MLJ: Dragon Lee vs Virus/Casas 4: Diamante Azul, Dragon Lee, La Sombra vs Cavernario, Hechicero, Negro Casas

Aired: 2014-09-27 

Taped: 2014-09-16 @ Arena Coliseo Guadalajara 

Diamante Azul, Dragon Lee, La Sombra vs Cavernario, Hechicero, Negro Casas

This is lucha comfort food. Sure, it's got a few twists and folds (Sombra being a tweener) and one pretty glaring weakness (Azul), but in general, it just felt right. Sombra was aloof and a little impatient but not over the top in his Ingobernable rudoness. This didn't feel like a revelos increibles match or anything. Azul was stiff and wooden but played his part and, most importantly, the rudos he had to work against were so good that they did all the hard work. It's probably my ideal 2014-2015 rudo side. Cavernario, Hechicero, Casas. You don't get better than that right now. This was right after Casas' hair loss too so he was extra grumpy. 

Then came the segunda, and after some nice back and forth (including Casas and Dragon Lee trading paralleled moves, Cavernario feeding well for Azul, and Sombra and Casas having another intense exchange, with Sombra cutting his legs out as he went for the running apron senton, as he does so well), they finally had the rudos take over with a great spot of Lee going for a hanging sleeper on Hechicero only to get clocked by Cavernario, which led to the arm hook spinning backbreaker. Good stuff:

This led to the rudos taking the segunda. My favorite thing about Sombra as a rudo, past his wonderfully dickish attitude, is how he always goes for the little thing, grabs from the outside, for instance. Here, he tried to break up the Cavernario bomb, but couldn't. It was a nice little touch. Then he really didn't want to get back into the ring to eat the fall but ultimately did. 

Anyway, the beating continued into the tercera, including this awesome tandem goardbuster onto the top rope/dropkick combo:

The comeback was mild at best, which is a shame. I blame Azul even though he had a good moment of tossing Cavernario around by his hair (which was set up earlier in the match). At least hit had a great finish with Sombra embracing his partners, hoisting Dragon Lee up for a dive and hitting a parallel suplex/slam with Azul:

All in all, this was good. Azul was frustrating. He reminded me a bit of Dos Caras, Jr., just without the connection to the crowd (albeit quizzical) that Caras had. He had some good spots but there was nothing meaningful behind them. They teased Sombra vs Hechicero twice and didn't deliver, which was frustrating too. Worst of all, though, were the endless chopfests. They just went at each other the whole match. It's okay when Sombra and Casas do it, with intensity and hatred, but everyone was doing it. They just went to that well way too often. In the matches with Rush and Casas, it always felt like a big moment when everything stopped and they tore into each other. This match was the exact opposite. Those criticisms aside, it was a good one though.