2017 Ongoing MOTY List: Terry/Navarro v. Panthers

15. Black Terry/Negro Navarro v. Blue Panther/The Panther CMLL 4/11

ER: The old dogs make one of their couple-times-a-year Arena Mexico appearances and work a fun exhibition-y match with some nice scrapes and solid drama down the stretch. Each caida had some time to breathe, and while there were some holes in the game at times, this was plenty fun. Navarro and Terry come out to a nice reaction, both men looking like they could teach a trade school class titled "How to Wear a Championship Belt". Terry and Panther son start and have probably my favorite matwork of the match, fighting over arms rolling through things not gracefully, but assuredly, Terry almost feeling like he's testing the young member of the match, his dad more of a known commodity. Terry gets caught a couple times early and by the time their partners get involved Terry is bending arms and working indian deathlocks in a more painful way. Navarro and Panther Sr. have more of a spry-off, trading arm drags, Panther gets a nice short arm scissor and makes Navarro yell with a nice ankle lock, and Navarro locks in this awesome hold, like he folded a figure 4 while holding his own legs for leverage. The arm lock he taps BP to end the primera was simple and wonderful, and then Jr. goes for a roll up and Navarro catches it, hoists him up and wrenches his neck in nasty fashion. Drama ramps up in the tercera with Terry hitting a big Thesz press, and everybody doing a fun and silly "everybody trapped in a hold" spot, but instead of stacking a superplex or holding a 4 man abdominal stretch, they all lock twisty lucha holds on each other. It's dumb, but I enjoyed it. It comes down to Terry/Jr. and I liked this, with Jr. hitting a huge dive but comes up limping, and that limp leads to him taking too long to hit a moonsault, so he catches knees. Panther hits a seated dropkick waaaaay across the ring (his second of the match) for another nice nearfall. Maybe my favorite moment was right after this, when Navarro and Blue Panther are both getting as close to possible to the action from the apron - with both even getting inside the ring - knowing they won't be able to physically save their partner but recognizing how close each man is to a loss. Nice emotional moment to cap a fun match.

PAS: I really loved the first fall of this match, it is what you want when you see this matchup on paper and Navarro and Terry are clearly excited to be plying their trade in a title match in Arena Mexico. Navarro and Panther do some really intricate stuff, I especially loved how Navarro tapped Panther with a short arm scissors, I was expecting them to do the Backlund Deadlift spot, but instead Navarro just shifted his weight and got the tap. The roll up counter was awesome looking too, he catches young Panther and stretches him out like he is on the rack. Second and third falls were fine, although that was closer to a normal CMLL tag match as opposed to the maestro stuff which you never see in big arena lucha.

2017 MOTY MASTER LIST

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE BLACK TERRY