CMLL Worth Watching 1/4/15, 1/18/15 & 2/1/15

Hechicero, Ephesto & Niebla Roja vs. Blue Panther, Valiente & Maximo (1/18/15)

On paper you look at that match and go "man I hope Panther and Hechicero match up a bunch" and if that's what you went in wanting, you'll leave a happy human. There are also many other things that happened that were a blast, but I personally showed up for Panther and Hechicero squaring off. They get a nice long exchange in the primera and more in the tercera. Primera is those two have a bunch of cool struggling matwork, which really is worth the price of admission (zero dollars, technically so easily worth that). Hechicero is a super adaptable mat guy and Panther still looks like Blue Fucking Panther on the mat which is one of the first things that made me fall in love with lucha. All the takeovers and sweeps and arms held painfully behind backs. It's glorious. Hechicero gets runs with all the guys and he really makes Maximo's stuff look spectacular. And all of Hechicero's little roll ups and submissions are so fluidly executed. I'm a fan. Segunda is short but we build to a nice crescendo in the tercera with Valiente hitting the mother of all great topes, just bending Roja in half over the barrier. Just a scud missile flying fast and accurately right at you. Wrestlers are crazy. Ephesto gets a big dive of his own and this delivered in the exact ways I was hoping it would.

Rey Cometa vs. Niebla Roja (Lightning Match) (1/4/15)

This was really cool as Roja throws way more rudo elements into a lightning match than almost anybody I've seen. Usually this format is used for guys to show off their highlight reel in heatless exhibitions. But here's Roja kicking Cometa in the face, ripping at his gear, choking him and being a dick. Cometa is a guy with plenty of great looking spots but he goes along with Roja's match plan and it makes a standard lightning match mean so much more, makes Cometa's few highlight spots seem that much bigger. The opening mat stuff is nice and engaging, and then things go to a new level when Cometa goes for a leaping tornado DDT off the apron but gets caught by Roja and tossed brutally into the barrier. It made Cometa's later rana off the apron mean so much more.We also build to a great Cometa tope that blasts Roja impressively into the barrier. Roja dicks it up the whole time, Cometa's hope spots come off better for it, and all that equals a much more satisfying 7 minutes than we normally get.

Kraneo, Olimpico & Ephesto vs. Blue Panther, Titan & Dragon Rojo Jr. (2/1/15)

So Cubsfan should get around to uploading this one so more people can see it, because it's really fun. I mean, it's not like that guy uploads hundreds of matches over the course of a year or anything. It makes me feel just a tiny shred of minimal importance to write about a match like this, since it does not appear to exist online, and one day somebody might ask "I wonder if anybody ever watched a Kraneo match from 2/1/15?" and then they will find that, yes, at least one man did watch a Kraneo match from that date, and documented it FOR THE WORLD. Match was really fun and would have landed on the MOTY list had the segunda and tercera gotten more time. Primera had some of Titan's best stuff, doing some lightning fast exchanges with Ephesto with no Titan silliness. Then Panther and Olimpico got to roll and that is all of a sudden one of my favorite match-ups in lucha. Olimpico has looked better in the last couple months than he has in 8 years. Now he's working a weird glammy Egyptian gimmick and looks like Ben Kingsley playing the Jaye Davidson role in Stargate. His mat stuff with Panther is great with BP always going after an arm or leg but Olimpico scrambling all over him, working more to disorient. Kraneo continues to be my favorite luchador of the moment as he's all massive shoulderblocks and big bumps and fatness. He always works as if he has something to prove, as if he gets ribbed about his mass all the time and wants to show everybody that he can work harder and better than anybody. He's like the modern lucha Buddy Rose. So yeah, upload this match Cubs! Pretty please?

Read more!

MLJ: Guerreros del Infierno A-10: Rey Bucanero & Último Guerrero vs Negro Casas & El Hijo del Santo [CMLL Tag]

2001-08-31 @ Arena México
El Hijo Del Santo & Negro Casas vs Rey Bucanero & Último Guerrero [CMLL Tag]

Alright, I know what match this is. I had my suspicions, but thankfully Rob made a music video of it so I can pin the thing down. Which means that I get to link it for you guys and even grab a gif of a spot, though just one. There are a couple of other good ones in there, but you can give Rob the view and check them out in the video.

This felt like a big deal from the get go. As far as I can tell, this was just another Friday night show, of which the other big attraction would have been Gigante Silva. They do the posing with the belts before hand. Olimpico is seconding the tecnicos (and he had teamed with Niebla and Silva vs Cien Caras, Wagner, Jr., Satanico, and Shocker in the semi main). Both Mascara Magica and Tarzan Boy are out there with the Rudos, but they instantly send Magica away.

I'm not going to go too in depth here in laying out the narrative. I want to focus on things more generally. We don't have the segunda here, which is a shame as this was a really great match. I give myself some credit in figuring it out sooner than not, though, and that's really such a testament to lucha structure and how rigid it is. When watching this, I thought things felt pretty weird and that's because they were pretty weird, but not necessarily in a bad way. The match was good enough that it would have worked, but I'm sure it would have worked better with the middle fall entact.

In brief, tecnicos took the primera off of Santo outfinessing his opponents. I have no idea what happened with the segunda. Early in the tercera (which started with the tecnicos recovering and with a reset), Tarzan Boy grabbed Casas' legs from the outside and I think his dad, referee Pepe Casas, there in an official's role, banned him from ringside. This whole bit got massive heat on the rudos. Things progressed with the tecnicos holding an advantage and some really gripping near falls especially after Santo's flipping rana position sunset flip, but not just that, before the rudos finally had a chance, with Santo up, ready for the Guerrero Special, only to have "Mascara Magica" run out and attack the tecnicos causing a presumed DQ which would have cost GdI the belts. It was really Satanico in disguise though and the match was tossed out. They'd run through the Infernales vs Infernales feud (soon to pay off at the Anniversary cage match) before going back for a rematch.

There's a lot of stuff in here, so I'm actually going to bullet point it. I promise I wont' do this often.

-Part of me kind of loves smiling tecnico Negro Casas who seems to hug Santo at every opportunity.
-I think that Rey, while getting better through working with great talents, just didn't have it on the mat, not to the level that his card placement needed him to be. He could follow along but half the time he'd have great struggle and the other half he'd be putting himself into things too obviously. He and UG were regarded highly at the time, but I really think it was a case where the sum was more than the parts.
-I've been watching too much lucha, because at the point that Santo hit his second diving arm scissors drop onto Rey, and locked in the armlock again, I was thinking "Alright, it's time for UG to run in and rudo it up," and that's exactly waht he did. That lasted a bit until Santo fought back against both of them which culminated with a reversal to the double facebuster that was so, so organic.

and immediately thereafter followed a propelled up dropkick and the tecnicos locking on cabelleras (with Casas' following a low dropkick).

-The dive spot was really goofy. UG and Casas were brawling on the outside, and Rey and Santo went for dives. a ducked clothesline meant that both guys crashed into their own partners though. At first glance it was a bit too cute but I liked it looking back.
-Santo looked great the whole match. He hit this elbow drop just running that was so king-sized and this awesome driving tope off the top into the ring.
-I can't get across how great some of the nearfalls were. The best (which is in the video) was Santo reversing a Splash Mountain into a Rana just as Casas was doing a somersault off of the apron onto UG on the outside.
-Obviously, there was a real sense that a title change was going to happen with both seconds on the rudo side getting sent back. I don't mind these finishes. I know there's something innately horrible about a screwjob non-finish on a title match (which isn't some sort of rudo foul to get heat or what not or the rudo getting his comeuppance), but I would MUCH, MUCH rather CMLL be running little angles and swerves and moments like this than not doing anything ever, which is where they are now.

Ultimately, I really liked this and just wish we had it in full. There are more matches in this feud too, which only makes me happy.

Read more!