#18 Negro Casas

by Tomk

In the strange world of internet wrestling fans, Negro Casas is an oddly divisive figure. There are lots of wrestlers who the internet community is split on. But there is a normal shape that those splits take. Critic of wrestler A will point to things that wrestler A does poorly, fans of wrestler A will counter that he either does those things better than people acknowledge or that while he does one set of things poorly there is a whole other set of things that he does really well. Negro Casas is this odd guy where both the critics and the fans pretty much agree on what it is that he does. The Negro Casas critic will complain that Negro Casas’ selling prevents his opponents from doing as many creative things as they are capable of doing as instead they are forced to focus on his selling. His fans will praise that Negro Casas’ selling forces his opponents to work a focused match and not go overboard with all the creative things they are capable of doing. His critics will complain that he is somehow both lazy and selfish: that when he isn’t the focus of the match he won’t do a lot of attention drawing stuff, and that when he is the focus of the match he will go overboard in making the match about himself. His fans will praise him for how he works in matches where he is a secondary character where he always puts the shine on the other guy and doesn’t draw attention to himself, and will praise him when the focus of the match is on him for being a guy who completely holds the focus of the match. Everyone agrees on what it is that he does, just the question is whether it’s praiseworthy or not. I plant my feet on the praiseworthy side of the debate. Lucha is about roles and Negro Casas is a really great minor character actor when he’s called to be one and a super over the top lead actor when called on to do that. Casas turned heel in June of 08 and so his character actor secondary roles became less Jack Lemon and more James Spader and his leading roles were less Al Pacino and more Al Pacino mating with Michael Ironside and Powers Boothe to create a completely awesome over the top monster.

Recommended 2008 matches:

~w/Heavy Metal/Shocker v Hijo del Perro Aguayo/Terrible/Texano Jr, CMLL 5/16/08
~vs. Blue Panther, CMLL Guadalajara 8/3/08
~w/ Atlantis/Ultimo Guerrero vs. Hector Garza/La Mascara/Hijo Del Fantasma, CMLL 8/05/08
~w/ Mr. Niebla/Ultimo Guerrero vs. Blue Panther/Hector Garza/Mistico, CMLL 8/22/08

Career Recommended Matches:
~vs. El Hijo del Santo, 7/18/87
~vs. El Dandy, 7/3/92
~vs. El Hijo del Santo vs. El Dandy, 12/6/96
~vs. El Hijo del Santo, 9/19/97
~w/ El Hijo del Santo vs. Scorpio Jr./Bestia Salvaje, 2/26/99
~w/ El Hijo del Santo vs. Scorpio Jr./Bestia Salvaje, 3/11/99
~w/ El Hijo del Santo vs. Ultimo Guerrero/Rey Buccanaro, 11/02/01
~w/ Mistico vs. El Averno/El Mephisto, 4/14/06

2009 Outlook:

Good. I’m going to miss understated face stuff but he’s getting a huge main event push as a heel. He’s also asked for a hair match with Blue Panther. I really enjoyed their mano a mano in Guadalajara. That match was mostly built around heel ref shenanigans. Local heel ref is essentially the top local heel star, guy who thwarts tecnicos week after week. It’s often hard for heels to get heat on themselves in that type of situation but Casas managed to make it clear that the ref was doing his bidding and that Casas was the rudo thwarting the tecnico. I imagine in Arena Mexico where the match is built around the two guys and not the ref, it could be really great.