IWRG 9/3/09

Blasfemia/Vampiro Metálico vs. Exodia/Miss Gaviota

TKG: Exodia makes it all the way through this match without injuring himself. Instead Miss Gaviota tweaks her neck on a dive. Vampiro Metalico and Blasfemia are both guys with really amusing facial expressions. They are a fun heel RPMs always loosing exchanges and mugging concern about possibly being touched by Gaviota.

PAS: Before this match Tomk asked me what fall I thought Exodia would injure himself, Gaviota getting crippled instead was a real Russo twist. Blasfemia is such a scumbag looking dude there is no way he hasn’t sucked a cock or two for drugs. I do still buy him being freaked out by Miss Gaviota though, because public is public.

Bushi/Chico Che/Freelance vs. Avisman/Brandon (IWRG)/Gringo Loco

TKG: I have no idea who Brandon is but he is a fine guy to eat some brawling from Chico Che. Freelance matches up early opposite Avisman and they are guys who will do shit you’ve never seen before when paired up. At one point Avisman throws Freelance into essentially the Chris Hamrick caught in ropes corner bump. At an other Avisman tosees Freelance over his head for Freelance to land outside the ring on the middle rope and then essentially 2nd rope moonsault his way back in. Gringo Loco is a guy who has spent a chunk of his career working as a mini heel and he is really great at bumping around for Freelance’s stuff. The third fall is absolutely nuttball as everyone just goes for bigger and bigger crazy dives.

PAS: I thought the first two falls were a little underwhelming, but holy shit was the third fall crazy. When Chico Che gets on a roll he is one of the most spectacular wrestlers in the world, and I loved his in ring tope here. Freelance is fucking nuts and we keep saying it, he breaks out a springboard flip dive which ends with him in the third row of seats. Rudos didn’t do anything super spectaular but they were all pretty good at being at the right place when folks went flying.

Head Hunter I & Tóxico DF vs. Bobby Lee Jr. & Scorpio Jr.

TKG: Toxico is a big guy with a really cool elaborate outfit. He comes in with an elaborate metal mask jet pack and flare shooting guns. But he stinks in the ring. Bobby Lee Jr is a guy who can do some fine rope running exchanges but instead is stuck doing embarrassing HBKesque strike exchanges with Toxico. Headhunter and Scorpio make each other bleed and bleed and bleed. Headhunter probably can’t do a moonsault anymore but he takes a big bump to the floor and his standing splashes, butt drops (or spots where he grinds his body into opponent) all really look like they would hurt.

PAS: I have no idea why you would run a grim bloody spectacle like this as a semi main, when your main is Sangre Chicana and V3 Still Scorpio and Headhunter I can bleed and they do. Scorpio looks like he has melted cherry Slurpee coming out of his head, and Headhunter punches him in the wound. We have seen a bunch of shitty luchadores while going through the IWRG for 2009, but I think Toxico is the worst, very cool mask, very very bad wrestler.

Sangre Chicana vs. Villano III

TKG: Yep this is everything you wanted it to be. Sangre Chicana comes in seconded by his son carrying a bag with a rusty cheese grater. They also had a heel ref but the heel ref never got too involved or central to the match. In the tag match I said that I was disappointed with Villano III’s face comebacks. Here he delivered. throwing some cool combos, headbutts some reckless stuff to the back of Chicana’s head, a bunch of DDTs and chairshots. Chicana also takes some nice looking bumps into chairs. They do the spot where Chicana holds Villano III for his son to tope only for VIII to move out of the way. Chicana Jr’s tope is a really huge Black Warrior bullet tope, and Chicana eats the bump against the ramp steps.

PAS: Chicana just oozes charisma in this match, he is not in the physical shape he was in the 1980’s, but I get the sense he could get way more broken down and still have an amazing match. He just knows how to move and strut and demonstrate. Villano III did look kind of shot in the tag last week, but he can still step up big for a main event mano y mano. Of course he bleeds, but he brings the offense too, I loved his rabbit punches and combos. Finish was totally great too, Villano is being double teamed by the Chicanas so he says “fuck it” and kicks him right in the balls. Great finish, to a great match.

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IWRG 6/4/09

PAS: We are all members of the Lucha Libre Nation

Lucha Libre Nation
TKG: Sadly they didn't air the Gizmo v Radamantis opener.

Epidemia, Heavy Boy VS Comando Negro, Goleador

TKG:So neither of us wrote anything about Commando Negro in the 4/2/09 show. Commando Negro is a undercard heel who works a pretty simple heel style of guy who is always bested by the faces. He’s not a big bumping heel or an Averno style guy who eats face offense spectacularly. Just a guy who the faces get the better of. He has nice punches, works nice mat exchanges, nice rope running exchanges but the point with him is that he will always loose those exchanges. He’s never guy in control. When he wins a fall it’s normally a quick cheap win where he either cheats or takes advantages of a slip. Combine that with some good heel shtick and that’s a fine way to work as a heel. But here he is working as a defacto face. Face who is always on the loosing end of exchanges and has no hope spots feels especially jobberish. The Pareja Toxico have worked IWRG a couple times in the past and they’re a indy rudo tag team with lots of “innovative” combo moves. A couple neat spots here and there that someone should steal (I liked both leg drop combo finishers in first fall) but the good ideas are drowned out by the sheer volume of ugly looking show- offy elaborate innovation for innovation garbage. On some level this felt like a political burial as your flashy indy team gets to do all their spots and control 85% of the match and yet still loose to an ad hoc team of midcard face and undercard heel.

PAS: Yeah the whole booking was very odd, it would be the equivalent of the WWE bringing in the Motor City Machine Guns, having them hit all their spots, but still job to a makeshift Zach Ryder and K-Krush team, or ROH signing Osiarian Portal and having lose to Shawn Spears and Sugarfoot. That would actually be a perfectly appropriate use of both teams, but if it happened you would suspect something was up. IWRG is full of guys who aren't any good, but I enjoy, and Goledor has definitely turned into one of them. Maybe it is the height he gets on his springboard armdrag, or his goofy mask, I don't like soccer but I dig him.

Diva Salvaje, Miss Gaviota, Péndulo VS Avisman, Fantasma de la Ópera, Bushi

TKG: They finally got rid of Xibalba in this feud. This was a really fun all over the place brawl. On paper you wouldn’t think adding Bushi and Pendulo would work this well in this context. They start with some Bushi v Diva Salvaje mat exchanges which were inexplicably better than you’d expect. From there they went pretty much straight into a brawl. Pendulo’s a guy who I always thought of as a really dull rote technico, but he came off really charismatic here. I’m not completely sold yet. He may have gotten better. May just be that a pendulum swing both ways and there is an extra bit of sugar in his step when he’s swinging with the queens.

PAS: Diva Salvaje really has the look of a guy who lived in a small town in Indiana his whole life, and at 42 decides out of the blue to start taking hormones and live as a woman. "Well I have bought Insurance from Sam for years, if he wants to call himself Samantha now, well that is his concern and he won't lose my business." This was the best of your 2009 Exoctico matches. I am surprised how well Bushi fit in here, lucha exoticos work very differently then Men's Teiho or Dino, and I am impressed that he could adjust.

Black Terry, Cerebro Negro, Dr. Cerebro VS Trauma I, Trauma II, Zatura

TKG:I dug this a lot although I don’t know how good it actually was. I left this thinking these two teams match up really well and have a really good match in them, this has hints of it but isn’t it. That’s the same feeling I have leaving every Jumbo v Billy Robinson or Backlund v Adonis. I may have ridiculously high standards. It’s kind of ridiculous to say I liked this match for its sloppiness. I don’t know if Trauma I legit busted his arm up or if he was just selling over the three falls. Don’t know if Trauma II legit fucked up Cerebro Negro’s neck or if that was a match element. Either way the match was constantly broken up by medical staff checking on guys pulling them out of the action and eventually letting them back in, while the rest of the luchadors had to continue to work ignoring the downed guys and medical staff. I’m assuming that this was all guys getting legit tweaked but I really enjoyed the weird pacing and general dynamic (of guys getting pulled out and reinserted) that it created. Not a dynamic that I think they’ll ever be able to recreate. I imagine if they rematch these teams, the rematch will be smoother and not sure if that’s necessarily for the better. Anyway the real shocker of this match was how good both Cerebro Negro and Zatura looked; and how well they matched up opposite each other. Cerebro Negro was a guy who I enjoyed a bunch in 08 as kind of the best of the “flashy innovative offense” IWRG rudos. But he’s really underwhelmed in the Terry/Cerebros v Dinastia Navarro stuff. And well Zatura is a guy who always struck me as being nothing but insane out-of-control dives. But here the two match up shockingly well and felt like working spotty highflyer lit a fire under Cerebro Negro. I get the sense that people are starting to get a better sense of what they can do with Trauma I and really liked both all the Terry work on Trauma I’s arm and how Terry set up and sold all the Trauma I comebacks. The Trauma II v Dr Cerebro interactions were really the least version of that match up and shockingly the most uninteresting part of the match.

PAS: I don't think anyone would look at this match up on paper and think that Zatura and Cerebro Negro would come out looking the best. Their long mat section was very cool, I especially loved all of the countering based around Zatura's arm. Zatura also broke out a great looking dive, and Negro was probably the top brawler during the brawl section. There is a moment where Trauma II is on his stomach and Cerebro Negro is just unloading with right hands, it really looked like a guy violently finishing someone in MMA. There is such a great mix of trios right now in IWRG, now that it looks like the Trauma's turned on Zatura, I hope we get Negro Navarro back soon, because Dinastia De La Muerte v. Officiales, Juvi/Fuerza/Pirata or Zatura/Chico Che/Freelance all could be incredible


Scorpio Jr, Angelico, Bobby Lee Jr VS Pirata Morgan, Fuerza Guerrera, Ricky Cruz

TKG: Last time I saw Scorpio Jr work a match, he looked completely immobile and a week away from death. I don’t want to say he looked "healthy" here. In his quarter century career I don’t think there’s ever been a period where I’d describe Scorpio Jr as a "healthy looking guy". But he was a lot of fun here, a guy who I will look forawrd to seeing in the ring in the future, commanding presence, bumped around a bunch and for the most part held the technico side of this match together. Unfortunately one of his fellow technicos was Angelico. My wrestling opinions are not infallible. Watching last weeks show I opined that the problem with Angelico was that he was working captain, when he’s a guy who would be less objectionable working ancillary role. Holy shit was I wrong. Working ancillary he was an awful guy who completely took me out of this match. This rudo team is a really superior team to the brawling rudos in the second match but wow Angelico stinks. I mean if you replaced him with Pendulo, Goleador, or either of the Exoticos I think this could have been a blast. Watching Angelico v Cruz, it might be possible that Angelico could work Puerto Rico as an evil chicken shit pussy Spaniard. In that role the Puerto Rican wouldn’t have to sell for him. I don’t even know if he can do that as that doesn't work if the heel is sloppily busting his opponent open. Was Travesti Man from Spain? Travesti Man v Angelico working a Lou Perlman v Nick Carter feud in Spain might be fun. There may be a role for Angelico somewhere in wrestling…just not in Mexico.

PAS: I really liked parts of this, Bobby Lee Jr. had a nice in ring back tope and a tope to the floor. Fuerza and Pirata both owned and I loved all of their interactions with each other. Fuerza doing the ringpost shoulder bump and fouling his partner was a cool heel miscommunication spot I have never seen before, and should be stolen by Austin Aries and D'Lo. Scorpio Jr. really looks facially like an old jew now, and his brawling with Pirata looked like an especially violent Buddy Hackett v. Ruth Buzzi slapfight. Lots of things to like, but man is Angelico the fucking worst, he isn't in this much, but just drags the match into the toilet every time he tags in. He didn't potato Cruz with his awful looking kicks, but when he slipped on his Low-Ki rip off double stomp and kicked him in the eye. I am hoping this was just a short visit over in Mexico and he returns to his feud with the Catalanian separatist heel faction in whatever random Spanish indy he normally works

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