Phil Schneider, Eric Ritz, Matt D, Sebastian, and other friends write about pro wrestling. Follow us @segundacaida
Saturday, May 14, 2016
Lucha Worth Watching: Tournament Lucha!?
Triton & Mistico vs. Rey Bucanero & El Cuatrero (CMLL 3/22/16)
Man, a tournament lucha match that actually gets some heat from the crowd, AND features guys taking silly bumps as if the match actually mattered? Are the Gran Alternativa's always this interesting? It's still tourney lucha so it ain't perfect, or great, or very good, but damn did this exceed some expectations. Triton decides to take a Bucanero shoulderblock like Chris Hamrick and just flies through the ropes to the floor without slowing himself down, then later gets yanked out of the ring onto his stomach and into the barrier. Mistico also didn't get told this was just a tourney as he does this great dead fish sell off a Bucanero clothesline and does things I've never noticed him doing before like a sneaky little drop down during a Bucanero rope run. We get some dives that mostly hit, and most excitedly we get a series of pinfalls that are unexpected. Often in these quick tournament matches, we go through each match with both members of one team getting pinned at the same time. It's an end to a caida you've gotten used to after years of watching lucha. Yet here we get each pinfall staggered, 4 in all, which is something very rare in early tourney matches and helped add to the overall unique feeling of this match. This was a pleasant surprise.
This is from the parejas increibles tourney and I feel like if this had been on WorldWide in '98 it would be one of those legendary syndicated matches. It's just 4 minutes, but Dorada is flat out insane. He starts the match taking two of the highest backdrop bumps you've ever seen (Niebla and Volador tossed him up at the same time), and then takes a big splat hiptoss onto the entrance ramp. Niebla cuts the ring off by just shoving Zavala to the floor, and Dorada runs smack into a Niebla slap. But we do build to one of Dorada's high speed dives and man is it a crazy one, with him flying almost vertically to the floor. Volador gets a nice flip dive, Dorada gets planted with a flip piledriver, Niebla plants Zavala with a big senton, and yeah this would be a legendary C-show WCW match. Watch it thinking about your fond WCW Pro memories. (Match starts at the 1 hour 50 minute portion of the video)
MLJ: Blue Panther Lightning Matches 6: Blue Panther vs Boby Zavala in a lightning match
Aired: 2014-07-20
Taped: 2014-07-20 @ Arena Coliseo
Blue Panther vs Boby Zavala in a lightning match
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x21tm3a
This probably isn't a good enough match go to go Dailymotion for. It wasn't for lack of effort, though. Let's put it this way: this could be a very interesting match to watch in five years if Boby moves up the card, gets more experienced, and really settles in as a great talent. I think he's got the potential for it and I think he's positioned by CMLL in a way that it might work out. Unless I'm mistaken, he'll be on Fantasticamania, so onward and upwards and all that. At that point, it could be interesting to see this as it pertains to his development. As it is now, it's just a sort of crummy lightning match, where the wrestlers tried but couldn't pull it together. It's more damning for Panther than Zavala in my mind, because he didn't get him through the match nearly as well as I thought he would.
So, what went wrong? Execution mostly. The effort was there. I'd even say the ideas were there, but the actually execution fell apart. That's not the most important thing in the world to me, but it does stand out, and here, the recovery and the covering up of it just weren't good enough.
In some ways, this was an interesting pairing. I think Zavala's strengths are in his facial expressions. I know he wears the cowboy hat and all that, but he always comes off as a barely-in-shape frat boy huffing and puffing through his matches, but in a good way. He portrays this sort of frustrated exasperation when getting beat on by a tecnico. Panther, on the other hand, has great expressions too, able to garner sympathy and portray real pain with that sort of withered, aged look. So whenever Panther made just about anything work, Zavala was able to make it mean something and the same was true when Zavala locked in a hold.
It just still wasn't enough to overcome things like a flubbed snapmare or a lot of not great attempts at a surfboard, or that same rolling keylock from the Virus match, but here it wasn't rolling so much as as thumping about in a vaguely circular manner. Even then, the ideas were good. Zavala kept trying to go for that foot-assisted surfboard. When that didn't work, he tried multiple attempts at a full nelson. The last time they went to it (after the first dive of the match), Zavala seemed too winded to even put it on, and Panther was just able to casually snatch an arm and take him down.
So, to recap, what they went for? Pretty good. How it came out? Not so good, though to Panther's credit, he both hit a nice diving top rope rana and took a bump out of the ring that he probably shouldn't have. The match more or less built to two dives, a Panther tope after a Boby Z Ultimo Guerrero corner knee bump in the middle and the Zavala one at the end (after said bump Panther probably shouldn't have taken). After the second dive, they laid around a bunch selling, drawing a double count out.
Ultimately, it was good that Boby got to have the experience of a match like this with a wrestler like Panther, and hopefully he learned something, but this just wasn't good.
MLJ: July 2015 Matches Week: Negro Casas/Esfinge/Guerrero Maya, Jr. vs Virus/Disturbio/Boby Zavala
Taped 2015/7/24 @ Arena Mexico
Negro Casas/Esfinge/Guerrero Maya, Jr. vs Virus/Disturbio/Boby Zavala
I wanted to take a little break from my fair, impartial, and critically beloved look at Volador in 2015 to check out a few other things from July. This was the Busca trios match. I looked at the one from last year not that long ago. Generally, due to Negro Casas and Virus' involvement, if you're going to watch one match from these things, this is the one to go with.
I think everyone agrees that the field this year was terribly lackluster. If you're someone who wants kinetic action and big dives, then things were particularly weak. They tended to work a more subdued sort of match with more (often meandering) matwork. Canelo Casas and Blue Panther, Jr. stunk up their share of matches. The guys who can fly big like Flyer tended to move gingerly and without confidence. The judging bordered from embarrassing (Hijo del Gladiador's reactions explains so much about CMLL's booking) to hilariously embarrassing (Blue Panther, Sr. refusing to judge Blue Panther, Jr.) to just hilarious (Porky giving everyone 10s). Add in the shadiness of Esfinge advancing and the specter of last year's highly enjoyable field and it's really just depressing. You'll notice that Segunda Caida didn't cover it to any great degree.
But hey, this match has Casas and Virus and I'll watch any match with Casas and Virus, so here we go. If you remember, last year's trio match was smart with its pairings, starting with the maestros (and Hechicero) separated so that there were three solid exchanges to begin things. It also had the weirdness of Cachorro on the rudo side. Here, the split is very clean. Casas, super over with the Arena Mexico crowd, would play babyface (if not tecnico) and Virus, Disturbio, and Zavala would naturally play rudo.
This year they started with Disturbio vs Esfinge, which was tolerable. I know Esfinge has gotten criticized for the nepotism but he's seasoned enough to do the little things here. Disturbio probably has the best facial reactions in CMLL right now. I'm trying to think who would be better an coming up blank. He's just such a goon. Anyway, the matwork here was perfectly okay. They led into what I'd consider the main rivalry of the match, and it was a surprising one, the sort that really didn't exist in last year's more heralded match, Casas vs Zavala. They were paired up numerous times throughout the match. If anyone was the breakout star of the Busca this year, it was Boby, and Casas bent over backwards to highlight him here. They were presented as very even in strike exchanges and in Casas just respecting him as an opponent worth his time. Virus was paired with Maya and tat was fine, if brief, leading to a pace picking up for the primera's finish. It looked like it was going to be the tecnicos ascendant with Esfinge hitting a dive and Casas locking in the Casita on Zavala, but Esfinge wiped out and Zavala blocked the Casita to hit a power bomb. I watched this back a few times, and I'm pretty certain that Zavala shook the ropes to make Esfinge wipe out. If so, that was really clever and it's not something you see all the time. The camera just didn't catch it well. It was a good primera which set the tone for the match.
I think the really exciting stuff here was Casas' face in peril during the segunda. That said, I wasn't quite as high on it as some people, if only because I wish it went a little longer. The nature of lucha trios matches is that you don't get extended face in peril segments. You get a side-in-peril, yes, but they tend to keep things moving and the importance of a "tag" instead of a momentum shift is minimized. It's a little like focused limbwork. It's rare enough that when you do see it, it really stands out. Here they cut off the ring for a few minutes (maybe even less than that) and kept Casas from tagging. Virus was especially great here. It sort of led to nothing when Disturbio came in and just launched Casas into his own corner, but I'm more than willing to give the match the benefit of the doubt and say that it was inexperience that caused it. Disturbio's such a goon. The comeback led to an awesome Virus vs Casas exchange and then Maya getting the pin on Virus after his skullbreaker over the knee. I liked how they let Zavala pin Casas in the primera and Maya pin Virus in the segunda. It's almost like they knew what they were doing.
The tercera was all action with Casas looking like the best guy in the world between how crisp he was hitting things, the emotion he was inspiring form the fans through his selling, and his timing in repeatedly grabbing the ropes on pins. More than that, though, he made Zavala feel like a big deal. He didn't have to, and there are so many other wrestlers at his level, even put into a mentor role, that wouldn't. We've seen that already from Casas this year vs Dragon Lee and others but Zavala feels a little lower on the card (and also a rudo) and it just really stood out. I was expecting them to go back to Virus vs Casas to finish things up but it was Zavala vs Casas and it made perfect sense within the confines of the match and didn't feel forced at all. Yes, Casas won the match for his side with the Casita on him but Zavala came out looking even better than he did coming in. It wasn't nearly as special a match as last year's maestro trios but it's still probably the highlight of the tournament this year and just more proof of how amazing Negro Casas is.
This was less lunatic then last years qualifier, it had less awkward blown stuff (really the only awful thing was Maya Jr. blowing a dive, which is weird because he is the most experienced guy here), but also less holy shit moments. I liked Joker's brawling, and Cancerbero is always good, they were the two stand outs for the non-qualifiers. Flyer looks like he will take the Star. Jr./Dragon Lee role of young guy embracing hot death, will be interesting to see if he has anymore to show. Casas, Maya and Panther Jr. have the genetics and Maya has been pretty good for a long time, although he did look off here. Hard to get much of a sense of anything in a match like this, but I am going to remain optimistic.
MLJ: Cavernario vs Titan 5: Blue Panther Jr., The Panther, Titán vs Bárbaro Cavernario, Boby Zavala, Mr. Águila
Aired: 2015-01-03
Taped: 2014-12-23 @ Arena Coliseo Guadalajara
Blue Panther Jr., The Panther, Titán vs Bárbaro Cavernario, Boby Zavala, Mr. Águila
I'll admit that I came into this one with some hope for a fun match. Titan and Cavernario obviously pair off with each other well. I wanted a look at Zavala since he might be in the Busca this year, and hey Panthers are Panthers, right? Plus Aguila is a game veteran. It was all a bit of a mess though, with one of the most brutal (in a bad way) comebacks I've seen.
All of the problem stemmed from Blue Panther, Jr. I've seen him in just a few matches where he's not paired up against an opponent he's very used to wrestling or in matches where he didn't have his father to help direct traffic. Or maybe he just hadn't been given too much responsibility as he was here. Or maybe I just don't pay enough attention. I know there wasn't a lot of excitement for him being in this year's Busca, potentially, and you can kind of see why here.
I'll talk about the things I liked first. Zavala was very earnest with his character. There's an eager jock rudo feel to him. Not everything he did was good, but everything he did seemed to fit a character and a personality and that's a great base for everything else. Aguila rounded out the rudos and I don't get to see him all that much in 2015. He brings a lot to the table, generally, a sort of off-beat offense and way of handling things that isn't quite what most of the CMLL rudos do. He played well to the crowd but he also brought the biting and mask pulling that you rarely see in a match on this part of the card. Maybe they can get away with a bit more at Guadalajara too. That's the stuff I wish I'd see Cavernario do a bit more though. He also did my favorite thing that I've seen all year, something I was actually begging for, but we'll get to that later.
The match was structured well enough. They ran through the pairings and everyone looked well enough, with Panther, Jr. having just a few clumsy moments, like a leg pull against Zavala. The rudos swarmed when he locked on the Fujiwara and it all felt a little more disjointed than usual, not that clean tidal shift. The rudos took it with the Caveman Vader Bomb.
The comeback in the segunda was where it all fell apart. The rudos had been controlling things with double teaming ambushes. Zavala and Aguila were in the ring here, Aguila having just ambushed Panther, Jr. They tossed Panther, Jr. into the corner. Aguila charged after and Jr. went up too soon.
Aguila had to stop, wait for Jr. to run around him, and dive into the corner shoulder first for no reason as Panther lamely charged into the other rudos. A botch is a botch and it's not the end of the world. It just goes to show the level of difficulty in spots that we take for granted all the time. A lot of times, a good recovery can even seem more impressive than if they hit what they meant to the first time.
This was not a good recovery. Everything just fell to chaos after that. The fans turned against it. Aguila ran into a terrible quebadora. Cavernario whiffs way too big on a missed clothesline. Titan hit his nice moonsault in the midst for this. Maybe more on that next match, but it was followed by Cavernario being sort of clumsy again though hitting his run up plancha out of the ring well. All of that left the ring clear for Jr. to put a lifting submission on Aguila.
They tried but the match never really recovered. I'll admit that it came closest to recovering due to Titan hitting a lot of stuff nicely and having some good sequence. Zavala seemed absolutely winded throughout this caida, but to his credit, not only ate a lot of offense with gusto but really played his character well throughout. Cavernario even did a bit of mask pulling which is what I wanted forever out of him.
Then came a moment that made the match almost worth it despite it all. The Panther hit a huge tope on Cavernario who had just gone out on a body scissors over the rope. That wasn't it, though. Following that, Titan went for his Titanics, getting in his goofy late match handstand. Aguila dropkicked his gut in half. So great. Maybe they've done that spot thirty times but it was the first time I saw it and I loved it. One moonsault later and the rudos picked up the very satisfying win. I was satisfied at least.
Fun quick and dirty spotfest. Ultimo has been so much fun ever since losing his mask. I love when guys get a new lease on life like that. I love how the match starts with Volador taking the Sombra bump asshole over elbow into the crowd, then Ultimo high jumping the barrier to crash into the recovering Volador. Rudos mostly set up nice spots for the tecnicos in this. Volador actually looked much better here than usual. Roja was doing the lord's work catching some Mistico ranas and making them look good. Euforia is always an admirable bumper. Valiente has one of those matches every several months where he just has no balance, and that was this match. Poor guy. Everybody else looked about as on point as possible, and he fell a couple times and seemed rattled. Nice recovery though for the big finish as the Valiente Especial looked wonderful. This is 3 falls in well under 15 minutes, and as lucha junkfood it worked just fine.
You see that team of tecnicos and instantly think "those are three guys I like watching opposite Virus" and that is not only accurate, but fun. I would have liked to see him opposite Pegasso more, as they don't seem to pair off that much. But Virus/Lee is a guarantee win and he usually brings some extra spice out of Fuego. Bobby Zavala is a unique presence who never really gets talked about, but he feels like he has Rush breakout rudo potential. He always has the false modesty to him, a real "who, me??" face. He plays to the crowd using some old Hector Garza tactics and that attitude has been missing from CMLL. Okumura works really nicely with Pegasso here, taking some complicated armdrags and flinging himself into the barricade off a rana from the apron. We get some big dives, and while you know these same six guys could have an epic match, they weren't given the time to do so, but still had a fun one. Come for the opening Virus/Fuego matwork, stay for the rest!
Fun little match even though the caidas ended in fairly disappointing ways. Still this was a real nice Mercurio showcase as he's arguably the best bumping rudo mini, here he takes a nice back splat bump to the floor, Chris Masters style, and then a great Halloween bump later on. He also shows a lot more personality than most minis, and he with Pierrothito is a rudo mini powerhouse. Stukita is a bit too tiny to buy as any sort of threat, and really the tecnicos are missing somebody with more fluidity, such as Bam Bam. Electric has a couple nice springboard moves and Dragoncito whips around quickly on a Santo roll up, but Mercurio was where it's at in this one.
Daaaaamn this was a fun little spotfest! Constant fast exchanges and no down time, all fast action with cool little moments. Kamaitachi is back to being my little replacement Namajague. He looked good throughout from his bigger spots to little mat things like he and Fuego going to the mat and Kamaitachi doing a cool shoulder shrug to buck him off. Zavala also looked killer throughout as he bumped all over for the flippy offense and had a couple great stooge moments, and a real fun bump where he took a back bump and then scooted on his back to safety, but scooted too far and went right out the ring with a back bump to the floor. Hombre Bala had some nice flying including a wild tope en reversa from the top to the floor, Pegasso is always a fun guy to have pop up on TV and his flying is even better with a base like Zavala. Fun stuff that didn't even really feel like a "CMLL" match, would have fit nicely on Lucha Underground.
Decided to change the name of this from CMLL Workrate Round-Up to CMLL Worth Watching, as really the only CMLL stuff I write up now is stuff that I think is worth watching. Why beat around the bush? I watch the CMLL, I spend time writing about the stuff I think is worth writing about, so let's just say that.
This was not great, and not nearly as fun as the few trios matches used to build it up, and that is mainly because Oro Jr. just isn't really that good. The build to this match was pretty lopsided, with almost every part of the trios matches being Metalico walloping Oro and cutting off every single thing he attempted to do. Now obviously the big stipulation singles match couldn't be worked like that, unless it was the weirdest mask match in lucha history. Obviously there was going to be some sort of back and forth, which meant there was going to have to be Oro offense, and Oro is not very good at offense. He can bump well enough and he's flexible so he's good at being twisted into knots by rudos, and he can hit a dive, but his move and submission execution are really, really lacking. Every time he would lock on a flippy arm submission he would end up flipping Metalico close to the ropes. That was fine when the plan was for Metalico to break a hold, but when it was something he had to tap to or create drama, Metalico would have to subtly move himself farther away from the ropes. Oro is just kind of stumbly and clunky. Metalico, on the other hand, continues to impress me and if anything this feud has given me a new cool guy to look for. Metalico has a cool southern heel vibe to him that I've never ever picked up on before this feud, doing great stuff like sneaky little punches and probably my favorite knee lift in current wrestling (depending on whether or not you count Brock Lesnar's sternum-caving knees). At one point in the tercera he drags Oro out of the corner and just blasts him with a bunch of consecutive knees, to the stomach and face. They all looked great. He also locks on a bunch of cool subs that would rank up with any maestro. Metalico's mom also kept getting shown in the crowd rooting him on and that's something that would get me more into everything. So yeah. Match was about what I expected, but overall I'm excited to see where Metalico takes things from here.
Man fuck Felino. It's so much better to have never have experienced love than to love and have lost. Felino is an asshole who is actually a good worker who just chooses to act like the worst worker in lucha 85% of the time. Here he runs ropes faster than anybody in the match (even showing off by bouncing off the bottom rope when he does it), does these really great drop downs, fast dropkick sequences, just a totally different guy than you get most of the time. and why? What's he proving in this match that he doesn't feel the need to prove when working with his brother? Delta hits a wild moonsault to the floor, Stuka always tosses in a couple nice dives or splashes, Zavala is always an amusing low rent Rush, Misterioso is a pro and then there's fucking Felino outworking them all, being the most frustrating guy in lucha.
I really wasn't expecting much from this on paper but the execution was nice. This became apparent just a minute into the match when Titan took a wild sideways bump into the ring barrier and Terrible decked Volador with a mean right and a hard headbutt. The Volador involvement was limited for most of this, with Terrible always cutting him off with face punching. Volador getting regularly punched in the face is enough to make me recommend a match. There was a story within the match of Mascara naturally not caring about his team, but Volador and Titan trying to make him feel welcome and almost try to recruit him back from the lawless side. That kind of thing can drag a match down but I think it helped this one. It worked because Mascara kept interrupting Titan and Volador's worst offense to just get to the fucking point and finish things. So it was actually a quite clever way to capitalize on guys having to stand around selling while Titan does his little handstand. Titan walks off on his hands and while Terrible is focusing on him for reasons, Mascara just runs in and rolls him into a pendulum sub. It does kind of blow up how silly some of Titan's stuff can be, but I already knew that so thought this worked incredibly well within the existing universe.
More awesome from this little feud that I didn't see anybody talking about. It is very possible I'm just reading the wrong places. But ever since a couple weeks ago when I first noticed Memphis heel Metalico tearing apart Oro Jr., and have since seen two more of their trios, it has become the thing I most look forward to in wrestling. So far, yes, the feud has been one-sided, with Metalico punching his way into my heart. Looking back, even though the tecnicos took the 2nd and 3rd, this match was 90% rudos. The segunda was won by DQ, and the comeback in the tercera didn't happen until late. Up until that point it was Metalico taking out all his frustrations on poor Oro Jr., which meant Oro taking tons of Metalico's cool hooking southpaw lariats, tons of punches to the temple, tons of forearms scraped across his eyes, and tons of getting yanked rudely around by his mask. Virus and Zavala kind of purposely took a backseat to Metalico beating down Oro. At one point I was begging Oro to fight back! Virus and Zavala would keep the other two at bay, and those two are guys I'm always entertained by when they're being dick heels. Virus has a great moment scraping and yanking Cometa's finger crotch over the ropes. Jesus Virus is taking torture to paper cut tantamount levels. Oro Jr. is kind of like a tecnico Stevie Richards, as he bumps big but has basically zero offense. So his big comeback in the tercera falls somewhat flat as he sorta hits Metalico with meek little kicks, but it was still satisfying seeing him rip Metalico's mask right back. Two weeks ago Metalico was just one of those guys who I had seen a bunch but barely registered with me. Now he's a guy I'm actively seeking out. Funny how these things work. Watch this feud now!
Another good match for these two. It got a lot of time and I think they filled it pretty admirably. The tercera went probably a little too long, but overall I liked this. The primera especially was fun as they do some cool mat stuff and standing exchanges that doesn't usually happen in the women's matches. Silueta grapevines the leg of a standing Zeuxis and kicks out her other knee, felt like William Regal with a prettier face. They throw out some pretty big things in this, with Zeuxis doing a nice Spanish Fly and a great moonsault to the floor, wiping out both seconds (Halcon and Super Comando). Silueta has a nice rana roll up and manages to do the "opponent trapped in ropes while I dropkick them from the top" spot without making it look too absurd. Crowd was really hot throughout the whole tercera so they were doing something right, even if I thought it had too many near fall exchanges. Crowd was into every one of them.
Really fun sprint with a nice spirited Mephisto performance, and one of Titan's best showings of the year. Angel de Oro continues to look sorta clunky but it was easy to just watch all the other guys do their thing. I'm really starting to love rudos cutting off Titan. Last week we watched Terrible punch him right in the face after a handspring floor routine, and now he somersaults onto the rampway from the ring, turns around to run back and runs right into a mean Ephesto clothesline. Mephisto was really great at cutting guys off all match, catching all the flying offense and even hitting a great dive. Ephesto also hit a nice big chubster dive. Kamaitachi continues being a blast, love his high jump dropkick from the ramp. Everything was worked super fast and didn't have any time to get bad.
So I got a lot of things on the back burner wrestling-wise, that should be bumped up to the front burner. I watch lucha more than any other kind of wrestling, but I got to the point where I realized I probably don't need to write about EVERY single lucha match that I watch. I watch plenty of CMLL. How many different things can I really write about a Corleone match or a blown up Shocker performance or a perfectly horrible Volador Jr. main event or a perfectly fine Maximo performance. So I'm gonna combine all the CMLL I watch into more concise write-ups, skipping over the stuff that doesn't need to be written about, writing up in depth the stuff that deserves it, dumping on the stuff that is notably horrible. This will leave more time for other cool stuff, give a little more variety to the blog, and avoid pointless burnout. C'est la vie!
1. Misterioso Jr., Metalico & Bobby Zavala vs. Rey Cometa, Oro Jr., Sagrado (7/6/14)
Great energy here and a nice little rudo showcase. The tecnicos kind of got steamrolled a bit but Misterioso is always a fun rudo when he gets the chance to be. Bobby Zavala has the same kind of unwitting douche charisma as Rush, and Metalico was a fun little bulldog going after Oro. Sagrado is almost always bad and this was no different. What a total long term dud. Every move always misses by just enough with him. Every moonsault gets slightly overshot, can't do painful looking submissions, and can't hold himself into others' submissions. Just a total zero. It was nice seeing Metalico punch him in the jaw a few times. We get several really nice dives in this, with one of them sending Zavala right into a mom and daughter and flattening them in the front row. It let to a incredibly smart (planned?) ending as Rey Cometa has an oh shit moment and is instantly down on his hands and knees apologizing to the women, and back in the ring moments later Sagrado gets submitted handing Cometa's team the loss. Metalico has developed a nice little undercard vicious streak, loved him ripping Oro down off the ropes in the middle of a moonsault attempt. Real fun stuff.
Kamaitachi is showing himself to be a valuable add. Loved how hard he went after Delta in this. I've said it before but he seems like he really enjoys the lucha crowd atmosphere, really seems excited to be there, gets dumped on his head off a clothesline. Maya hits his nice dive past the turnbuckles, Euforia has a kind of lazy night for him, Okumura hits a mean missile dropkick to Delta's face for the win. Atlantis was having a very "Atlantis in a trios" performance until he went on a spirited run opposite Euforia that ended in a capable old man dive.
3. Lightning Match: Bobby Zavala vs. Super Halcon Jr. (2/9/14)
Well hey, this was pretty good! You remember Super Halcon from being the worst guy in the Busca de un Idolo. Here he looks pretty good! They work a tight and smart little 6 minute match with Halcon hitting a big flip dive and nice tope, and Zavala taking advantage of Halcon going for high risk stuff. For every big move Halcon did that worked, the next one would see him taking boots to the face or stomach. He crumpled fantastically on a moonsault-to-boots off the top, and Zavala nicely timed a dropkick to Halcon's stomach off a springboard. Zavala also hit a bunch of stiff clotheslines. Zavala has a sturdy build and does great clotheslines and shoulder blocks the way a guy with a sturdy build should.
4. Atlantis vs. Mr. Niebla (1/19/14)
Man, fun and spirited Niebla really makes you realize what a crap bag that can be in trios matches. I really dug this; both guys worked hard and this was a fun old guy sprint. Niebla took a bunch of big bumps off of simple Atlantis stuff, really whipping himself into the mat of dropkicks and quebradoras, getting crotched on the top turnbuckle violently in the tercera and taking a painful bump to the floor. It was real impressive how quickly both men worked, even though the match went a decent length. Really made things seem more immediate. Atlantis wins the first with a smooth roll up, Niebla wins the second while holding the ropes. The ropes holding turns out to be his undoing as he keeps trying to end it the same way in the third and keeps getting caught. Finish is odd and funny, as both men resort to cheating at the exact same moment, with Atlantis' cheating being more violent and thus more effective: Niebla swipes Atlantis mask off at the same time Atlantis punts him in the balls. Ballshot gets the win. Fans in the crowd yell things at Atlantis that get blurred out. These two matched up again a few months later and that match wasn't very good. This one is definitely worth watching.
These matches were all from the 4/11 Arena Mexico show.
Blue Panther, Valiente & Diamante Azul vs. Terrible, Vangellys & Rey Bucanero
Primera gives us a bunch of Blue Panther/Terrible mat work and it rules. This is maybe the most I've ever seen Terrible hit the mat, and definitely one of Panther's longer mat rolls of the year. It's all really good stuff too, with Terrible working around a keylock and Panther finding ways to reverse out of it. Panther breaks out a cool British style backspin wristlock and a smooth arm drag into a headscissor lock. Terrible yanks on his arm a bunch and BP does simple little things to relieve pressure such as grab his own wrist. Terrible at one point floats over out of a BP head scissors to grab a headlock in one motion. Just a bunch of cool mat stuff from two guys I don't recall going at it on the mat (Terrible almost always sticks to brawling so him looking so damn good on that mat just makes me a bigger Terrible fan). We cut to a Mexican girl in the crowd wearing an Arctic Monkeys trucker hat. That's weird. The match overall is shorter than I would have liked, but was crammed with a bunch of cool moments, even after the awesome Panther/Terrible twisting. Terrible did leaping punches to guys in corners, Valiente plastered Bucanero into the barricade with a dive, Comandante looks slimmed down and was on point with the interference, Terrible kicked some guys in the taint in vicious style (Panther even sold it like he was guesting on Chavo, with an incredible Ay Dios Mio hard sell eyeroll into the back of his head, right at the camera). Killer match.
Puma, Misteriso Jr. & Boby Zavala vs. Fuego, Triton & Sagrado
This might be the absolute shortest three fall lucha match I have ever seen. Maybe Lucha Azteca clipped it (I can't get Dailymotion to play at the moment to see the real match time) but this whole thing was 3 falls in 5 minutes, and that's including the replays of how each fall ended. What in the actual fuck? Misterioso had a cool inverted powerslam, Zavala caught a Triton rana from the ring to the floor, Triton took a cool apron-to-floor bump, Sagrado continued to hold his crown as worst CMLL wrestler (going on several years now), Puma is great and we're done. Where was the fire? (aside from on Fuego's pants)
Rush, Rey Escorpion & La Sombra vs. Negro Casas, Maximo & Volador Jr.
Relevos Increibles matches are almost always fun, as you get to see tecnicos working like rudos and some cool match dynamics. And this match is a blast. Rey Escorpion is a dickhead, you knew that. Rush is a dickhead, you knew that. But La Sombra working rudo is a new favorite of mine. He chose to work rudo not long ago in a singles match against Volador which took a match I was expecting to dread and turned it into something that was super fun (until Volador invincibility took over). Casas is such a joyful rudo that I forget how sympathetic he can be as a tecnico, and how killer his triumphant comebacks can be. You come for Rush stomping and kicking Negro Casas a bunch, and you stay for Sombra being a jerk. At one point he teased taking his shirt off, and when squeals started up he slowly rolled his shirt back down. Yes. Sombra is a total shit kicker here, at one point just destroying Volador into the corner with rapid fire successive left and right elbows (which Volador threatened to ruin with his goof troop dazed selling). Sombra needs to be a rudo NOW. Ever since Volador turned tecnico and also turned horrible the promotion has been missing a highflier/rudo presence. As advertised, Casas took a big beating here, with Rush and Escorpion stomping on him with glee, all leading up to a brief but fired up Casas comeback that saw him thrust headbutt Rush to the floor. Alas, as he's going for his Thesz press off the apron Rush catches him and plants him with a powerbomb on the floor, taking him out of the tercera. Sombra tapes Volador to the corner in real menacing fashion and I like Volador fighting back by catching him with one last superkick, before he gets ganged up on and wins by DQ. I really dug this. Strong rudo/tecnico dynamics from some real charismatic guys.
These matches were from the 3/16 Arena Mexico show.
Blue Panther, Guerrero Maya Jr. & Sagrado vs. Puma, Boby Zavala & Tiger
Good match that got tons of time to stretch out. Puma is really emerging as a guy who I'm actively excited to see, Tiger too, to a lesser extent. They've been CMLL undercarders for several years now, but they've never done too much to stand out to me. Lately though they've clearly upped their game. Extra snap to their offense and putting over tecnicos with big bumps. Tiger ate a fast Sagrado dive and Puma took a big spill into the barricade on a spot where less would have been acceptable. Speaking of guys standing out, Sagrado actually looked really good here, and he's been consistently one of my least favorite CMLL guys for several years running. Here he hit a big dive and had some nice mat stuff, and never got lost or tangled during big sequences as he usually tends to do.
Negros Casas, Kraneo & Niebla Roja vs. Rush, Maximo & Marco Corleone
Killer short match that delivered everything I hoped it would. You get all the nasty Rush and Casas sequences, with Rush stomping and kicking the life out of Casas (it's beginning to happen so often that I'm thinking getting kicked by tassled boots is some weird wrestler fetish that Casas is into). Kraneo continues to be the best big company worker that nobody talks about. The guy is like a lucha Buddy Rose in that he always looks like the most agile guy in the match, while also having a 2 out of 10 body. I mean just a horrible, awful body, stuffed into a too tight outfit that gives him two butts and a lot of weird bulges. And then he goes out and takes awesome armdrags, huge bumps to the floor, and has the best stomach kicks. Niebla Roja is impressive matching up equally nice with Maximo and Corleone, which is not easy. Maximo has an epic new LEGO shirt. I want a LEGO Maximo shirt. What friend of the blog will hook that up? This only goes about 12 minutes but is so damn fun. Watch it for the awesome fatness of Kraneo, stay for the Rush/Casas ass beatings you love.
Reaper vs. Volador Jr.
Better than I thought it would be but Volador is still mostly terrible as a maskless no selling tecnico. None of his matches have any consequences as no matter how bad a beating he's taking, he can just pop up at any moment to fit his moves in. It's pretty pointless getting invested in anything done to him as none of it matters. Reaper looked good, leaned into Volador's flip dives and superkicks. I liked him working over Volador's knees, hanging him in by the legs and kicking him. Again, didn't matter since nothing slows down Volador. What makes all this so consistently stunning to me is that last year Volador was one of my favorites. I thought he was almost always the best guy in a trios. And now he embodies almost everybody characteristic I hate in a wrestler. I don't know if I've ever turned so hard on a guy. But seriously, fuck Volador matches.
These matches were from the 11/15 Arena Mexico show, so we're back to being just 2 weeks behind. Remember when Galavision was like 6-8 months behind?
1. Lightning Match: Titan vs. Bobby Zavala
Titan is pretty goofy but I guess a lightning match is about the best place to hide him. I'd rather have him doing bad matwork and "hold my hand while I walk on ropes" and handstand flippy spots in a match like this then muck up a decent trios with it. Bobby Zavala is also a goofball but in a different way. He was still able to standout by showing up his douchebag...charm? Charm doesn't seem like a good word for it. He's a rudo, and he's a complete douche. He wears his full body suit and comes out with a dorky spiky mask because I assume he thinks he looks cool but instead he kinda looks like some sort reptilian leather daddy. He's one of those new breed of luchadors who watch a lot of bad indy wrestling and then mimic it, so while Titan is doing goofy headstand backflip head scissors, Zavala is doing crappy things like death valley drivers into turnbuckles, or vertical suplex into turnbuckles. Basically, most moves into turnbuckles looks dangerous, stupid, and less impactful than just doing the move normally. It works better for him since he does act like a total douche, so he may as well have douchey offense. Zavala did do some cool things as well, like Titan leaping over the top to the floor (like the Silver King dive from the middle rope to the floor) and Zavala blasts him with a dropkick on the way down. This was mostly goofy, but still sorta fun.
2. Blue Panther, Atlantis & Diamante Azul vs. Felino, Mr. Niebla & Comandante Pierroth
Wow, this stunk.The first two falls were among the worst I can remember seeing from a match with competent workers. I've seen fairly recent Felino involved in a good match, but when he dogs it I don't think there's anybody who dogs it harder. Here he just gets in the way and can hardly be bothered to do anything when he's in the ring. Panther tries to work mat stuff with him and he just kinda lies there. Niebla was amusing in this but seemed to be more invested in yukking it up with the crowd instead of working the match. Azul seems pretty awful, too. Just because they dress him up like Blue Demon Jr. doesn't mean he has to wrestle down to that level. Comandante had some cool left uppercuts. That was about the best thing that happened here.
3. Negro Casas, Terrible & Tama Tonga vs. Rush, La Sombra & La Mascara
Who cares about that lousy Felino match when you get something like this!? This match is awesome and Rush/Casas completely ramp up the intensity and beat the shit out of each other the whole match. Arena Mexico loves Casas and Rush soaks up the hate, as he taunts them with fake soccer kicks and boots Casas in the balls. Both guys take turns dishing a beating, Rush kicks in Casas chest while he's slumped into the corner, Casas cashes his receipt on Rush's chin later on. Casas throws all his kicks really violently here, Rush had to have been hurting after. Casas throws all those awesome full extension kicks, catching Rush with knees, tons of great stuff. The other guys know their place and do fine complementary stuff. But they knew you were here to see Rush and Casas tear things down, and hung back. Go out of your way to watch this. It will have you salivating for the Rush/Casas singles.
Not really my kind of lucha, as this was pretty much just young guys throwing out all of there spots. Still this was a singles match which got some time, and some of the spots were pretty crazy. All the second caida stuff around the ramp was nuts, as was Titan's tope to Polvora's back. CMLL is going have this kind of match and this isn't a bad version of it.
I liked this a bunch, four guys given a shot to have a hair match in Arena Mexico and they left it all on the mat. Really liked the rudos they were both really aggressive, bumped huge and eat all of the technicos offense. Liked Zavala's chops a bunch, he threw them in a different way, big dives and some real drama with out overkill like the title match. Would like to see all of these guys get more chances
