IWRG 12/20/09

And so begins the great IWRG handheld revolution as the first half of this is available on handhelds on youtube and the second was shown on Teleformula

Handhelds are here

http://www.youtube.com/user/tvluchadelpasado

Commando Negro v Guizmo

TKG: I’ve written about Commando Negro before. Described him as the type of rudo who is all about shtick, eating stuff and loosing exchanges. Here he is working dominant heel vs. green highflyer, which is role that I didn’t know he could pull off. Does a nice job of it controlling offense for most of the falls and letting Pikachu get in his little runs. He also throws two of the best looking dropkicks I’ve seen in 2009. It’s IWRG so it’s always possible that this is a different guy given the Commando Negro gimmick (the mask looks different). But if it is the same Commando , nice to see him mix up his game, and I wouldn’t mind seeing him work from above more often.

PAS: Guizmo is one of the many green technicos who are filling IWRG undercards these days. I have seen him look better then he did here, as his good stuff didn't look that good, and his bad stuff was pretty bad. Commando Negro looked good here, although there was a couple of Guizmo armdrags he didn't save. Guizmo isn't really ready for a singles match, although I guess this is how he will get there.

Maldito Jr./Samoth v Alan Extreme/Miss Gaviota

TKG: Man alive does Samot have a beautiful mask. It’s like the eye design from Cobarde’s mask combined with the mouth design from Mano Negra’s mask. People these days are all about putting drawings on their masks or making the mask look like something else but this type of attention to typographical serifs is so much cooler.

PAS: Maldito Jr. and Samoth are both really big dudes, especially for lucha libre. Mostly a big guy squash with the technicos getting a couple of flashes of offense. Samoth had some nice power moves, and a big splash, and Alan Extreme had a nice dive, but otherwise this was pretty dull.

Black Terry/Trauma II/Veneno v Angelico/Bushi/Freelance

TKG: We are going to be writing lots and lots about IWRG at this point and I’d like to stop writing about the poor wrestling of Angelico. Yes his South African diamonds has bought him an inexplicable main event push. But I figure those same South African diamonds have paid for Black Terry Jr’s digital video camera. So I’ll take the bad with the good. It totally makes up for it. And I guess there are other things that I could write about in this match besides Angelico. Black Terrry almost lobotomized himself catching a dive, almost impaling his brain on an exposed post. I could write about how awesome Trauma II has gotten, how good his submissions looked in first fall (especially liked the Mr Mexico finisher spun into a leglock) and how he really seems to be stepping up the selling in submissions or how amazing his brawling has become. But instead I’ve got to talk about Angelico. There have been a bunch of people who have criticized Angelico for how awful his stuff looks. And I think that is all besides the point. I mean Malcolm Gladwell is an idiot. The Beatles success had nothing to do with how many hours they spent playing together in Hamburg. Revolver is their sixth album and Harrison recognized that he was a mediocre guitarist so he got Mccartney to play the solo on Harrison’s Taxman, and that solo mainly works for Mccartney’s unsteady wavering playing. There are lots of dumb oversimplisitc explanations for the Beatles success that make more sense than hours of practice; the military draft removing older male peers and their ability to exert social pressure telling their younger peers to stop listening to such wussy stuff, yadda yadda. All that said, practice does increases skills and does make for better performance. Angelico is getting lots and lots of experience and his stuff will look less awkward and more polished. He will probably have enough skill to look good when he leaves Mexico to become the top ethnic babyface in the Orania Wrestling Fed. But beyond Angelico's bad execution and goofy stuff is the fact that he seems completely uninterested in working a lucha match. I mean you almost get the sense that he's a guy who'se calling his sections. On some level I'm always impressed with Veneno's handling of Angelico. Veneno is not a guy who I think of highly, but he knows how to work Angelico or Ricky Cruzz. Veneno is a guy who can keep a Spanish speeking non luchador usefully occupied. And you get the sense that if you edited out everything but the Veneno-Angelico sections you'd have a fine Maryland Championship Wrestling main event. The best possible Corporal Punishment v Julio Dinero main event ever. I get the sense that Veneno v Bandido Jr in ECWA would be a really good ECWA match. But not interested in an ECWA main event when I'm watching IWRG. I'm watching a lucha match don't foul it up. In this trios match Angelico is working Trauma II, and Trauma II is one of the most improved promising guys in lucha, and Angelico manages to turn a Trauma II primera caida section into a Arik Cannon v Alex Shelley comedy segment where I kept on waiting for Bryce Rensburg to draw a hopscotch board on the mat and have both guys throw a rock and jump to the appropriate number before putting on submissions. Yes Angelico's execution has gotten better but he still wants to be in an Arik Canon match and here turns Trauma II into Shelley. I mean I was just getting used to Angelico fouling up main events (with guys who know better), but now he’s going to foul up the workrate semi-mains (with developing young talent)?

PAS: There was enough good in this match to mitigate the Angelico. Black Terry and Freelance have feuded in the past, with limited footage available. You get a nice section opening between the two here, and you can just imagine how excellent their title and hair matches must have been. Bushi also continues to be perfectly adequate. I think that Trauma II is one of the few guys who can do something with Angelico, I am with Tom on how their standing wrist lock exchanges looked. At one point Dave Taylor ran some camps for indy workers and guys like Chris Hero, C.M. Punk and Colt Cabana came back with British spots in their movesets. Then other indy dudes like Arik Cannon watched Chris Hero tapes and stole those spots, Angelico looks like he watched Arik Cannon tapes and tried to emulate him The actual mat work between the two however felt much more like a 1st Generation copy, he was doing Negro Navarro stuff he actually learned from Negro Navarro.

Canek/Hijo del Canek v Pirata Morgan/Hijo Del Pirata v Negro Navarro/Trauma I v Mascara Ano Dos Mill/Mascara Ano Dos Mill Jr v Olimpico/Exodia v Pantera/Hijo Del Pantera

TKG:Hey Exodia made it through a match without injuring himself. His father didn’t but still. Concept here is father-son elimination match. You start with all six sons working an everyone for themselves elimination match. Whenever a son gets eliminated he is replaced by an avenging father. It’s a match designed to be a clusterf*ck. I mean they do keep the action in the ring from ever getting too cluttered by having lots of participants brawl on floor. On the plus side: all of the fathers are charismatic enough to know how to keep this from getting completely unfocused and know how to work the kind of punch and kick stuff that you’re going to be doing in a battle royale. On the negative you have Canek, Pirata, Mascara Ano Dos Mill, and Negro Navarro and the everyone for themselves means that you never work face/heel spots; guys who know how to structure a match in a match that is formless by design. I did leave this really wanting to see a trios match captained by Negro Navarro v Masscara Ano Dos Mill.

PAS: Yeah this was kind of a mess, it was really hard to get sense of any of the juniors. Once Negro Navarro and Mascara Ano 2000 came in we got a couple of moments of brilliance. It was just a pair of bad ass old dudes smacking the shit out of each other, I can imagine how great matwork between the two would be. I would love to see the Capos get a run in IWRG, MA200, Universo and random fake son vs. Dinastia Navarro is my new dream match.

TKG: The final elimination with the sons interfering was kind of disappointing. This could have actually used Angelico/ Col Deklerk (RIP) team, Ted Petty knew how to put a big table spot at the end of a clusterrf@ck.