CMLL
CMLL (TUE) 02/22/2022 Arena México [CMLL, Excelsior, Kaiser Sports, Mas Lucha]
1) Apocalipsis, Cholo, Raider b Leono, Retro, Valiente Jr. 
Raider defeated Valiente (Arena Mexico debut) with la de a caballo, Valiente had his foot on the ropes, Olimpico missed it. Seemed more happenstance than an angle.
2) Arkalis, Pegasso, Stigma b Disturbio, Enfermero Jr., Nitro
3) Marcela b Metálica
Marcela took 2/3.
4) Espanto Jr., Felino, Gemelo Diablo I, Gemelo Diablo II b Blue Panther, Dark Panther, Panterita del Ring, Panterita del Ring Jr.
Espanto Jr. replaced Felino Jr. on Tuesday morning. Rudos took 1/3.
5) Euforia DQ Atlantis Jr. 
Euforia took 2/3. Atlantis Jr. unmasked Euforia
Atlantis was a tecnico going full rudo, talking about all the masks he wanted to take and including Mistico on that list. If they could just stick with him as a rudo, that would be great. Teasing matches with all of Euforia, Stuka, and Mistico suggests CMLL hasn’t really picked out a plan yet or hasn’t let Atlantis Jr. in it – there’s no consistency of vision found when CMLL has an actual direction.
The MarcaClaro mystery was solved; it was the return of the Tuesday streaming shows, so someone put it on the right time but the wrong day. CMLL didn’t mention the stream existing until the moment the show started. Like in the past, it’s Mexico only by the apparent choice of MarcaClaro, and it’s unlikely that’ll ever be fixed. I’ve renewed the one Mexico VPN I can find that doesn’t block Mexico (40/year!) and put the matches up on the Google Drive. CMLL has been on and off MarcaClaro the last few months, so no telling how long this last.
The opener finish was odd. A missed foot on the ropes bit only happens in important matches and that was anything but. It wasn’t really played up post-match which challenges, but Retro immediately pointed it out, it was done in a way for the referee to point out and CMLL posted a photo explicitly pointing it out. We are seeing slightly different things in CMLL – these women 1v1 matches seem to exist just to do something different, not yet for a cage match – so maybe this is part of that? Or it’s just a weird bit?
Valiente Jr., talking in a post-match interview about one day teaming with his father, mentioned Valiente will be out for eight or nine more months. I had no sense his injury was that serious; I’m not even totally sure what it is.
CMLL (TUE) 02/22/2022 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara [Arena Coliseo Guadalajara]
1) Ponzoña Jr. & Temerario b Estrella de Jalisco I & Estrella de Jalisco II
2) Adrenalina, Estrella Oriental, Minotauro b Destructor, Persa, Quka
3) Dark Silueta & Valkiria b Náutica & Sexy Sol
4) Flash & Gallo DDQ Mr. Trueno & Rey Trueno
Match fell apart at the end when Flash suffered an arm injury, landing awkwardly on a Trueno after a missed dropkick. Gallo and one of the Truenos pulled off their mask at the same time for the DQ to get out of it, which didn’t seem like the intended finish.
5) Bestia Negra b Exterminador
Bestia submitted Exterminador and challenged him to a title match.
6) Zandokan Jr. b Principe Daniel © [OCCIDENTE MIDDLE]
Guadalajara/Fuego en el Ring posting results seems to be over and so that’s extra time for me on this show every week. Having to watch it myself did have the benefit of seeing the remarkable freak injury in the fourth match, which seemed like the fault of the Trueno for not moving in the right spot for the missed dropkick.
Vampiro was in the crowd at the show and pointed out by the announcers. I presume he was there just as a fan, he must be living in Guadalajara again. I wouldn’t ever rule out Vampiro somehow getting another job in wrestling. He’s really good at getting unlikely jobs, it’s doing them where the difficulties sometimes arrive.
CMLL (FRI) 02/25/2022 Arena México
1) El Suicida & Panterita del Ring Jr. vs Eléctrico & Halcón Suriano Jr.
2) Akuma, Dark Magic, Espanto Jr. vs Cancerbero, Luciferno, Virus
3) Dark Silueta © vs Lluvia [MEX WOMEN]
first defense
4) Averno & Místico vs Mephisto & Volador Jr. and Atlantis Jr. & Stuka Jr. and Blue Panther & Negro Casas and Cavernario & Titán and Hechicero & Sagrado and Soberano Jr. & Templario and Euforia & Último Guerrero [Torneo Increible de Parejas, torneo]
5) ? & ?? vs ??? & ???? [Torneo Increible de Parejas, quarterfinal]
6) ? & ?? vs ??? & ???? [Torneo Increible de Parejas, quarterfinal]
7) ? & ?? vs ??? & ???? [Torneo Increible de Parejas, quarterfinal]
8) ? & ?? vs ??? & ???? [Torneo Increible de Parejas, quarterfinal]
9) ? & ?? vs ??? & ???? [Torneo Increible de Parejas, semifinal]
10) ? & ?? vs ??? & ???? [Torneo Increible de Parejas, semifinal]
11) ? & ?? vs ??? & ???? [Torneo Increible de Parejas, final]
I think this is a match too long to give everything justice in terms of time, especially given this is a tournament final and not a block final. It’s CMLL, what are you going to do, the priority is to hit a monthly number of matches for all the wrestlers over putting on good shows. It will be fine, it will leave you wishing it could be a little bit better.
CMLL (SAT) 02/26/2022 Arena Coliseo
1) Acero & Aéreo vs Full Metal & Minos
2) La Vaquerita, Marcela, Skadi vs Dalys, Metálica, Reyna Isis
3) Flyer, Guerrero Maya Jr., Volcano vs Dark Magic, Misterioso Jr., Nitro
4) Esfinge vs Rugido
5) Fugaz, Soberano Jr., Star Jr. vs Ángel de Oro, Niebla Roja, Terrible
Esfinge versus Rugido is happening. Angel de Oro and Niebla Roja back to being rudos on this night.
CMLL (MON) 02/28/2022 Arena Puebla
1) Asturiano, Leono, Retro vs Cholo, Siki Osama, Sombra Diabólika
2) Micro Gemelo Diablo I & Micro Gemelo Diablo II vs Átomo & Chamuel
3) La Magnifica & La Vaquerita vs La Metálica & Reyna Isis
4) Místico, Templario, Titán vs Atlantis Jr., Gran Guerrero, Último Guerrero [Relevos Increíbles]
5) Volador Jr. vs Averno
Always bet on it being a Volador singles match. CMLL’s highlights of last Monday’s show had a Mistico/Averno feud instead, so that’s a change. CMLL appears to be doing highlights of either Puebla or Coliseo each week, but I’m probably detecting a pattern when there’s just randomness.
Efekto10 talked to Arena Puebla mask seller, who says business has been about 60-70% of normal since the latest restart. She believes that the decrease is due to a lack of a star to drive interest; she hoped Mistico coming in that night would help.
CMLL Informa has Atlantis Jr., Stuka Jr., Lluvia, Esfinge, Mercurio and Valiente Jr.
AAA
Dorian Roldan was on the Business of the Business podcast, talking about AAA’s business for about 45 minutes. It’s well worth your time if you care about these things, both for additional context and because I’m not going to cover everything said there. If you’re going to quote something out of this for your own publication, you should both credit that podcast and also listen to it yourself.
A significant chunk of the podcast talked about AAA’s US aspirations. Dorian Roldan believes AAA has two audiences in the US, a general wrestling market and a US Hispanic nostalgia fanbase, and their goal is to try and the goal is from both. Roldan thought AAA went too big in the Madison Square Garden show and that AAA could find better success running smaller (and less expensive) buildings and other locations. Chicago, Phoenix, “a tour in Texas” were all mentioned as possible locations (unclear if they were examples or plans), with the idea of running a couple of shows in the US and launching a live touring business in the US in 2023.
Dorian Roldan would also like to get AAA on TV in the US. He brought up existing TV partners they have and possible obstacles – WWE’s deal with NBC may prevent a Universo/Telemundo from bringing in AAA content – in getting something done. Later, when NJPW came up, Roldan pointed out that the viewership numbers that promotion is getting on its AXS TV return are equal or lesser than what Lucha Underground was getting on a weaker El Rey station. (That was also a now a few years back, and general viewership has on linear TV in that time.) Roldan spoke positively about NJPW and said their AEW alliance was a great way to get people into their product. Still, it came off like he believed AAA is a significantly more valuable property than NJPW in the US, feeling the Hispanic culture is a bigger part of the US than Japanese and that gives AAA more potential for growth. That TV product could be something other than a traditional wrestling show: Roldan suggested the idea of producing a docu/reality series or a movie or something else a little more adjacent to wrestling promotion. He mentioned working with Disney+ on content (maybe the ex-Blue Demon series?) and another deal to be announced with someone else in the next few weeks.
One of the more interesting answers was when Dorian Roldan was asked about who the biggest star in AAA. Psycho Clown was his pick as the biggest name, but only in Mexico. He feels he’s a character that resonates with that market in the same way as La Parka AAA, but elsewhere Hijo del Vikingo or the Lucha Brothers are a bigger deal. This is where the two different audiences come up again: Roldan said the US names on Mexico shows are only to attract international audiences, not the local fans who are more into the local names. AAA’s PPV numbers are “totally different” with and without US names. “The American audience is not interested in watching just Mexican wrestling”, which was quite a thing to say given his position. I feel like I should argue with that but I also feel like the only Rey de Reyes thing that resonated to people who didn’t watch the show was “John Morrison had another new name.” There were no conversations about Dralistico’s performance, for example.
AAA does want to appeal more to foreign fans when they come to Mexico; they believe 40% of the fans who come to Arena Mexico are tourists. Dorian Roldan said they’d be opening a venue to run daily shows in the next few months to serve the market and hinted that it would be in a tourist destination, not necessarily Mexico City.
Some quicker stuff: Rey de Reyes attendance was 5,000. The high wind was as much an issue to the setup as the rain. Dorian Roldan talked up Konnan’s work, said it was a tough job, and called him the only person really working as a booker in Mexico. AAA’s open to work with any company that’ll make sense with their business. With other promotions, AAA gets US talent that helps be more international, their wrestlers can get a bigger payday and are happier. AAA can’t compete with WWE or AEW contracts, but they can closer with AAA + a US company. WWE’s talked to them in the past, most recently around the start of Lucha Underground, but probably aren’t going to share talent and don’t seem interested in acquisitions at the moment. (“Visions weren’t aligned” with The Crash.)
Partnering with other types of business has worked. TripleMania Regia has been a success and credits that through the partnership with Multimedios. They’re partnering with the Xolos owners in Tijuana, hoping for the same. Reading between the lines, it sounded like the TripleMania Tijuana show has a chance of being an annual event if successful. We’ve only seen “5%” of the Marvel Lucha Libre concept so far, which is the same thing Konnan’s said many times. AAA and Marvel are now aiming for the end of 2022/early 2023 to show the full concept (moved back from Q1 2022.) And, most importantly, the AAA YouTube channel should be back on a worldwide basis “soon.” Individual links work but the full channel is still regionlocked to Mexico.
On the Japanese/Mexico thing, my one take is “lucha libre” is 100% a more appealing concept to a super casual wrestling fan than “puroresu” and even more so for non-wrestling fans. At the same time, “NJPW” means exponentially more than “AAA”, because NJPW’s reputation is good shows and AAA’s reputation is a mess. NJPW, mostly its Japanese branch, is not especially good now but their reputation is still fine at this point because of the years of better shows that came before it. People are still willing to take a bet on them. AAA doesn’t appear interested in improving its reputation and it could be holding them back.
Other
IWRG (SAT) 02/26/2022 Arena Naucalpan
1) Gran Felipe, Guerrero Olímpico, X-Boy vs Güero Palma, Skanda, Villarreal
2) Blue Win, Jhon Tito, Rey Minos vs Carnicero, Perseo, Rey Aztaroth
3) Caballero de Plata, Hell Boy, Sol vs Garra Mortal, Kenji, X-Devil
4) Karma I, Karma II, Mary Caporal vs Fly Warrior, Fulgor, Satania
5) Black Dragón, Cerebro Negro Jr., Cheff Benito, Legendario, Mexica, Puma de Oro, Rey Halcón vs Águila Oriental, Billy Jones, Calibus, Limbo, Noisy Boy, Spider Fly, Súper Cometa
IWRG said they were only going to run on Sundays for this month, so this is an unexpected show. I think there still is a Sunday show this week, but not sure. The main event on Saturday is FILL versus NGT, the short-lived Tuesday shows. A lot of other trainees on this show. I presume IWRG is about to start booking people off the Tryout series, which would likely mean fewer spots for these guys.
MLW tomorrow has Arez, Gino Medina, Mini Abismo Negro versus Aramis, El Dragon, and the debuting Microman. Microman is both a surprise and also not a surprise because MLW is already selling meet and greet tickets for Microman in Dallas. You can meet Cesar Duran as well.
Pagano will also be in Dallas for WrestleMania weekend; he’s announced for The Wrld on Lucha show on 04/01. Drago Kid is also announced. People on that show are likely to be part of the AAA show on 03/31.
NJPW announced TJP versus Mascara Dorada for Tampa on March 20th.
RIOT confirmed their La Rina tournament will now take place on March 25th and March 26th. Hopefully everyone who was scheduled can still make it; March 26th is also the AAA taping in Tijuana.
LuchaWorld has this week’s Poster-Mania.
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You gotta get last friday’s CMLL show up on the drive as well
(feb 18)
>2) La Magnifica & La Vaquerita vs La Metálica & Reyna Isis
the same match again in Arena Puebla?
Last one must have been a classic that we will sadly never see.
To be honest, he’s right about needing American names, but that’s also because of AAA failing to get anyone over to US audiences not named Pentagon or Fenix and Kenny’s nomination of him is the reason Vikingo is known.
The issue is he doesn’t get that the Empresa clusterfucks just turn people off. I think having a ton of pointless brawls on the show really hurts.
Lucha Libre is more appealing to casual fans to some extent, yeah, but when you have to go out of your way to buy a show, that’s when you get into the territory of needing hardcores. Many hardcore(not the style) wrestling fans prefer puro with its epics over lucha any day. However, you even lose the people who like having lots of high spots and fast paced matches when you dilute the product with dusty finshes and three way brawling between groups. When the main thing people want out of the product is a showcase of the athleticism of the talent, it’s completely destructive to focus on other stuff.
I also don’t know why no Mexican promotion can train women well enough at this stage.
Private Internet Access has a Mexico VPN
I think Japanese wrestling is a far better match for average fans than Mexican wrestling. The rules are more similar and the focus on winning and titles is far more closer the American wrestling making it easier to follow. I think it’s hard to figure out who is who as well since there’s so many people in each match and they are all masked. Japanese wrestling also just looks more professional with the shows being on-time, well-lit and clean. And just as you can see, Japanese wrestling in general has a much bigger following online.
I don’t want to put words in Dorian Roldan’s mouth but I think he would agree with you about “average fans”. He thinks Mexican wrestling has a better chance to attract non-fans than Japanese wrestling and there’s a lot more of them than average fans. It is the same sort of dream WWE and others have chased for years.
I want to know why Dorian doesn’t seem to take an interest in gaining more Mexican fans (and international fans), specifically ex-CMLL fans. As we already know, CMLL is at a low point in all aspects; quality of matches, creative, booking, PPV/streaming, etc. I’d love for AAA to be somewhere in the middle between “Seria Y Estable” and the crazy, nonsensical multi-man/team matches and brawls or constant referee interference. I want to be a fan so badly, and root for them, because they have a pretty good roster right now, but AAA always wants to screw up their matches in some way. Konnan wants to create heat when they don’t always need it. How about a spectacular match with no funny business? Is that too much to ask?
Konnan seems to want the same thing but he sabotages himself by promising 40 people work on a show & then when he’d rather just run an awesome Aramis and Laredo Kid vs Flamita & Taurus match he realized oh shit I have to add people to keep up my promises so he it ends up like the 3 way tag coming up next week in Madero. Or look at the segunda which is a dumb fucking 3 way trios match with one team that shouldn’t even be booked (Mexican Powers) & then 5 exoticos + Komander. Why is Komander with the exoticos? Because he was booked. And the rest of the matches are full. So who cares, let’s put him in this mess. Oh by the way – it’s a lumberjack strap match. Why? Because. There will be 45 people running around during that match. I’m sure it will go swell.
The solution is cutting people from the show & booking based on good matches + angles you are running. But Konnan is never going to cut people he promised work, that’s his main priority over anything to do with AAA itself. So the matches suffer & you get a million angles because at some point he has to justify why he booked all those guys. I’m just awaiting the dumb angle with the exoticos we’re going to get.