Lucha Azteca Workrate Report 2/15/14

Phil's favorite!!! It's tournament lucha!!! The dry hump of lucha libre!!! This is the Gran Alternativa tourney from 1/31.

1. Blue Panther & Cachorro vs. Averno & Rebelde

Wow, 5 minutes for a tourney lucha match that isn't the finals? Color me spoiled. This was really fun for what it was. Panther and his kid vs. Averno and Hooligan's kid (which is to say, Averno teaming with Hooligan's son. I don't think Averno and Hooligan have a sexual relationship). This is my first time seeing Rebelde and he breaks out a bananas dive on Panther, almost going vertical before crashing into him. In the ring he hits a cool corkscrew splash off the top. Cachorro gets his own big dive, Panther does some swank armlock on Averno. Really this is the most you can hope for with tourney lucha.

2. La Sombra & Oro Jr. vs. Rey Bucanero & Akuma

And then there's this. 150 seconds of dry indie moves delivered heatlessly and pointlessly. Oro hit a pair of nice moonsault presses, one to the floor. Indie move, guy gets up, other guy does indie move, etc.

3. Maximo & Hombre Bala Jr. vs. Terrible & Guerrero Negro Jr.

Wow. If anybody needed any proof of why tourney lucha is the worst, here we have a 45 second match where they go to nearfalls right out of the gate. Maximo goes to kiss Negro, Negro fights, and then amusingly Terrible forces a kiss on Maximo which shocks him enough for Negro to get the pin. Clever, but that doesn't mean it wasn't a waste of everybody's time (is there anything more lame than sitting through entrances that last longer than the match?).

4. Volador Jr. & Soberano Jr. vs. Mephisto & Espanto Jr.

It usually takes about 3-4 matches into a lucha tourney to make you wonder why the hell you even bothered, but then you know you're half way through the whole thing and you've come this far and you still haven't learned to cut your losses after all these years. Soberano is wearing his dorky spider-man jammy jams and does just about the ugliest standing moonsault you've ever seen. Throw in his sloppy backcracker and you have indie goober Yahtzee. Volador took forever to set up a rana off the top rope, which in a match this short was essentially 1/3 of the match. The best part of the match was when they cut to a gal in the crowd drinking beer, 3 solo cups deep. I'd be getting wasted too if I had shown up for some Friday night wrestling and was presented with a collection of 2 minute matches.

5. Blue Panther & Cachorro vs. La Sombra & Oro Jr.

Cachorro hits another epic tope that just plasters Sombra into the back wall. Panther gets hit with Oro's moonsault press and looks like he's starting to turn the pinfall attempt into some sort of cool crucifix submission...but his son runs in and breaks up the pinfall.

6. El Terrible & Guerrero Negro Jr. vs. Volador Jr. & Soberano Jr.

All of the dated indie spots! I'm starting to think when I put a bunch of old Japan and indie wrestling VHS tapes on craigslist that they somehow ended up in the hands of undercard luchadors. Here was Soberano and Volador doing some throwback Scoot Andrews spots while Negro tried his fucking damndest to make it look plausible. A for effort. Volador looks sluggish and bored.

7. THE FINALS: La Sombra & Oro Jr. vs. Volador Jr. & Soberano Jr.

Sombra dumped himself on his dome a couple times whipping off Volador Code Red variations, Volador absolutely brained Oro with a superkick in the corner. The crowd is usually mic'd down quite a bit and you could hear a noticeable uproar immediately following the kick. The ref even checked on him. It looked nasty. But most of this match was inept 2.9 counts with no heat or drama. The most hilariously inept was towards the end when Soberano and Oro, the two featured young guys in this whole tournament, finally were left solo in the ring to square off. They're both getting their sides of the crowd hyped up, crowd is wanting it, Oro rushes at him...and Soberano just powerbombs and pins him. Waah waah. No exchanges, no flash, just...bloop.