP & Jeff Jarrett in their main event. I think they’re likely to work with Sam Adonis against xRayo de Jalisco, Huracan Ramirez Jr. and Mistico better.

A story on Torreon mask collector Oscar Galindo’s giant mask collection, which gets written about occasionally.

I’m on the LuchaWorld podcast talking about TripleMania.

CultIcon and TKD review last night’s Lucha Underground. CultIcon also writes about Psycho Clown vs Dr. Wagner and one previewing the Gran Prix.

MedioTiempo looks back at the history of Gran Prix.

Kcidis draws the Wagners and an unhappy third party.