Found Footage Friday: APACHE~! SKAYDE~! HECHICERO~! RAYO~! FIERA~! LUCERO~! SANGRE~! ULTIMO~! ATLANTIS~!

Gran Apache vs. Skayde DTU 4/18/10

MD: We're all happy that Black Terry, Jr. is posting matches. He's posted this one here and on Facebook, so give him clicks:  https://www.facebook.com/reel/1681600072845956. Here we got up close and personal for a super enjoyable encounter. Apache was able to keep up with Skyde on the mat the whole way through and had a bunch of thunking power moves, while also bringing multiple dropkicks, a moonsault attempt in the middle, and then the two dives at the end. There was something a little clunky about him at times. When he went over for the rolling Boston crab set up for a rowboat, he had a hard time getting over, but it never felt collaborative. It just added to the grit, and, in my mind, set up the finish where while he took Skyde out, he was spent from the effort he put in on the dives and couldn't beat the count either. 

What made this jump off the screen, however, was how sharp the holds were. They were so good at unlocking holds with little shots and bits of positioning: a twist of the arm one way so as to twist it another, a cradle that wasn't meant to be a pin but to set up the next hold, a transition from a kickout right into the next thing. For the most part Apache pressed the advantage. He had bit of a size, came off as an all arounder. Where he stumbled was not accounting for the fact that one side of the ring happened to have barbed wire all over it and he careened into it on rope running. Later on, there was a bit of added drama that for him to get a rope break on a hold, he'd have to grab the ropes on that side of the ring. It didn't play into the match too much past that but it created a more interesting environment for them to joust in.

While the crowd groaned a bit at the finish, they had no reason to complain with the action up til then. Apparently BT, Jr. is going to be posting every Monday so we'll have lots to look at over time. 

PAS: The 2010's period when Black Terry Jr. was just releasing incredible indy lucha every week (and we would get new FUTEN shows) was one of the most rewarding periods of my pro-wrestling fandom. IWRG and the smaller lucha promotions were just on fire, awesome cool matches every week with guys like Black Terry, Negro Navarro, Dr. Cerebro and many more just killing it. Lots of that stuff has been only sporadically available in recent years, and I am pretty sure this is a match which is completely new. Apache is a guy who dipped into that 2010s indy lucha world, but wasn't a mainstay, so it is especially neat to get to see him stretch, and more Skayde is also always a treat. This is a match which just fulfilled expectations, I came in expecting great looking Llave, some cool exchanges and a little Apache high flying and it just checked the boxes. My expectations are pretty high for this stuff, and while it didn't exceed them, just hitting them is pretty great.  

ER: Had I been there live this is something I still would be thinking about. Black Terry Jr. is back and puts you in the front row of lost lucha libre like few. Phil isn't exaggerating about how much the original BTJ handhelds meant to his fandom, I remember all the excited phone calls and texts about every single new upload, leading down the Black Terry rabbit hole, documenting some of the coolest lucha that had mostly to that point gone unseen by all but the most dedicated lucha heads. I don't think I've ever seen Gran Apache in any of BTJ's handhelds, and the sight of Apache in an environment like this looks totally foreign to me. It's beautiful. Live, seeing two old guys (well, 50 and 45, youthful for our brand of lucha) working llave and the hardest fucking mat possible, it's the thing I want from my lucha. We see them fully up close rolling through exchanges, Apache rolling through leg locks that get tighter with each roll, going through what feels like a 12 step process to knot up Skayde's legs. Apache's llave somehow looks more graceful while Skayde's moves more heavily. I don't mean that as an insult to Skayde's work, I thought the heaviness added to the pendulum swings of his llave, his floating majistral looking like an act of magic physics rather than fast Quackenbush precision. Skayde's single legs and cinched in crabs looked ligament tearing, and Apache is wise to just start slapping and punching him the longer we go. 

Apache's punches and slaps were one of the first things that got me into actual lucha libre, believe it or not. I was mostly familiar with lucha through WCW, and Psychosis/Rey/Juvy matches from Japan or ECW. When my family finally got cable TV in the year 2000 it wasn't long before I found Galavision, and discovered Gran Apache slapping the shit out of Oscar Sevilla in his little Sears portrait matador suit. I was fully onboard the Apache express from one match, and here every punch and slap to Skayde brought me back to those first ones I saw. I never got to see Apache live (I saw Skayde once, during a period where he had gained weight and got outshone by a 60 year old Solar) and the sound of his strikes live must have been incredible. 

7 minutes into this I yelled "There's barbed wire in there?!" to my living room, as BT Jr. had kept that angle hidden. There's a whole side of the ring with barbed wire around the ropes and while these men mostly stay away from the wire, Apache does accidentally hit it once and yelps loudly, a hilarious camera reveal. It also leads to my actual favorite shot, late in the match, as Apache punches Skayde in the face. The afternoon sun glows behind them and The Barbed Wire Side of the Ring looms in the foreground unused, the kind of lucha vision only seen in outdoor tent lucha. Now that BTJ is back, who knows how many more similar visions we will see. We'll write about every one. 

Caifan Rockero I vs. Rey Hechicero 2/13/09

MD: Likewise, Rob's gone through a channel posting a ton of things and pried out what seems to be new or lost or recovered, perfect for us. And for us, it doesn't get too much more perfect than an incredibly blurry match between Caifan and Hechicero from 09. I'm pretty certain AEW fans have no idea how old Hechicero is and how long he's been doing this. I saw my share of his stuff back when I first started getting into lucha, including an apuestas match with Caifan from a year after this one, so this is like going home in some ways.

They go almost 30 and it feels like a series of a hundred mostly disconnected exchanges, each one interesting and experimental in its own right. They're all full of struggle. For a lot of it, Caifan is the aggressor and Hechicero has to get out of something, though he has his share of hefting Caifan up as well. Sometimes it's clear what they're going for and it works beautifully. Sometimes you're left to wonder. There's a shoulder breaker Hechicero does twenty minutes in where I'm not sure if that's what he meant to start with. Other times, though, the struggle is wonderful. When Hechicero went for a tapitia, he only got it after slamming Caifan's head into the mat a few times in a way that I'm not sure I've ever quite seen; simple but it worked very well within the sequence. Caifan hit his arm cradle suplex twice. There was a bit more of a sense of build for the second one, but you still wonder about him having to go to the well in such a long match like that.

They did escalate to rope running but then they'd take it back down. So much as there was a narrative, it was one of increasing exhaustion and damage over time. You believed it because they were doing so much. The moves did get bigger to a degree, more off the top, for instance. When Hechicero finally stunned Caifan enough to get the hold he really wanted, it felt more like him outlasting Caifan than anything else. I wouldn't call this particularly focused, but it was certainly imaginative and fun. 

Atlantis/Rayo De Jalisco Jr./Ultimo Dragon vs. La Fiera/Sangre Chicana/Charles Lucero 9/6/92 Plaza De Toros Monumental

MD: Lucero was a replacement for Tugboat Tyler. They didn't even update the graphics. But he's part of what made this fun. We've seen the rest of these guys go at it, and yeah, I'll always be glad to see Chicana and Fiera, but a relatively young (relative to a lot of the footage we have of him fifteen years later) Lucero in the mix was novel.

A lot of this is the rudos stooging all over the place, Lucero pretending Atlantis fouled him, Fiera having Ultimo run over his back, everyone playing into Rayo's act. Again, some of the novelty is seeing Lucero feed into it. Eventually Chicana punches Rayo in the skull while he has a hold on and the rudos take over. Atlantis comes back with a chair on Chicana and it feels a little unwarranted maybe but who knows what these guys were up to otherwise. The tonal shift is especially weird as they go into everyone-in-a-headlock-at-once and la estella and a celebratory finishing bit for the tecnicos but hey, we're not going to complain too much about mean Atlantis chairshots. This too, like everything else this week, was fun. 

ER: I love when 15 minutes of VHS tape trader quality lucha shows up, talk about a trip back. There's always something new to observe, always somebody who stands out that you weren't thinking about earlier that week, month, or year. Charles Lucero was someone I didn't know about until his matches with Hechicero, Rayo a lot of people didn't know about until he was older and lazier and up his own ass (complimentary, and pejoratively) and here they're both a perfect set of rivals. In the primera there's this great early moment where Rayo is teasing his matador attacks on Chicana, before just rushing past him to double hammer fist Lucero off the ropes to the floor, just swinging that Mexican Polish Hammer into his chest. His misdirections to throw off Lucero's timing are wildly entertaining. I enjoyed old conceited Rayo but whenever I see the stop-start routines done in younger Rayo speed it feels like some of the best lucha trickster work we have. La Fiera was also a standout, because early 90s Fiera is always going to be a standout, and here he was especially gifted at making 1992 Ultimo Dragon's offense sing. Great pairing, an accompanist who knew how to make a guy feel like a star.  

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New Footage Friday: LASARTESSE! VAN BUYTEN! AMERICAN ALPHA! REVIVAL! CAIFAN! HECHICERO!

Rene Lasartesse/ Double Trouble vs. Franz Van Buyten/Scott Casey/Boston Blackie CWA 1992

PAS: Lasartesse vs. Van Buyten is an all time legendary feud and this maybe one of their last matches opposite each other. This is a really fun house show style six man tag. Van Buyten kind of reminds me of the Bullet as he has some really fun old man dancing, monkey flipping and armdragging. Lasartesse struts around the ring like a total dipshit and stooges great. Really enjoyed Double Trouble, they were a totally ok roidy tag team, sort of a heel High Voltage and they should have had a solid WCW Pro run. They even hit an assisted flip senton, which is a pretty big highspot in 1992. Lots of jazz and misdirection and hot tags, exactly the way you want to see legends showcased in their declining years.

MD: Watching this, I'm not sure what I'd rather see, late 92 Lasartesse vs Lawler, with both of them letting every little moment sink in or 92 van Buyten doing that headscissors (or step over) counter to the armlock vs old man Nick Bockwinkel. We've hit a point where we've seen that counter so many times that it doesn't quite have the same zing it did before, but if it was really so commonplace, why aren't people using it in matches today? Anyway, this was a tale of two matches. About midway through, with a lot of heat and antics, Van Buyten (who had played FIP very well for a lot of the first ten minutes, so well that the camera angle/video quality really wasn't a problem at all) and Lasartesse (who had played a chickenshit old heel during that time) both got tossed and it settled down into a 2 on 2 with Casey as FIP. It was still perfectly fine, with everyone playing their roles well, but we were here for the old guys so it was a shame to see them gone. It built to a pretty amusing spot with one Trouble tied up and the second one used as a battering ram, before the heels overdid it and everything got thrown out.

ER: When I saw the name Double Trouble I thought we were getting the two big fatties who worked WWF house shows in exchange for selling the Undertaker name rights. That said, I really liked them and yes they definitely seem like a team that should have showed up somewhere. They broke out fistdrops and flying headbutts and high legdrops, each took big bumps over the top to the floor, an unexpected Drive-By, set up a great spot where one of them got tied in the ropes and the other gets rammed HARD into his gut battering ram style and yeah these are probably the actual better Double Trouble team. I liked how the first half played as the old man Van Buyten vs. Lasartesse showdown, and the second half was our Double Trouble showcase (or at least a showcase for me). Van Buyten was still super spry in his early 50s and his early headscissors is downright majestic. Van Buyten had wonderful babyface energy and I adored all the mincing and posturing from Lasartesse, the whole thing was satisfying.

Caifan Rockero vs. Hechicero Poder y Honor 1/31/09

PAS: This is the earliest Hechicero match we have on video and we get to see him against probably his greatest rival in Caifan. This was really a treat, you could tell that they had kind of a touring match worked out, and this had all of the little beats you want from these two.  They had an opening llave section with a lot of very cool twisting leg locks, the rolling leglock submissions is a Hechicero trademark, and he breaks out a bunch of cool ones here. It build to a bigger near fall section with some cool arm trap slams, a big armlock triangle submission near fall by Hechicero and a nifty top rope springboard rana by Caifan. You could see that both guys hadn't fully developed their personas yet, there was a lot of mirroring that was cool, but didn't allow then to differentiate themselves, the way they would in later matches. It felt like what it was, two super talented young guys in a garage figuring their stuff out, our boy Rob Bihari dug this one out of his crate and it was really cool to see.

MD: This is a great little piece of history and I'm glad Rob posted it. We don't have a ton of pre-2010 Hechicero online. I wrote up their 2010 match almost five years ago when I was still figuring out lucha. That was a hair vs mask match with more intensity. This had a very different feel given the sparse crowd. Hechicero didn't forget they were there certainly, but this did feel a bit like a match in a bubble or an exhibition. They had all the time in the world and a thousand things to try. It made for one tricked out hold or interesting spot after the next. I think I preferred it once they picked up the pace because they were more actively trying to foil and counter each other there. Honestly, I think my favorite thing in the whole match was Hechicero feigning not knowing that Caifan had landed on the apron after getting hoisted over the top so that he could try to launch a sneak attack. It failed, of course, letting Caifan fly in, but the set up with Hechicero tapping his head and really milking it before going for the sneak attack turned a normal spot into something with extra wrinkles just like one of his tricked out submissions.

24. American Alpha vs. The Revival WWE 4/23/16

MD: It's a little bit hard to remember just how special those first run of NXT house shows were. They didn't get around to my part of the country until Fall of 2016, and by then, a lot of the match-ups and moments I had wanted to see before had been cycled out. Top of the list was probably American Alpha vs Revival. We obviously have a number of big matches between them, southern tags turned up to 11 style, but it's nice to see one on a smaller stage.

The first fall was basically all shine, super athletic with well coordinated, complex spots and reversals, with AA looking world class and Revival being just competitive enough to make it seem like Alpha earned it. There was a transition tease at the end (with Dawson swatting down Wilder's feet from the apron to prevent a German) which really stood out.

The transition was also the end of the second fall, a set up for a shatter effect so elaborate that it could have served as a finish in and of itself. The structure of 2/3 falls tags is always interesting to look at. We have so many from Portland specifically that there are great examples. I think my ideal is when the heels takeover at the end of the first fall and the babyfaces come back at the end of the second, with a reset and second bit of heat into the third, but having an extended shine through most of the first two falls and lean into the heat for the third was a fun (and very WWF/E) house show variation here. Alpha has enough stuff and Revival stooges well enough that it worked. There were a lot of little things to like too. Dash is underrated at working the apron. Dawson doing a twenty second set up for a slingshot suplex in 2016 is how you make a move matter. I don't care whether they were just playing along or not, the fan reaction to the ref missing the tag was just what you wanted, as was the Gable chant that followed and the pop for Jordan pulling down the strap (even if maybe you wanted a bit more for the actual hot tag pop). The crowd knew that what they were getting was special and unique. Glad it popped up now.

PAS:  This was a lot of fun, I could totally see going to an NXT house show and just being engrossed with what they were doing. I was really impressed by Jason Jordan in this match, what a bummer the ending of his career ended up being. He was totally explosive, almost like Doug Furnas with better amateur takedowns, some of the better popped hips on suplexes, a total treat to watch. The Revival have their shtick down, and are really good at filling time, which is a real skill for a heel tag team in a southern tag style.

ER: I have been to three NXT house shows and all of them have been great experiences, real high bang for my buck while being set in nice smaller venues (including a gorgeous old rock venue in the middle of downtown Sacramento). By the time I got to see my first NXT house show in 2016, neither of these teams was on the tour, and this match was better than any match I saw across three shows (with a War Raiders vs. Strong/O'Reilly match from 2018 being the closest competition). This felt like an actually fleshed out (and better) version of the fondly remembered Brain Busters/Rockers tags from 30 years earlier, without ever feeling like they were aping those matches. AA just felt like such a timeless classic babyface team, a team who moved so explosively that it felt like they could be responsible for getting casual fans excited about high dropkicks and tight armdrags and classic Morton/Jannetty style headscissors (that Gable himself doesn't even do anymore). Both of them - especially Jordan - had such pop in everything they did, and this is the kind of go go go I wish had caught on as a house style instead of the learned behavior horseshit we got instead. Gable was charismatic as hell, loved him hitting an axehandle off the middle rope on Dawson, rolling through and coming up swinging at Dawson on the other side of the ring; also loved him hitting a second headscissors on Dawson right near the opposite side of the ring and pointing at Wilder on the apron while before taking Dawson over. It was like he was waving to his buddy from the top of a rollercoaster. Both teams spent their time in control wisely, and Revival particularly feel like a team that can work an interesting 5 minute or 45 minute tag match on any given night. Down the stretch we even get a perfectly timed moment of Jordan finally getting a hot tag only for the ref to send him back to the apron and admonish him for not using the tag rope. This was such a good tag, and it felt like they had material they hadn't even worked through yet. These teams worked a ton of matches throughout the Carolinas, I have no doubt that all of them ruled.


2016 MOTY MASTER LIST

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2019 Ongoing MOTY List: Ultimo vs. Caifan CABELLERA CONTRA CABELLERA

22. Ultimo Guerrero vs. Caifan XMW 3/2

PAS: This was a hair match and another chapter of the inexplicable UG indy run. This one wasn't the blood fest their early match was, but UG still took a pretty big beating, getting smashed with crutch, tossed into chairs, hit with full cups of beer. Caifan took a thumping too, including eating a baseball slide on the apron which sent him crashing to the floor and may have opened up the back of his head (you couldn't see anything, but the ref was checking it good). Really good near falls in this and UG's final submission was nasty. Great little two match feud between these guys, and Caifan is pretty consistently a must watch.

ER: UG the indy monster is back in San Juan Pantitlan again, showing those fine folks what a beating his head and face can take the smaller the crowd is. Small arena UG + stips match Caifan and you knew this would be good. I think hair match and I think blood, and while this didn't have that, it did have a ton of mean spills and Caifan taking his future loss out on UG's face. UG taking a beating around ringside is one of the more sympathetic tecnico things in modern lucha, as he is really able to portray that Blue Panther old man sympathy in these moments, really tapping into a guy too old for this shit, as he takes several headers into old as hard seats, absolutely cruel overhand chops to the face and chest, and punches right to the chin. He gets so much sympathy from me during these beatings that I just find myself sitting here saying "WHY?" But his comebacks always deliver and the baseball slide dropkick was an awesome moment, and I love how they treated it like a huge potential stoppage, really made the move feel like a huge deal. UG's running hip attack looks cool when he's jumping barriers, but HERE it looks its best ever as he literally hip attacks Caifan directly through the back of a chair, looked like a comic book where someone gets thrown against a wall and the wall cracks behind them. The reversals in the ring were hard fought and added extra excitement to the big nearfall spots (loved the fight that ended with a dangerous rana off the middle rope from Caifan, with him maneuvering around UG's shoulders and looking like he was going to take a lethal powerbomb). They kept up their violent pace well, and this kept paying off.


2019 MOTY MASTER LIST

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WWCI Arena San Juan Pantitlan 2/16/19

Another week, another cool looking Indy Lucha show put up by Lucha TV. Grabbed what looked cool to review

Demus vs. Bam Bam

PAS: Bam Bam was a mainstay of the CMLL minis division, but seemed to disappear around 2014. Demus welcomes him to the indies with a classic Demus bloodletting. Bam Bam comes in with Demus style face paint on and Demus tries to wash it off using Bam Bam's blood. Lots of great looking brawling from both guys. Bam Bam hits a great looking tope early, but when he goes for it again, Demus steps aside and flings him head first into some ratty looking chairs. It is a crazy bump and a great way to finish a match. Demus brawls are one of the most fun things in wrestling and welcome back Bam Bam.

ER: Bam Bam was out! He was done! So, welcome back to wrestling Bam Bam, and if you're curious, here's what a bunch of your blood looks like! I loved these two feuding a decade ago, would love to see them feuding right now. Bam Bam is a little chunkier, but that's probably because he was told that people love bleeding chunky luchadors, so he probably took a few years off to get that proper size. The weight doesn't appear to slow him down a lot, his rope running was still whip fast and he hits a tope in the first minute of the match that looks as good as his topes looked a decade ago. Demus won't stand for that, naturally, so proceeds to bust Bam Bam wide open. And it's one of those really great lucha bloodlettings where Bam Bam's face and torso get covered in dark red and you realize Bam Bam is a lunatic who must have wanted this! The finish is incredible, truly a finish worth of a count out victory: We get a scene very similar to the beginning of the match, a Bam Bam feint sends Demus to the floor, tope clearly coming...and Demus steps aside and helps Bam Bam find the front row of painful chairs instead. This needs to be run back all throughout 2019.

Impulso/Drako vs. Fly Star/Toscano

PAS: Three young indy guys and Toscano (the former Tarzan Boy) put on a shortish spotfest. I don't think I have seen Drako before, and I am always going to enjoy a fat guy who wrestles fat. He had a nice tackle, a baseball slide splash to the floor and a stiff powerbomb. Fly Star and Impulso are clearly setting something up, and they try some complex spots, some of which they pull off. The finish was true young guy dippshittery with Fly Star hitting a running electric chair headrop right into the corner, really looked like the kind of thing a backyard wrestler might break a cervical vertebrae with. I think we get hair challenges post match, which makes total sense, I would want to shave a guy bald if he tried to break my neck like that.

Caifan vs. Ultimo Guerrero

PAS: Ultimo Guerrero is one of the five biggest stars in one of the biggest promotions in the world, and for some reason he will show up in a tiny filthy arena to cut him self open and leak all over the ring. I am as captivated by indy brawl Guerrero as I am bored by CMLL main eventer Guerrero. Caifan is a great, great wrestler who never got a break, and he jumps Ultimo and posts him, and 90 seconds into the match Guerrero is dripping. Caifan whoops him all around the ring, including chucking a bunch of beers into his bloody head. Guerrero comes back, opens up Caifan and they just exchange big shots on the floor. This goes about 10 minutes and maybe 90 seconds are in the ring. Finish was kind of a lame low blow DQ, and they set up a hair match on the next show (third hair challenge on this show but they are doing this one.) They sold me.

ER: I loved this! UG is such a bizarre and fascinating glutton for this kind of a dirty gritty small crowd arena brawl, here he is leaving blood souvenirs on chairs and bystanders and merch all over Arena San Juan Pantitlan, beaten bloody and bumping hard on a ring that doesn't move an inch. I don't know what his deal is, but it's weird how my eyeballs glaze over his CMLL matches at this point and yet actively seek his indy work. It would be like if Dean Ambrose were currently working his typical fast forwardable Raw matches, but also bloody brawls from random VFWs near wherever Raw was taped. It makes no sense. Caifan is really great. He's someone who knows just how well to set up UG's trademark offense, while also knowing when to step in and bop him on the nose. And a LOT of the early part of this is nose bopping. I might have to break the stopwatch out to see who started bleeding earlier, UG or Bam Bam, but we're the winners in that race. UG gets smashed around ringside, Caifan is really mean about sending him tumbling and then running after him with a hard kick before UG can regain his bearings, and we get all time great brawl violence like Caifan wrapping UG's head in a banner and then punching his face through the banner. I love Caifan's hockey fight style of lucha. Ultimo's comeback on the floor is great, shoving through fans, grabbing drinks to bounce off Caifan's head, doing his flying hip attack into Caifan who was also sitting on a fan (and that fan went wandering off after being on the bottom of that pile making that teeth sucking face of someone who accidentally opened a car door into their own balls); at one point Ultimo is slamming Caifan's head repeatedly into some chairs and right behind them you can see 4 or 5 young boys just staring at these bloody lunatics in awe, not knowing how to react to the violence right in front of them. I like how Caifan handles a couple signature UG spots, namely how he ran headlong into eating a front suplex off the middle ropes (onto that damn hard ring). We've all seen UG just climb the ropes with his opponent on the way to doing that move, so it's cool that instead we get Caifan setting UG up for something and then getting grabbed on the run. Big ball shot finish works for something like this, and honestly with how much they killed each other here I have no clue what they're going to do in their hair match to top it...but I can't wait to see them try.


2019 MOTY MASTER LIST

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2017 Ongoing MOTY List: Niebla v. Caifan

27. Caifan v. Mr. Niebla Lucha Memes 11/20

PAS: Talk about an out of nowhere gem! Niebla has spent the last 20 or so years, drunk and fat and coasting on comedy spots, Caifan comes out as says "fuck that we are spilling blood" and we get a great grimey Arena Naculpan bloody brawl. Caifan rips Niebla's mask and cuts him, smashing him with chairs, a case of beer and some great knuckle punches to the wound. At one point he even uses Niebla's blood as face paint. Niebla gets a great comeback, opening up Caifan with a chair shot and a box, and even hits a great fat boy tope. I also loved Niebla using his Pesta Negra dance moves and loogie spot as a Dusty style dancing babyface comeback.  Loved every second of this, and on paper this would have totally been a skipper.

ER: I think the last Niebla match I actually wrote up and recommended was from early 2016, and that was a 4 minute tournament lucha match. Now, it was a really fun tournament lucha match that I think would be a legendary WCW WorldWide match, but that's still a rough recent track record. And here, suddenly many of the things that make Niebla FF material in 2017 work to his benefit. He's not hammy, he's fat and vulnerable, and Caifan jumps on him and acts like a total prick for the first half of this. He jumps Niebla at the bell and violently rips his mask, and a violent mask rip always looks great and makes me cringe. My neck can ache if I hold a phone awkwardly or sleep weird, so picturing my head and body being yanked around by something I'm wearing on my face, and not just wearing but using my neck and arm muscles to try to keep it on my face, just makes me hurt. Caifan has his hands taped up with white tape, so you know you're gonna see Niebla bleed, and he bleeds, and Caifan continues beating on him, bashing him with those hard Naucalpan chairs, braining him with a wood crate holding empty beer bottles (with a great glass clank as it hits Niebla's head), and back in the ring Niebla gets his head smashed through an empty wood crate. Caifan is a royal jerk dragging Niebla around, painting with his blood, and for the first time in ages (ever?) I found myself really really rooting for a Niebla comeback. And it was a good old fat man comeback. He pops Caifan with his big swinging left, lures him into dropkicking the ref, lures him into wrapping himself around the ringpost, and then follows up with a great middle aged fat guy dive that sends Caifan into the front row near a guy holding a baby. We get a great bloody standoff in the ring with Caifan making these bloody tear facials, all that early match confidence gone. And, miracle of miracles, for the first time ever I totally loved Niebla's hip wiggling loogie spitting comeback, treated here like Lawler dropping the strap or Popeye downing a can of spinach. What a total surprise, what a total treat. Shock gem of the year.


2017 MOTY MASTER LIST

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Black Terry Ordered the Jugs Filled With Water

Black Terry v. Wotan v. Canis Lupus v. Caifan Titanes Del Ring 10/30/16 - GREAT

PAS: Wotan and Terry had a stone cold classic earlier in the year, this wasn't that, but it had it's moments. Wotan and Terry didn't square off as much as I hoped they would, but I liked the Wotan v. Lupus sections, both guys bleed a ton and really wailed on each other. Terry matched up with Caifan and it was pretty great including old man Terry taking a case of beer bottles to the side of the head. There wasn't a ton of structure, but a lot of wildness. Finish pulled it down a bit as they did a weak double elimination on Terry and Caifan and then a low blow ref distraction pin. Felt a little house showish, but I enjoyed a bunch of the performances.

COMPLETE AND ACCURATE BLACK TERRY

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Lucha Memes 12/25/15 Review

Lucha Memes is one of the super indies which have shown up in Mexico lately booking matches out of my brain. A lot of the time they don't live up to the on paper possibility, but always worth checking out. 

Alas de Acero, Aramis, Iron Kid y Demasiado vs Suicida, Freelance, Súper Mega y Séptimo Rayo

PAS: This is a spotfest opener, with a mix of cool and blown spots. Suicida and Freelance are always a welcome sight and they break out the two coolest dives of the match with Suicida going horizontal on a tope and Freelance getting thrown to the celling by his partner in a tope con hilo. There was some pretty bad construction Ric Blade stuff with chairs for the finish, much more of a chance to see some fun guys then a good match

Arez, Impulso y Belial vs Decnnis, Toscano y Zumbido


PAS: This a vetrans vs. young hot shot luchadores Indystrongtibles. The young guys have some fun spots, and I enjoy Zumbido, but parts of this were pretty bad. Toscano especially was clearly just mailing this whole thing in. Not enough good to recommend, most time your veterans work hard on these indy shows, not here.

ER: This wasn't good, but I did think Zumbido was actually really good in this. Not good enough to lift up 5 other guys, but his stuff looked like Zumbido's stuff, which is good. Loved him leaning jaw first into a Belial superkick, taking his huge flip bump to the floor, dragging a guy to the apron to paste him with a DDT. I thought he was a bright spot. Skip to those spots. 

Negro Navarro vs Virus

PAS: Maestro match of the year, and just beautiful grappling. No catch and release stuff, all nasty twists and counters. Both guys are like a pair of jazz masters just riffing, Navarro tries an attack, Virus comes up with a trippy way to get out, and Navarro counters his counter. Virus does this awesome thing where he is stuck in a submission and he just shifts his weight around until he finds a weak spot in the submission. Lesser mat workers will just go from hold to hold, you get to see Virus show his work. Navarro is especially great at setting up a submission and have an extra crank, he gets everything lined up and then BOOM here comes a quick extra violent twist. I loved this so much, it is a match up I dreamed about for years and it has always lived up to expectations. 

ER: This was just constant, and so damn impressive. Phil mentions most guys going hold to hold, and it's totally true. Submission, break, start over. Submission, let other guy go, start over. The stuff is impressive, but never advances things. This is constant advancement. There's a rope break and a truce off of it, but most of it is just two men wanting to roll and wanting to beat the other without strikes. It's a benefit of a una caida match, although most una caida matches are just worked like shorter, lesser matches. I can't fathom some of the predicaments each man ends up in during this match, even though they pretty clearly intentionally get into those positions. The foresight is incredible. Navarro on his back with Virus standing, Virus appears to be stepping around to get in the mount, but instead he's just slyly hooking Navarro's leg with his own leg, then dropping down and falling to his left, the momentum naturally rolling Navarro up a bit, as Virus is already focused on clamping down his leg at the knee over Navarro's leg. It's smooth, fast beautiful and the match is full of little things like that. No robotics, just too experts with incredible instincts who make this kind of stuff look easy. We know it's not easy, but you'd never know watching these two. Also let's give a shout out to the awesome ref in cool glasses, bowtie and short sleeve pink shirt. That man is almost distractingly cool. 


Dalys vs Keira


PAS: This was pretty bad, Dalys was a last minute replacement for Marcela and that would have work a lot better as Dalys can't do this kind of workrate joshi luchadora match at all. She is pretty Sexy Starish here, the rollup section early looked totally amateurish. She works kind of stiff but that is her only positive. Double pin finish just adds to the turd sandwich. 

Dr. Cerebro vs Negro Casas

PAS: What we got of this was pretty great, Casas is a wrestling genius and Cerebro is one of the more underrated guys in wrestling history. There was a great strike exchange with both guys laying into each other and doing a great job of selling each shot, Casas especially can write a novel with every expression. Still this goes 5 minutes, which is barely enough for a first fall, much less an entire match. I have no idea why you book this and give it such short shrift. Negro Casas is at the show, you booked a cool first time match, let him do his thing.

ER: I've always been curious about how things like this happen. I don't know how lucha payouts work, but I have to imagine Casas can demand more than your average luchador. So how does this happen? There are a few scenarios, so we can figure out which is the most likely: 1) Casas calls up and says "Hey I'm gonna be in Naucalpan, any room for me to pop in and work a really short match? I won't charge much." 2) Booker in the back says "Alright boys, go out and give me 4 minutes, and NOTHING MORE." 3) Both men just happen to work a short match, get into a shouting match with booker in the back who expected them to go longer. 4) Potentially all three of those things. 


Trauma I y Trauma II vs Black Terry y Negro Navarro

PAS: These two teams had one of my favorite matches of the decade in 2011 and this match hits a lot of the same beats. The match starts with cool mat sections between II and Terry and I and Navarro. Navarro and I were doing some catch and release stuff which I don't usually love, but works fine with a son trying to upstage his father. Navarro ends one mat section with a little tap on the head, and T1 responds with a nasty slap to Pops ear. This causes Navarro to do this great semi concussed selling, and it gets nasty from there with both sons trying to take out their father and their dad's old drinking buddy. Both oldsters are great brawlers, and there is a point where Terry has II in a full mount and is just punching him right in the jaw. I admit it is a little unnerving to see Trauma II slap someone he loves, but I suppose I should divorce art from the news. Finish kept this a bit below the 2011 classic as Navarro gets eliminated and it comes down to Terry v. both Traumas, considering the whole story was patricide, it is off to have Terry be the last man standing. Still Terry is a great last man standing as he opens up his own forehead with a headbutt before succumbing to the spinning figure four.

ER: Weird, cool match that had strange undercurrents to it. I was not expecting that slap to Navarro, and Navarro either did one of the all time great sells or he wasn't much expecting it either. Navarro acted kind funny and bell rung the rest of the match so who the hell knows. But things clearly changed after that. Now Navarro did work a tough match earlier in the night so maybe he just needed a reason to sit out a bit, but I bought it no matter how odd it was. From there the structure was odd, as instead of matwork gamesmanship, with guys working holds and then letting the other guy go, you had brawling gamesmanship. Terry would come in, slap around Trauma I for a bit, then let up. Then Trauma II would come in, slap Terry around a bit, then let up. I thought Terry looked great throughout this and drove the story along with his facials, and then doing his own amazing selling. Him dropping to his knees after a strike exchange reminded me of Lawler/Dundee. Loved him holding onto the headlock a couple times with Trauma trying to push him off, with Terry hitting the breaks and dropping down to the mat. I love headlock spots where the guy holds on. And those mounted punches to Trauma II were some of the nastiest strikes I've seen this decade. Terry might still be the best damn brawler in the game, which is crazy considering he's the age of my father. The two of them each have similar mustaches, one of them is the arguable best brawler in wrestling, the other is thinking of how best to retire from his dentistry practice. So we had a weird match, not the match I was expecting, but a match with tons of nasty charm. 

Atlantis vs Caifán

PAS: This match is a real example of the value of blood. Atlantis is a wrestler who at his prime was a graceful athlete, he has lost almost all of that (there is a bodypress in this match which is really bad), but still has great timing and a sense of a match. Caifan goes ahead and sprays blood out of his head and bumps into the crowd and tries really hard to make this memorable. Don't know he completely succeeds, but I mostly enjoyed it.


***Navarro/Virus was awesome and was an easy addition to our 2015 Ongoing MOTY List***

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MLJ: Chilanga Mask X-Mas in August 4: Caifan/Avisman vs Ultimo Guerrero/Hechicero

2015-08-16 @ Arena Naucalpan
Caifan/Avisman vs Ultimo Guerrero/Hechicero
Match starts 2:13:13

I'm really high on this match too. I don't think it's as good as the Virus/Cerebro match, but it's one of the most fun tag team matches I've seen in ages. Avisman brought it down a bit in general. Maybe he was more constrained in the Virus match I've seen him in previously, but he didn't look nearly as strong here as he did there. The other three were really on their game though. Indy Ultimo Guerrero is the second best Ultimo Guerrero (the first being Bandit King Apuestas Match Ultimo Guerrero).

I really liked how this was structured, and while a lot of the individual exchanges and spots and character stuff was good, that's what I'm going to focus on. I don't watch a lot of single-fall lucha, as a rule (not counting lightning matches/tournament lucha) but this match was very regimented in its different segments, and I thought that let it tell a very compelling story. Everything fit, even as if it would have been a three fall match. That could be what UG is used to, but it really showed you can let things breathe and have that sort of structure even in a one fall match and still have it seem natural.

Let me break it down. then. The match started with Guerrero vs Avisman with solid matwork. On another card, it might even stand out a bit, but here it was just solid. Guerrero showed more than he usually does in his home promotion, and Avisman was fine countering. They then moved onto Caifan and Hechicero, two guys who are so used to working with each other over the years, and it showed. High end stuff here, Hechicero wasn't playing heavy rudo, more of a cocky one, with good sportsmanship here. Lots of little leverage tricks building to trading suplexes and push ups, with Hechicero catching Caifan celebrating and Caifan coming back with one of the best headlock takeovers you'll see this year. Total one-upsmanship with moves traded, but it's early in the match that it really worked. So, two initial exchanges, one involving feeling out and the next involving one-upsmanship.

Finally, Caifan walked right over and smacked Guerrero on the apron and we had a funny moment of UG taking Hechicero's hand and coaxing him out so that he could get in and go after Caifan. They picked up the pace momentarily until UG sent Caifan out. He pulled Hechicero back in and they started doubleteaming, including a corner set up for the senton de la muerte. This is pretty much where a fall would come in a normal 2/3 falls match. Then we'd get the continued beatdown until the comeback, which is exactly what we do get. The rudos (and we'll keep calling Hechicero and Guerrero the rudos here even if it doesn't feel that clear cut) kept playing the numbers game. It wasn't all smooth and perfect but it was effective.

Unfortunately, the comeback spot wasn't so smooth with Caifan and Hechicero mistiming a lift up dodge in the corner. They recovered quickly into rudo miscommunication and a really strange double tope spot where Avisman took out Hechicero but Guerrero just moved out of the way letting Caifan wipe out. That led to some awkward chops back and forth, a reset into the ring, UG bumping out, Caifan following only to get tossed over the rail and the UG flying hip attack into the crowd. Fun stuff that let things switch over to Avisman vs Hechicero, with Avisman flying around a bit and getting the advantage. So to sum up again, we've got Feeling out, one-upsmanship, rudo beatdown, tecnico comeback, high flying tecnico shine.

Next is a reset to Caifan and UG and they start hitting bombs, including the goardbuster off the top, a great super bomb, and an armdrag off the top. All of these led to two counts and I would have liked them to have made use of the tag nature of the match and done some partner break-ups here instead of straight kick outs. That's my only real complaint though. After the bombs, we moved onto a lot of near-fall pin attempts by Avisman and Hechicero. We were into the finishing stretch now, the bombs starting that, and out of all the pins, Hechicero was able to lock in a rolling leg submission to take out Avisman. Caifan came in and he's worked this whole match very deliberately and just milked things in a good way. An exchange with Hechicero, worked just that way, led to a top rope rana and the pin. Guerrero came in for the final face off, which had a few near-falls, a big move or two, and ultimately, Caifan going for a desperate moonsault only to get knocked onto the top rope for the world's nastiest Guerrero Special.

There were a few rough patches, but everything felt like it was exactly where it should have been and to me, that made for a really fun match. It was just an example of what honed, meticulous lucha can be, the developed form executed by luchadores who do interesting things within it. Very fun match. Caifan is a guy who I think probably deserves more than what he has and I'd watch a Hechicero/Guerrero team any day. Fourth good match on a stacked show. I envy the people who were there live for it.

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2014 Ongoing Match of the Year List

66. Rey Hechicero v. Caifan 7/5



PAS: Hechicero is a master, we have gotten to see him work on the big stage in shorter matches, so it is a treat to see him in a garage work a longer crazier match. This was against his long time Monterey opponent and tag partner, and was kind of the equivalent of Dean Ambrose going back and working a crazy match with Sami Callihan in IWA-MS. The mat work here was awesome lots of cool twisty counters and takedowns that had real violence to them, every leg lock looked like it was going to rip out a knee, every takedown looked like it was going tear out a shoulder. The finish run was a little indy, but Hechicero smashing a plastic chair with a powerbomb, and the finishing armbar were pretty spectacular. Great match, so happy this showed up.

ER: This match had a pretty difficult task, which was filling 33 minutes of time with no real rest or breaks, and it did that admirably. 30+ minute, una caida lucha matches are pretty rare. Normally you get the breaks in between falls to kind of reset things, but these guys really just go go go for the duration. It's pretty impressive. At times it did give the match a kind of aimless feel, not quite filling time, but more that there was no real ebb and flow, not always rhyme or reason for the comebacks or dominance transitions. But this was quite a nice little feather for Hechicero. He plays into Caifan perfectly and finds plausible ways to deal with some of his stumbles. Caifan takes far to long to get Hechicero into a pendulum? Hechicero bides his time, waits for it to be locked on, and then immediately grapevines a leg, hooks Caifan's arm and reverses things. Caifan taking a bit too long to do a rope walk rana? Hechicero busies himself with his own hubris. Hechicero's subtle hubris led to some logical Caifan comebacks throughout this, with Hechicero easily having the upper hand, but waving Caifan to keep going, to come at him. I really loved all of the submissions throughout this, especially the first 8 minutes. Hechicero really gets to show off his full arsenal of subs and I get the feeling he could have kept going. Caifan eventually brings strikes, using some Moe Howard type stuff, like grabbing Hechicero's nose and smacking downward. The powerbomb tease was awesome as there was no way I thought Hechicero would take a powerbomb on the floor, and he made the struggle look sooo great, really clutching those ropes and hugging them tight. When Caifan finally broke him free and planted him through a chintzy plastic chair it felt like he had just plain worn him out. Good match that never lagged, impressive with what they had to fill. The referee had the worst pants.


2014 MOTY MASTER LIST

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MLJ: Hechicero Spotlight 7: Blue Panther, Diluvio Negro II, Último Guerrero vs Caifan, LA Park, Rey Hechicero

Taped 2013-05-05 @ Arena Coliseo Monterrey
Blue Panther, Diluvio Negro II, Último Guerrero vs Caifan, LA Park, Rey Hechicero

I've seen a decent amount of Hechicero now. This is the seventh match in this mini project, and the only verdict I can safely come up with from what I've seen is that he just didn't have the total package even as late as mid 2013. I don't know what it was, whether he just flourished as being the foundation for all of the younger wrestlers around him in the Busca or if working a slightly higher level of workers in front of bigger crowds week in and week out made a difference or even if being in CMLL proper means you have more "agents" editing your match or what. I don't know enough about how lucha works in that regard, but I do know he needed that editing and it seems like he's gotten it.

There are glorious messes and then there was this match: it wasn't even glorious. If I was CMLL and had watched this, I'd slap a mask on Caifan and pass him off as a rookie instead. I am partial to Ultimo Guerrero but he's a ham when he gets the chance to be. Sometimes that makes for an entertaining match. Here it was just a mess. Parka's even more of one and less likely to have a great match because of it. Panther is one of the greatest stabilizing forces in the known world and he was lost to the tide of this disaster. It was nice to see him work rudo again and to see him work rudo alongside of UG (and against Parka and Hechicero) but there was just nothing there.

This started with Parka Jr. getting a beating from Ultimo Guerrero and ended with ref chicanery, Parka, Jr. returning to foul UG and a bunch of challenges. In the middle was some weapons shots from the ringside furniture and Parka's belt, about seventy two flubbed spots (plenty by both Panther and Hechicero which was just disheartening) and more heel ref bs than you could imagine (unless you've watched a bunch of Park matches. Then you probably could imagine plenty.) The height of payoff in this match was the ref getting nailed. I'm not even taking a gif though Park raising up one weapon and then the other so the crowd could decide was pretty funny.

It doesn't mean there weren't high points. The match was a mess but it was a fun mess at times. Hechicero did the coolest tecnico thing I've ever seen him do, catching the ropes on a Hamrick bump and skinning the cat over to hit a headscissors takedown.

Or there was the Parka/UG bullfighter spots. You know, fun stuff, if not groundbreaking.

And this sequence which sums up everything about the match. A nasty shot, the ref going crazy, Parka doing something insane off the ropes and then making poor decisions with whatever was supposed to come next. So many poor decisions.

Some matches need an editor. This needed an editor's guild. What a mess. Caifan looked good though!

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MLJ: Hechicero Spotlight 6: Blue Panther & Sagrado vs Caifan & Rey Hechicero

2013-04-14 @ Arena Coliseo Monterrey
Blue Panther & Sagrado vs Caifan & Rey Hechicero

I'm going off schedule with Hechicero. I had meant to watch the one last match we have (from Poder y Honor in the Monterrey Kids' Arena) from 2012 and call it, but that was a handheld from an annoying angle, and more importantly, clipped, and I've decided to move on to a couple of key 2013 matches instead. The main reason why is that I'm not satisfied that even after a number of years on the indies, I've seen the full product of Hechicero that we have now. We've gotten closer with every match but I just don't think we're there yet. Add in the fact that there are a few interesting looking matches from 2013 that I bet a lot of people just haven't seen, and I'm going to ride this out for a few more weeks.

I think I've only seen Sagrado once, back during the Cavernario Spotlight, so I don't have a great sense of him. I know Eric's certainly not high on him, and that's damning in and of itself. I would have probably rather have someone else from CMLL in here. Caifan, on the other hand, can hold his own in a setting like this. It's tecnicos vs tecnicos from what I can tell (Caifan may have been rudo but he didn't wrestle that way; lots of handshakes, etc), with Panther and Sagrado marketed as CMLL and Hechicero and Caifan as reglos.

This was a fun one. The story here was the actual exchanges and getting to see these indy guys of relatively lengthy experience go up against CMLL regulars, but it was the structure that I really dug. It had more time to breathe than a lot of TV matches and was very regimented. Caifan won the rock/paper/scissors to start so he had a matwork exchange with Panther. Then Sagrado and Hechicero got to have theirs. Then, still in the primera, we had the first rope running/pace-picking-up exchange between Panther and Caifan, which lead to things breaking down and BP and Sagrado taking the fall. When they reset to start the segunda, it was with the Hechicero and Sagrado pace-picking-up exchange, then the second one of Caifan and Panther, and finally the second of Hechicero and Sagrado to end the fall. Finally, in the Tercera, Panther calls for Hechicero and they break from the structure, the two of them going at it until Sagrado interrupts, which ends the tecnico lovefest and allows for a series of partner break-ups as they head to the finish. It all made for a great and disciplined sense of build, especially effective since it ended in a double-pin draw.

The Panther/Caifan interactions were better than the Hechicero/Sagrado ones. I can say that pretty definitively. The level of difficulty for Hechicero's stuff was certainly higher. He did a lot of his more complex holds and submissions, but Sagrado's escapes were lackluster, to say the least, and the smoothness of Panther and Caifan's struggle stood out much more. I do think that we had a more complete Hechicero here, but he still needs a dance partner that can handle the complexity of what he brings to the table, and Sagrado wasn't it. Panther's just so good at the little things; one example is how he was tossed into the bottom two ropes by Caifan (on a fun corner headstand headscissors) and as Caifan charged in, he immediately shifted his body around and got his feet up defensively to stop the charge. Also, neither here nor there, but Caifan's one arm over the head suplex with a bridge is awesome.

What i really wanted out of this match was Panther vs Hechicero and I didn't get a ton of it, but I enjoyed most of what I did get and there are still a bunch of interesting matches to come for the year (a trios with Ultimo Guerrero and Blue Panther on one side and Hechicero teaming with Caifan and LA Park and two singles matches with Lucero), so we'll try to finish this spotlight strong.

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MLJ: Hechicero Spotlight 3: Rey Hechicero vs Caifan Rockero I [mask vs hair]

Taped 2010-03-21 @ Gimnasio Nuevo León
Rey Hechicero vs Caifan Rockero I [mask vs hair]

7:51 in

Back to regularly scheduled programming. The plan for the Hechicero matches was to watch what we had easily available, two from 08, one from 09, one from 2010, one from 2011, and one from 2012. Looking at those, however, a big glaring miss was this hair vs hair match from 2010. It was listed as having been taped but wasn't online (or was but had been taken down). Obviously, if you're going to take a look at someone's early career, having an apuestas match is a great part of the equation. Thankfully, our community is great and my friend Mark sent out a call and TKD answered with the links to the match. So thank you to both.

I am skipping a Gato Fantasma, Silver Star, Tigre Universitario vs Diluvio Negro I, Diluvio Negro II, Rey Hechicero match from 2009 because I couldn't really get my bearings on that. Apologies to anyone who actually enjoys reading me fumbling about lost on a match. Here's the link for it if you want to see it:

http://youtu.be/qDkj3f0h77s?t=00h00m34s

http://youtu.be/d0Muqby9eOw

http://youtu.be/SdUSBR4_suw

If it's any help, I don't have a great sense of who Caifan Rockero is. He's dropped the Rockero at some point but earlier in his career teamed with his brother (being Caifan Rockero II). Apparently, they had a really great feud with Los Orientales back in 2001. Here's a match from that which I haven't had time to see yet. According to luchawiki, after his brother left wrestling, he had a big shot at CMLL but got injured and the moment passed.

This was aired on a Perros del Mal episode and it is clipped a little here and there but it's clipped well at least. My impression is that it was only one fall, but I honestly don't know. If it wasn't, then it was reedited competently to be so. The arena is strikingly empty for an apuestas match that made tv. I don't know the first thing about the arrangements here but I'm wondering if it got presented because the match had buzz after the fact. It felt like a match that should have had buzz. Out of everything I've seen of him so far, this was the first match where Hechicero was REALLY Hechicero.

There was the intensity here that you'd expect out of a match with these stakes, but maybe not the hate. That's not to say that Hechicero was doing the sort of pandering I've seen him do in earlier matches. He wasn't. He was focused, but there weren't a lot of strikes or blood or wound targeting or brawling. There was a little bit of that but just a little. Really, it felt more like the last fall of a title match. In fact, you could almost extrapolate it into a three falls title match just from what happened, with Hechicero getting his Valiente Driver in early (after what I think was a springboard flub that they recovered from) and Caifan getting his knees up to stop a spinning slingshot splash followed by a nice Gory driver. Both of those only received two counts, but I really could have seen each one getting the three and making for a short primera and segunda like we see all the time.

As I said, Hechicero really did feel like Hechicero here, with a lot of arm trap and pumphandle moves and submissions. He hit a bit exploder suplex and this insane reverse gutwrench, fisherman's turning facebuster thing, which was equally contrived and painful looking, plus all of his big signature surfboard submissions. He moved from one impressive looking thing to the next, with very little of it looking contrived, or alternatively, all of it looking so contrived that it came off as a legitimate style as opposed to being ridiculous. The few strikes he did looked great. His dives were impressive. And he ate some big offense from Caifan too (there was one top rope rana that they fought over that was particularly nuts).

More importantly the match really did flow for the most part. Maybe that was due, in part, to the clipping, but I bought the momentum shifts be it the knees coming up as mentioned before or Caifan appealing to the crowd too much as he was chopping Hechicero and getting tied up for his mistake. There was some of the big lay-down selling that you'd expect in a match like this, but it felt mostly warranted, though some of the start-stop pacing of it was a little jarring. I'd say it lacked polish in that regard, but that's how a lot of the big title and apuestas matches are run these days, so there's probably a better way to say that. Some of the fighting for holds felt a little sloppy but at the same time very competitive, especially towards the end stretch, so I'm more than forgiving there.

This really had too much in the way of spots and action to run them all down but I don't necessarily feel like it was too much for what they were trying to do. It probably was too much for the setting (one where they actually interview poor Caifan when he's getting his hair cut in front of such a seemingly small crowd), but that's sort of moot as they might not have been allowed to do it in a larger setting anyway. I think it's worth watching though, both to see where Hechicero was in his development in 2010 when he really had a chance to showcase his work and because it was dynamic and enjoyable on its own.

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