In opposite order for reasons which will be come obvious
Místico, Strong Man, Valiente vs Terrible, Texano Jr., Volador Jr. – Cesar accused Volador of being a Payaso during this match, and I disagree. The Payasos I know are either funny or undefeated and Volador was neither. This was all Volador refusing to fight Mistico (fair) and refusing to fight Strong Man (at all – completely derailing the match.) If there was a section of Volador being awesome with Valiente, that might have worked, but not this time. This was not very satisfying at all.
Dalys la Caribeña, Estrella Mágica, Star Fire vs La Seductora, Princesa Blanca, Princesa Sujei:
I remembering thinking this wasn’t as bad as I thought after watching it. Later, going back thru the report, I noticed how many times I caught a blown spot or something gone wrong, and I wasn’t even writing them all down. This was not historically bad, but this really wasn’t a match that was Arena Mexico level. New wrestlers, whoever they are, need to work in front of an audience to get better, but most of the guys are having these matches in smaller arenas and aren’t committed to tape. Wish this one wasn’t either.
The news that Estrellita is coming in wasn’t a surprise on Thursday, but that she’s coming in as a ruda in perplexing. It makes sense for the Invasors story, but it doesn’t work once you add her to matches. She never got a lot of consistent work while I’ve been watching AAA, but she always seemed an OK tecnica, and CMLL really could use some of those. If you split up the women’s roster between “women who can have good matches”, “women who will not mess up the good matches” and “women who need a lot more work”, it’d look like this:
rudas tecnicas
Amapola Marcela
Princesa Sujei (Lady Apache)
(Hiroka) Dark Angel
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Tiffany ??
Princesa Blanca
Estrellita ??
La Comandante (tumbleweeds)
Mima Shimoda
La Seductora
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Seuxis Estrella Mágica (?)
Yezka Dalys la Caribeña
Lluvia
Goya Kong
Luna Mágica
Star Fire
?? Silueta ??
There’s a drop between the top tier CMLL women and the Magica/Dalis group. It’s even bigger at the moment, because Lady Apache won’t be back until next year, and Dark Angel just missed a month and is probably going to be busy with TNA. CMLL really could’ve used a tecnica Estrellita – and a tecnica Tiffany! – to help lead the girls who aren’t ready thru this matches, but instead we’re getting more of a feud that sure seems to have peaked already. (Which is another reason 10/15 is too late, but this seems like an odd place for Charly Manson/Negro Casas commentary.) CMLL can’t even just turn someone else – La Comadante, Mima and Blanca are associated with rudo groups and it doesn’t make sense to split them up, and Seductora is probably not going to set anyone’s world on fire as a tecnica.
Any match that doesn’t have Marcela or Dark Angel in it will be bad, and they can’t be in every match. And even if one of them are, you’re still starting with two people who are going to be not ready for primetime, no matter who they’re facing. There was a point where CMLL had a consistent amount of good matches out of it’s women’s division, but that ain’t happening again any time soon.
One of the essential differences between the big two companies is AAA focuses on the big picture and forgets a lot of the details, and CMLL works more in the details while giving the main picture a push every so often and hoping the momentum carries it farther. When AAA has problems like too many people on the wrong side, it still needs to be fixed, but I expect them to have those problems. CMLL not thinking things thru is a bit more concerning.