MLJ: Black Terry Boot Camp 3: Black Terry, Cerebro Negro, Dr. Cerebro © vs Negro Navarro, Trauma I, Trauma II [EdM Trios] (4/16/09)

2009-04-16  @ Arena Naucalpan
Black Terry, Cerebro Negro, Dr. Cerebro © vs Negro Navarro, Trauma I, Trauma II [EdM Trios]

This was a week prior to the last match I reviewed. It was a title match and that really speaks to the variety. The match a week later had much clearer tecnico/rudo alignment. This was worked like a title match, with a long primera and a fairly long segunda consisting mainly of matwork.

It was a crowd conditioned to respond to it and that appreciated it, which probably wouldn't fly today in Arena Mexico. They popped for complex holds. They chanted (sometimes dueling) after an exchange or an escape. While it's a bit of a chicken/egg thing, I imagine that if matches at this level are put in front of a crowd steadily enough, they learn to respond quickly if they weren't already inclined to in the first place.

I know this is about Black Terry, and ultimately, I think that he may well be a more consistent and overall talented performer in 2009, but Navarro is tremendously engaging. He stands out far more. Yes, it's the strikes, just him chopping someone in the throat. It's the facial expressions, the way he moves around the ring, even the fact he's bald, which is rare in lucha because hair is such a valuable commodity. It's how amused he seems the first time or two that someone gets an advantage on him, the old man allowance of it. While he does have an exchange with Terry late in the match (and another leading to the finish after the dives clear out everyone else), and it's a hard-hitting one, he was never unleashed emotionally, like in the match a week later. They also reuse the spot where Cerebro Negro locks him in a step over stump puller and he seems terribly amused by it, which in and of itself, is fine, but in the context of this match, where they do so many different things than they would in the other, it stood out in a negative way. He, more than anyone else in the match, has the ability to make something pop. For instance, the submission that ended the primera looked like it was going to pop Cerebro Negro's limbs off, all of them.

A lot of my general comments in this process so far continue to stand. This is tricked out, high end matwork across the board. I don't think that Cerebro Negro looked as good in the matwork as the others. That's been true throughout too. When they picked up the pace in the tercera, he and Trauma II had a good exchange though which helped make up for their "your hold, my hold" bit in the segunda. Dr. Cerebro is interesting; they all cross limbs in order to achieve holds, but Cerebro seems to use that in order to position his opponent much more. He'll twist someone around not as part of the hold but to get them into position for something far more simple like a STF or crossface.

And Terry was there, a constant, more than holding his own in the matwork, selling better than anyone else in the match, and standing strong in the brutal chop exchange with Navarro. Like I said, Negro Navarro does stand out more, but Terry comes off as more of a total package.