2017 Ongoing MOTY List: Chico Che and Motocross Fight for the Hairs

72. Chico Che v. Motocross AAA Sanchez 9/16

PAS: So glad to see out boy Chico Che showing up again, he pretty much vanished after his last epic IWRG run, but has resurfaced. This is a hair v. hair brawl and is pretty much a one man Che show. Motocross bleeds and throws chairs, but doesn't bring much else to the table. Che is still really agile for such a chub, and his a beautiful elbow suicida to open the match. We also get some great Che thudding headbutts and a great top rope splash. Finish has a bunch of BS which keeps this from being a real top of the list contender, but still a treat to see Chico Che do his thing.

ER: This is a really really great "Oh yeah, THAT Chico Che!" performance, from a guy that I'm not sure I've seen since 2013. That 4 year gap vanishes as Che looks exactly the same and wrestles as great as you remember. Within the first couple seconds he hits a huge tope that crushes Motocross into the barricade, and in the first couple minutes he's already dropped him vertically with a seated double underhook piledriver, punched him across the bridge of the nose, and punted him in the jaw. Chico Che is the fattest Kurisu and it's great. I don't totally understand the finish of the segunda, as Che hits a full force crossbody and rolls away, and then just gets pinned. And that's a continuing theme, as I don't totally get Motocross here, but some fans in the back have a giant sign for him, and he takes some of the nastier chairshots you're going to see in modern wrestling, and lets a fat dude in overalls jump on him a bunch, so there's just a lot I'm not going to understand about Motocross. The violence keeps ramping in the tercera as both brawl around ringside and have a contest to see who can hit each other harder in the face with a chair. Neither win. Che takes some mean shots, but then gives it back to Motocross twofold, at one point wrapping a hard plastic chair around his neck and headbutting him. Both are bleeding, and we get some good nearfalls back inside. Che drops him with a nasty double underhook slam and splats him with a huge splash, but yeah we get some silliness with the finish, and I didn't think Chico Che should have gone down from just a nut shot, but this was a great Chico Che match.


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2017 Ongoing MOTY List: Lomeli v. Negro

87. Chavo Lomeli v. Guerrero Negro Jr. Coahuila 1/1

ER: Every neighborhood in Mexico must have a tubby local tecnico or a tubby local rudo, born and raised in that neighborhood and wrestling exclusively in that neighborhood. Chavo Lomeli is in his late 40s, wears great tassel tights like old tubby Jerry Estrada, looks like current Felino (+ 40 lb.) and was unseen by mine eyes until now. And again, there are hundreds of Chavo Lomelis in Mexico, and I'm always excited when a new one pops onto my radar. This was a fun New Years hair match, and Lomeli has a great head of hair on the line. You remember Negro as the worst participant in the Busca de un Idolo, and he's mostly what you remember: A guy who can do a dive and take a couple nice bumps. Chavo is a big bumping fatty which is probably the quickest way into my wrestling heart. Negro roughs him up with knuckle punches and Chavo continues the tradition of fat guys being great bleeders. Negro tosses him into the third row of not ready fans, and Negro has a bunch of bad body seconds roaming the ringside waving towels and sneaking boots in on Chavo. Negro eats a chairshot, Chavo does the excellent Harley Race bump where he falls backwards through the ropes and splats onto the floor. Negro hits a dive and Chavo ends up tossing HIM into those same fans. Finish is typical lucha ref fast count BS, but happens with good reason as Negro throws a punch at Chavo, misses, and ends up throwing the nastiest strike of the match right into the ref's jaw. Fun start to the indy lucha year.

PAS: Sort of a B- bloody hair match, but we get so few bloody hair matches these days, and bloody hair match is such a great match type, B- is going to get you on a list. Guerrero Negro Jr. is easier on the eyes when he has less to do, he isn't trying to keep up with Dragon Lee, he is just trying to punch an old guy in his bloody head. There is an obvious Negro blade job, but otherwise he was fine. Lomeli was a blast, you just know he has defended that luxurious mane many times before (probably in better matches) and he knows how to work a compelling apuestas match. We have the dominant heel opening caida, the quick turnaround second fall with Lomeli turning a sunset flip into a reverse package piledriver (which must have shocked Negro). Third falls has all of the bumps and dives you want, and a fine BS lucha finish. I love grimey lucha hand helds and this was a blast.


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El Brazo v. Brazo De Plata v. Brazo De Oro CMLL Cabellera contra Cabellera contra Cabellera

El Brazo v. Brazo De Plata v. Brazo De Oro CMLL Cabellera contra Cabellera contra Cabellera 3/31/95

This weekend I am going to a lucha show headlined by a La Mascara v. Psycho Clown v. Maximo three way, so I though I would check out an older Alavardo family three way. This was a fun idea which may have under delivered a bit. Super Porky gets two relatively quick pins over his brothers, including absolutely smushing El Brazo with a top rope splash that felt like Wiley Coyote getting a piano dropped on him. The final hair match is El Brazo v. Brazo de Oro and they have a fun brawl which never hits the level of epic hair matches. We do get some grizzly blood from Oro which is even nastier since it his brother chewing on his head. Kind of cheap finish with El Brazo putting his feet on the ropes with a powerbomb. Fun but not the mind blower I was hoping for.

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2017 Ongoing MOTY List: Panther v. Adonis Cabellera contra Cabellera

41. Blue Panther v. Sam Adonis CMLL 8/4

PAS: This a hair v. hair match between an all time lucha legend and a gringo with an American flag with Trumps face embroidered on it. This had all the heat you would expect from that pairing. This is probably Panther's last big CMLL main event, and he really puts in a great performance, including taking a nutty missed tope bump to the floor. Adonis gets a ton of heat, although the Trump flag is doing a lot of the work. This had a enough cool moments in the third fall to put it on the list, including an awesome Fujiwara armbar on the ramp, and Adonis draping Panther with the Trump flag and frog splashing him. Still Tirantes dropped his pants and pooped on portions of this, nothing I hate more then a heel ref, and he spent a lot of this match heat sucking, this match didn't need him to work, and watching a Trump supporter triumph over good with the help of undue collusion was a little close to home for me.

ER: Man, what the fuck with all the Tirantes? He's been in CMLL for awhile now and I don't remember him pulling his specific brand of bullshit...but I guess I hadn't had the privilege of seeing big match Tirantes. Every single thing about him was a total distraction, and I have zero clue why they thought they needed his gleeful pissing on this match. CMLL didn't draw their biggest crowd of the year because of Tirantes. The people came to see Panther whip Adonis' ass, and CMLL felt it would be best to regularly impede that whipping. You have a motherfucker who looks like Richard Spencer with Milo's shitty hair, wearing gloriously garish tights and waving a shitty trump flag on one side, and on the other side you have maybe the most sympathetic tecnico on the roster. But you know, we better jam this to the hilt with ref antics.

That the match was effective as it was is a true testament to Blue Panther: Great Wrestler, because Tirantes literally interjected himself into every one of Panther's great moments. First two falls are inconsequential (although right out of the gate we get BP pummeling Adonis, only for Tirantes to catch his hand on a punch. Good grief.), but the tercera brings the flames. The crowd is going bonkers by the time Panther nails Adonis with a tope, and then another one. Tirantes "inadvertantly" gets in the way of a third, and when Panther finally gets a clear runway he ends up taking a flip bump through the ropes to the floor, right on his tailbone. I wish Adonis had played more of a coward and used more cheapshots and hiding behind Tirantes, as he still came off pretty strong. But Panther was so nuts and his facials were so good that nobody in the match was going to hold this down. By the time they brawl to the ramp I was dying, and Panther's sympathetic facials while taking kicks to the jaw were great. Adonis ramps up the sympathy by bodyslamming nastily on the ramp, really splatting him. When Panther catches him in the Fujiwara it was a real markout moment. The big splash onto the draped-in-trump Panther was big, and Panther's kickout was grand. No way he's going out like that. At least Tirantes took a decent bump into the ropes to set up the end, but dammit Panther needs to take on Tirantes in a career vs. career match. CMLL needs to book The Panther vs. Adonis, mask vs. hair as a main, or BP/Panther vs. Adonis/proxy, with BP's career and Panther's mask on the line, and Adonis' hair and Tirantes' career (proxy wrestling for Tirantes) on the other line. Do it!


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MLJ: Recent Uploads: Kahoz vs La Fiera [hair]

1996-07-09 @ Arena Coliseo
La Fiera vs Kahoz [hair]

This was a poor man's Sangre Chicana vs MS-1. That said, even a poor man's Sangre Chicana vs MS-1 is still a rich man's match. Lately, Kozmic Trooths (sic) has been posting more matches than I have time to watch, lots of stuff from mid-late 90s CMLL that's gone under the radar from the most part. I'm not going to write up the Cibernetico from 99 he posted, for instance, but it's a worth checking out as a fun look at where guys like Olimpico, Black Warrior, Ultimo Guerrero, and Rey Bucanero were at that point in their development.

What I am going to write about is this. I'm not entirely sure what the backstory was here. Kahoz had lost his mask to Shocker in 1995 (which seems very early for Shocker to pick up that sort of a win even if it was December and after he won the Gran Alternativa). I'm sure everyone knows that Kahoz was a gimmick that Pena himself had used but had given to Astro Rey in the 80s. I hadn't known that until now. Anyway, it doesn't look like there was a ton of build to this. It really doesn't matter.

This followed the beautifully minimalist Chicana vs MS-1 format, though here Fiera was a full tecnico. That meant that Kahoz took over early, spent long minutes beating Fiera to a pulp, bloodying him all around the ring and the ringside area. This was where Fiera shined, selling broadly, bleeding huge, drawing a ton of sympathy. There was little attempt to fight back but that just build up the pressure for the eventual comeback all the more. Kahoz ended the fall with three pick-up/drop downs in a row (which I'm not sure I've ever actually seen. He could have finished him but kept picking him up; more on that later), and a stepover submission. As a primera, it was just as good as MS-1 vs Chicana, I think, a bloody, brutal beating.

The segunda and tercera were still solid, even at times transcendent, but there just wasn't quite enough there to match the very best bloody one-sided brawls. In the moment, like with all Fiera tecnico performances, I kept waiting for the trademark spin-kick to signal the comeback. As a single move, it's not quite as good as Chicana's punch, but it's more stylized, flashier even if less visceral. He hit it early in the segunda, but not until countering a caught kick into an vicious enziguri. From there it was a short but utterly triumphant revenge beating, capped off with a picture perfect frog splash. The Tercera was more of the same, awesome punches, blood and selling, a spot-on kick to the back of the head to send Kahoz to the floor followed by exactly the tope the match needed, all capping with a finish that called back to Kahoz arrogantly picking Fiera back up in the primera.

There was also a commercial for "La Sexy Olympia," and normally, I'd post a gif, but this match is too good to distract from. Watch the match. You can catch the commercial right before the segunda. Like I said, if you like MS-1 vs Sangre Chicana, you'll probably like this too. Even though it's not as good, that's still as good a company as a hair match can be in.

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2016 Ongoing MOTY List: Maximo v. Kamaitachi

1. Maximo v. Kamaitachi CMLL 1/1

PAS: This was the co-main event hair match of the Sin Piedad New Year's Day show and was a great start to 2016. First fall had Kamaitachi work over Maximo's knee with some nasty stuff, I loved his diving knees onto Maximo's knee. He eventually gets the submission with a kind of modified figure four, liked the second fall with Maximo still getting brutalized and pulling off a twisty armdrag and then really cranking a single crab to even it out. Third fall was more back and forth, with some really cool stuff. It also felt more like a story with Maximo gritting out the bad leg, this wasn't just a series of crazy spots. Maximo is a great bad leg diver, his topes are awesome looking but he also throws in a subtle but noticeable limp. Finish had a little goofiness with fake fouls that was uneccesary, but otherwise this was awesome stuff.

ER: What a fun match. I like Kamaitachi a lot in CMLL, and he has a wonderful head of hair to put up in a hair match. And it seems like Maximo has to pop up at least once a year on our MOTY list, so he fills his quota pretty quickly here. Kamaitachi is crazy and fully throws himself into everything he does. He's an easy guy to watch, but an easy guy to boo here. We're all used to him in the Dragon Lee feud at this point, and all their match-ups (both in singles and trios) have been go go go. Here we get to see Kamaitachi slow things down and be more sinister. He still gets to be a showy bump machine, but this is much more classic rudo bully picking apart a sympathetic tecnico's knee. And boy does he pick apart Maximo's knee! We start with a low dropkick and it's curtains for Maximo's knee from there. Kamaitachi does a great job of adjusting his signature offense to specifically attack the knee, especially his double knee drop. Maximo's selling is great throughout, and he's already one of the more over tecnicos in CMLL, so the selling bumped him up to an even greater level of sympathy. Crowd is going nuts the whole time, but CMLL also makes sure we see (a lot of) Kamaitachi's big fan as she holds her Kamaitachi mask, gleefully laughs when he's doing well, and sits in shock whenever Maximo turns the table. Of course, they end up showing her so much that it practically feels like she's the one who put her hair on the line. But Maximo is really great at putting over the knee injury, and the topes that it built to were glorious. Now, Kamaitachi still does his lunatic senton off the top to a standing opponent, and it's just crazy. I think I may use the word lunatic a lot, but I'm not sure any move deserves it as much as this senton. Kamaitachi just seems to have minimal regard for his body when doing this move, not caring if the back of his head smashes into the ground, caring most about just wrecking ball leveling his opponent. It's insane. It's awesome. And I liked the end run fake fouls. I thought it actually led to a nice false finish where I bought into Kamaitachi's nearfall (and considering I don't think I've ever seen a Japanese guy win a mask or hair match in CMLL, that should tell you how effective they were at creating this nearfall within the context). I loved the build throughout this match, felt it was one of the best uses of the modern CMLL caida format, with the two quicker first falls and then a longer tercera. A lot of times singles matches feel like they go that way because that's how the fed structures singles matches. This felt like it fit logically into that format, with Kamaitachi working over the knee and getting a quick win in the primera, Maximo getting a flash submission that worked great in the segunda, and then they worked a long tercera without ever making it feel like a 50/50 move exchange, as a lot of CMLL's long singles terceras devolve into. Everything about this was satisfying.


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2015 Ongoing Match of the Year List

8. Ultimo Guerrero v. Rey Escorpion CMLL 7/17

PAS: Man was this great, this is two years in a row Ultimo comes up huge in an apuestas match. The opening was fucking bonkers with both guys unloading with over hand slaps, with Rey Escorpion slipping in a straight right hand, he then delivers some nasty stomps in the corner,  finally leading to them trading shoot punches right into each others face. It looked like Hashimoto v. Ogawa or something, and UG comes up with a bloody and swollen nose, his facial damage kind of served the same dramatic purpose as a blade job, adding some pop and pizzazz to the match. The work itself was really great, with UG breaking out a bunch of cool dives, including a stage dive style plancha off the top rope to the floor, and off the apron, and Escorpion laying in some cool powerbombs. Finish felt like UG may have shrugged off a package piledriver a bit to quick, but was otherwise very good. Great match.

ER: Sometimes things can happen during a match, that take me out of a match. This often hurts the match, but in rare cases like this it adds gobs to the match. And the shoot punches to the face in this match jarred me right out of my chair and completely absorbed my eyeballs into what was happening.  We've seen these kind of shoot punches from Escorpion before, popping Porky several times during their feud. But this...this was different. Escorpion starts taking rough shots on UG and UG starts firing back and here you have a legit Frye/Takayama situation of two guys playing zero defense and just punching each other in the worst parts of the face. It was horrifying but I couldn't look away and it immediately made me legit want UG to kick Escorpion's ass. I don't know if that says something about me, or something about modern wrestling heels that the thing that brings legit heat is punching a man several times in the face, but there it is. UG looks like he doesn't see the hard shots coming, takes him a bit to figure out just what is happening, and then BOOM it's on and it adds a level of drama to the beginning of the match that sustains all the way through. For all of the times you've seen lucha camerawork take away from a moment, the up close shots of these punches really added to things. Cameras don't get this close even in UFC. This is a fight, filmed like pro wrestling. UG added his jumping hip attack a year ago and here he threw out several variations of it, crashing into Escorpion off the rampway, apron, into the crowd, off the top rope. All of that early drama really marked it, really said that "this match is a big deal" and it hooked me the whole way through. Love these guys.


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CMLL Worth Watching 7/12/15, 8/9/15 & 8/14/15

Blue Panther, The Panther & Blue Panther Jr. vs. Virus, Sangre Azteca & Okumura (7/12/15)

So, after showing some potential early last year, Panther's boys have so far revealed themselves to be duds. Clutzy, awkward, prone to confusion in the middle of segments. Luchadors can peak late, so there's still time, but for now it's best to expect nothing out of them. No, you watch this match expressly hoping for the few moments that papa Panther matches up with Virus. And those few moments totally made this worthwhile for me. Some of their exchanges lasted mere seconds but when you're dealing with two masters like them, sometimes that's all you need to see flashes of brilliance. At one point Panther armdrags Virus, Virus grabs BP's leg while going over, rolls through with it, Panther pulls Virus in with the captured leg and kicks off with the other. A 4 second moment, but gorgeous in its execution. There are more moments with them, and they're all the best parts of the match. There is some expected badness from BP's boys, though Jr. hits a nice dive at the tercera's peak, Virus wraps himself around a ringpost while also splatting on the apron, BP's opening mat play with Azteca was nice. A simple trios, and full of irony as I labeled it "worth watching" while later realizing it's not been uploaded by Cubs. I watched it on LATV. Add this to the pile of me historically documenting lucha matches that no one else will ever watch. (EDIT: It's up now)

Cabellera contra Cabellera: Pequeno Violencia vs. Aereo (8/9/15)

I can almost always get into a lucha stip matches, but I must say when the tecnico has 7/8" hair in a hair match, it kind of takes away some drama. You can almost guarantee it's going to be Violencia's ponytail getting got, and if it doesn't then Aero's hair will be back to the same cut within 4 weeks tops. But it's still fun to see minis get an extended singles match. It's tough to top a spot in the primera, as Aereo goes for a dive and Violencia just introduces him right into the floor. Splat. It sadly doesn't mean a whole lot as both men get into the ring at about the same time. Violencia immediately gets a leg lock to win the fall, and later in the match Aereo shows no hesitation in doing an even bigger dive. Aereo is real tiny, but doesn't quite have the same snap that fellow tiny minis like Shockercito have. Still, you get some nice headscissors and armdrags, just slower than the other guys. In that same vein, Violencia is your lesser bulky mini rudo, nowhere near as good as Demus or Pierrothito, and not anywhere near as exciting as a less bulky rudo like Mercurio. BUT, I like when 4th rung guys like this get showcase matches, get the chance to stretch out a bit. It doesn't always work, but there are usually fun moments. And this had fun moments.

Demus 3:16, Pequeno Violencia & Mercurio vs. Stukita, Shockercito & Ultimo Dragoncito (8/14/15)

This was real fun, too quick to be revolutionary, but tons of craziness which makes it an easy recommendation. The double dive alone is worth watching several times, which I certainly did. Stukita flies through Mercurio and lands right on the barrier, and Dragoncito gets a wild head of steam and comes in too hot, sending him crashing and burning OVER the barrier and into a front row chair, sending beer and a woman's smart phone flying. One of the camera angle looks like a beer geyser goes off. I mean he really just flew right into that front row. You crazy crazy tiny Dragon. Demus is kind of a nutbar, really has an outsized personality which is not something you ever see from minis. He really jaws with the ref, knows how to work a crowd, and is easily the best base of all the mini rudos. Shockercito goes for an around the world headscissors and Demus is nutty so he flips Shocker 4 times around his body and then upside down and then perfectly bumps through the ropes to the floor in an impossibly fluid way. The crowd kept getting louder with every revolution and he somehow made a 100% implausible move seem like something that could actually be done. Stukita is super smooth and breaks out all sorts of armdrags and moonsaults that he makes look effortless. I know the minis often have their matches recorded, but they rarely seem to make TV for whatever reason. This is the first time they've popped up on actual TV in...sheesh, over a year maybe?

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MLJ: Sin Salida 2010 Final: Maximo vs Taichi [cabellera vs cabellera]

2010-06-06 @ Arena México
Maximo vs Taichi [cabellera vs cabellera]

4:54 in

This is a fitting capstone for this mini project for a couple of reasons. I'm higher on Maximo than most people seem to be. That might be because it's refreshing to have so straightforward a tecnico in modern CMLL or it might just be my lack of seeing a lot of exoticos but he has a sort of physical confidence and spryness which combines with very dedicated character work. There's a reason he's always generally over with a crowd that tends to boo half the tecnicos.

He was also in one of the first matches I reviewed. There he was teaming with Porky. Here he has Porky as his corner man for an apuestas match and at that point I didn't even know their relationship. That was a little less than a year ago. Finally, maybe due to cuts, maybe due to my lack of language skills, I actually lost the flow of this match when watching it and I'm not entirely sure how Maximo won the segunda. So that's fun.

Fun's a good word to describe this match in general. Look, you know coming in you're not going to get an expert matwork demonstration and you're also not going to get a crazed bloody brawl. Maximo is fun. Taichi is crummy. At best what they were going to present was an enjoyable, story-based, character driven romp where Taichi got his comeuppance and lost that stupid mane he was always flicking around. That's pretty much what we got and I'm absolutely not going to complain.

The primera was straight to the point. Taichi (whose corner man was Okumura not surprisingly) came in aggressively with a double leg takedown and punches. Maximo ran circles around him for a minute before doing the same. Then he started to get cocky and tease and taunt him and ultimately, because he wasn't taking the match seriously enough, walked right into Taichi's lame looking Emerald Flowsion.

The segunda is a mystery to me. You'd expect Maximo to get beat up for a bit and then hit a roll up out of nowhere, which would lead to a reset to start the tercera. That's how these usually things go. I didn't see that. Instead, the comeback pretty much consisted of two topes, so we're going to be generous and say that Taichi was counted out during one of them. Ultimately, it doesn't matter, because this isn't the sort of match where there was a long beatdown and a meaningful comeback. Modern CMLL Apuestas matches are pretty much all tercera, though this did give the weird illusion of a segunda that felt like a tercera, until I figured out what was going on.

The point is, I liked the tercera. The selling didn't entirely feel earned, but it occurred after two pretty big tope suicidas (topes suicidas?), so in that regard quality overcame quantity. Taichi had the advantage for most of it, with a number of pretty good near falls. Nothing was overly complex but it really shouldn't have been. The biggest one was another flowsion too close to the ropes. Maximo finally started to fight back, hitting one of his multiple jump planchas into the ring, only to have Taichi pretty hilariously fake a foul off a near ref bump in order to score a roll up. That's how Maximo took Emilio Charles Jr.'s hair a few years before, btw. The fans were really into it.

I like it when Maximo turns on the physicality, as he's big enough to have just won the Heavyweight title, for instance and he did so here immediately thereafter with these boots.

There was one more roll up by Taichi but Maximo stood tall, hitting a powerbomb reversal for a fairly effective kill shot. You rarely see him do something like that, so it meant something when he did. For a match where I have no idea how the segunda ended, this was perfectly enjoyable for what it was. I'm not sure I'd main event a big show with it, but I'm not CMLL.

A Proud Papa: 

So much Glitter, so much Shame: 

Alright, so that's it for 2010. We're deeper into the Hechicero/Lucero feud on Monday and then the rest of the week is up in the air. I'm hoping to start delving into a comp, but we'll see. I have a lot of 90s Negro Casas to watch too before I start up with either the Mistico/Casas or more likely, the Rush/Terrible feud.

I think I will make a dash towards the Anniversary show in 2010 at some point later, though. There's enough going on that I still want to see more of it, and I'd like to do that with more Hector Garza. He was, and this is no exaggeration, one of the two or three most charismatic wrestlers I've ever seen. I think I got a little gif heavy by the end, but that's because his reactions to every little thing going on in the ring were worth capturing. I'm glad that I have so much of the rest of his career to watch and I'm sad that there won't be more to come, especially so this week, of cousre.

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The internet gives and gives - Fiera vs Casas - 10/1/1993 - Cabellera v. Cabellera

1993-10-1 - CMLL - Cabellera v. Cabellera - Negro Casas v. La Fiera



So the incredibly generous boon to society who posted the Santico/Chicana match that Phil went nuts over (and those early 90s Mocho Cota matches that I wrote up a few months ago) followed it up today by posting the Fiera/Negro Casas hair match from the 60th Anniversary show in 93 that I badly wanted to see. It was the follow up to this Haku match: http://segundacaida.blogspot.com/2015/02/mlj-enter-king-haku-2-king-haku-la.html

And it is awesome. I'm taking a look at the Taichi vs Maximo hair match on Friday and I'm not going to give this one a full write up like I might otherwise because a) I've already written that up before I saw this and you can't even compare a modern mid-card CMLL hair match with a match from twenty years ago with guys like this. It's night and day and it'd make what I have to say about Maximo/Taichi in a match that I liked for what it was, ring real hollow. and b) I don't want to spoil too much for people.

Instead, I'll just say that it has so many of the elements that I love in a really heated match of this type. There is a violent assault by the rudo, including the sort of biting that it's hard to imagine out of Casas looking at him now with selling (of the nose!) to match and a hard fought tecnico comeback, so very earned, where the hope spots aren't about the momentum shifting so much as the violence subsiding for a brief moment. There's a revenge spot into the stands to cap it off and an awesome, triumphant German suplex to put on the exclamation point.

There's the intense revenge beating by the tecnico, the rudo getting his second wind and desperately fighting for his life, and winning back the moment. Casas' selling after he gets the advantage back in the segunda is so great. At one point he is just leaning with his bloody head on Fiera's back in the corner trying to get a breath so he can get an attack in before Fiera can recover.

And the tercera's maybe a few minutes shorter than I'd have liked, but full of the earned selling that you'd expect from a match like this, with one or two really brutal spots (including a shove down out of the corner, and a really great spinkick block into a kick), with the ultimate finish coming in a satisfying way from a spot that both Casas and Fiera had attempted to hit previously. The first one that managed it won the match.

Great stuff. (NOTE: The sound drops for a bit early on but it comes back later)

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MLJ: Rush vs Negro Casas 21: Rush vs Negro Casas, Hair vs Hair

Aired 2014-08-09
taped 2014-08-01 @ Arena México
Rush vs Negro Casas, hair vs hair

Here we are, the end of the road. I tried my damnedest to avoid spoilers on it when it first happened. I figured it'd be fairly easy since lucha isn't as pervasive on the internet as other things. The only problem with that plan was that I wasn't nearly patient enough when it came to trying to find the match. Ah well, it's not like the result was really in doubt. Eventually, Rush needs to get his comeuppance, but that time was not yet and that place was not here. Also, in the name of honesty, I didn't love this match the first time around. I thought that Rush, as he was going to win, had taken too much of it and that the finish, especially, didn't feel definitive enough relative to the months of build and the fact that Casas wasn't going to be the one to give him that comeuppance. Let's see if I feel the same after a close watch.

The Ingobernales' gear and entrances have been a real highlight of 2014. I haven't seen the last couple of weeks of Halloween themed gear either. Here Rush had the white suit and hat and cigar. He came out first to show it off which meant that Casas certainly wasn't going to get a full entrance. Instead, Rush met him with his usual ambush; this time though he laid in a few stomps on Zacarias too. After that, they were off to the races. The sort of violence we are allowed to have in apuestas matches is different than what we had years ago. There's no blood and less gouging and biting and raking. There are more kicks to the head and toe-to-toe chop offs and shots in the corner. This match had all of that. It also had a lot of posing and crowd interaction from Rush and selling from Casas. During the beatdown, Rush would balance flurries of violent offense with playing to the crowd to high effect and while this wasn't a necessarily long beatdown, or even a particularly memorable one, since we've been watching this exact brand of violence for months, the arrogance and cockiness of Rush really bled through and made it stand out. They did add a couple of different spots, including a low dropkick out of the ring while Rush was seated against the ropes, and they used the reverse course clothesline relatively early in the match, not as a way to stop Casas' offense after a reset, like usual, but instead as a cut off to a hope spot. A little variation goes a long way. At the end, Rush goaded Casas to fight back, but pressed the advantage, kicked him down, and hit the corner setaed dropkick to take the primera. It was three minutes, but a three minutes that was carried on the back of months and months of violence.

One great little aspect of this match was that both Rush and Casas had to work to maintain momentum. In most of the lucha I've seen, there isn't a lot in the way of viable hope spots. In a trios, one tecnico might go out and the next might come in, but he's usually immediately swarmed. Likewise, when the comeback happens, it usually happens all at once, without much in the way of earning and building it. A missed spot or a quick move out of nowhere will lead to a momentum shift. Here, Rush had to deal with a hope spot or two in the primera and Casas had to earn his come back in the segunda. He rushed across the ring to attack at the start of the caida, but Rush cut him off with a brutal headbutt out of the corner. Casas would come back with a spinning back kick a little while later only to get cut off when Rush grabbed his hair as he tried to hit the ropes. It wasn't until Rush started to paintbrush him with slaps that Casas hit the pick up/drop down and started laying in punches. We didn't get much in the way of an extended comeback though, for he went right for the STF. Here we got some bs, but I liked the way they used it. Sombra rushed out with a chair to distract Casas and break the hold, and due to the distraction Rush nailed Casas with a power bomb. The ref remained distracted and missed the pin, however, and when Rush went to complain, Casas locked him in La Casita for the three. I liked this because it again followed from what happened over the last many months. Los Ingobernales are all about desecrating tradition and trying to interfere in such a way was right down their alley. That it backfired made it even sweeter.

They reset for the tercera and stormed towards the finish. Casas hit his diving seated senton off the apron. Rush responded with a diving dropkick off the apron. Casas sold big. Rush went for a top rope senton in the ring but he spent too long jawing with the fans in a match where he interacted with them a lot and it paid off with Casas moving. Casas followed up by going for some arm submissions, but Rush survived them (though he did make sure to shake the hand off to sell it before starting to strike back, which was appreciated). There was a sense here that Rush was younger and just had more recuperative power than Casas, despite Casas being more skilled and savvy. The finish had Rush going for the corner dropkick again but Casas jumping up and hitting a dropkick of his own across the ring. He went for one Casita but was pushed in to the ref and when he went to the other, Rush pushed him off and fouled him for the pin.

On a close rewatch, with most of their previous matches from the year under my belt as well, I thought this was very good, better than I gave it credit for initially. I do wish there was another minute or two of the initial beatdown (especially with one more cut off hope spot; that would have been Aces), and more than anything else, that Casas got to beat on Rush a bit more before Sombra ran down. That was the big component the match was missing. That said, it had a lot going for it, with everything feeling earned and having weight, and the violence pretty visceral for a match in this day and age. The finish ultimately worked fine because even though Casas probably isn't going to be the one to someday give Rush his comeuppance, that he cheated to win here will just make it all the sweeter no matter who it ends up being. Even though it occasionally veered into repetitiveness, this was a great feud, and one of the highlights of the year. I hope everyone enjoyed going through it with me.

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Live CMLL Aniversario Review

You can get the stream here

http://deportes.terra.com/en-vivo/26907/

I'll update with some thoughts after every match

Blue Panther/Dragon Lee/Cachorro beat Puma/Tiger/Felino

Fun but not great opener, which I imagine did it’s job in the arena. Had a hot beginning, bit of a meandering middle, and a crazy hot finish. Dragon Lee was as nuts as you would hope he would be. Doing a crazy dropkick to the floor, and a nutty assisted tope con hilo. Panther also broke out a triple tope which is bonkers for such an old dude. Match was sort of neither fish nor foul though, as we didn’t get to see Panther and Felino do their thing, and they might have been better off just making the match all crazy young guys.

Zeuxis won the Copa Femil beating Goya Kong/Marcela/Estrellita/Amapola/Tiffany/Dallys la Carbina/Princess Sugehit

Match with some highs and lows. The luchadoras cleared went all out for the big stage, and this had some big spots, although that ambition led to some stuff that didn’t look particularly good. I hadn’t seen Zeuxis before, she had some very crazy moves, including an asai moonsault and a bunch of nasty suplexes which ended up dropping ladies heads on her knees, although in between spots she would often look lost, she felt really indy. Still I was never bored.

Volador Jr./Mascara Dorada/Valiente beat Thunder/Euforia/Mr. Niebla

Short and mostly uneventful. Nibela has the outfit of the night so far with an awesome Kiss combo mask and paint. Match was mostly Thunder as a giant with everyone trying to knock him down, and he is not very good at wrestling. They had a nice dive train, but outside of that, this wasn’t very good, but it was compact.

Barbaro Cavenario beat Rey Cometa in a Cabellera contra Cabellera

Good match, although a step below a real MOTYC. It had each guy throwing out all of the crazy shit including Cometa opening up the match with a moonsault off of the ring entrance, and Barbaro hitting his superfly splash to the floor which is my favorite spot in wrestling, it is so reckless and violent looking. I still am not used to wager matches as spotfests, which is what this was. I need something a little more violent and a little less exhibitiony for me to truly fall in love with it. Still very much worth watching.

Negro Casas/Shocker beat Rush/La Mascara

Match of the night so far. I am never going to get tired of Rush and Casas beating on each, and Rush was at his douchebag best, smacking the old guys around violently slapping and dropkick them. Casas was firing back and using his guile to catch the younger more powerful team unaware. Rush was a beast in this, as was La Mascara and you really got the sense the veterans escaped with their titles by the skin of their teeth. I also liked Casas getting a bit of revenge for getting steamrolled for his hair.

Ultimo Guerrerro v. Atlantis

Wow. Totally exceeded my expectations. Really felt like a classic mascara contra mascara match. The stakes felt really high, two huge stars wagering their masks, which made every near fall huge. Ultimo Guerrero was throwing huge bombs, and Atlantis was trying to survive and catch him with the Alantida, there was a great moment where Guerrero hits the superbomb, rushes in an gets caught with the Altantida, only to have Atlantis collapse against the ropes unable to hold him. I didn't love the finish with UG hitting his reverse superplex, which is always a kill shot, only to get two, and then get caught in the Alantida, almost felt like Atlantis no sold it a bit. This was a superhero in a mask match, so I forgive it a bit, but I thought it was slightly abrupt. Still this might be the MOTY, I will have to rewatch it, but it felt huge. Postmatch is great with UG surrendering his mask while his family is sobbing and the crowd is throwing money

Such a treat to get to watch this live, and while some of the undercard was slightly disappointing, that main event was a treasure. 

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