Found Footage Friday: LOS INFERNALES~! VALENTE~! GUERRERO DE LA MUERTE~! NIEBLA~! LATIN LOVER I GUESS~!

Rayo De Jalisco Jr./Latin Lover/Valente Fernandez vs. Los Infernales (Satanico, MS-1, Pirata Morgan) Monterrey 8/23/92

MD: We had previously covered the Latin Lover vs Valente Fernandez apuestas match so it's nice to get this as well, which has Fernandez turning on him, including him explaining it after the match. Morgan wears a bandana through this as he'd just lost his hair to Vampiro. Infernales ambush to start, and it's a solid rudo beatdown where they cycle through the tecnicos before slamming Lover, holding him down, and having MS-1 squash him with a top rope splash. Segunda starts with Rayo charging the ring and it settles down to exchanges. He gets all of his stuff in as the Infernales bumble about. They're as good as anyone playing into it. Fernandez looks very good too, sharp offense, going out as a tecnico with a bang. Lover less so, overall. The tercera was short but chaotic with guys going in and out of the ring and the tecnicos sort of trying a hit and run approach. It ultimately backfired as Lover rushed in to save Fernandez from a 3 vs 1 situation and accidentally dropkicked him. Fernandez lost it after that and started in on Lover with a chair before raising his hands with the Infernales and going back out to post Lover some more. He got a ton of heat for it and on commentary after noted how sick he was of Lover constantly being so clumsy. The payoff was fun so now it's nice to have the set up too.

ER: I loved the match long payoff of Valente losing his shit on Latin Lover, because every time Lover was in this match he looked like the worst wrestler in Monterrey. Were Rayo's bunny hop headbutts ridiculous? Yes. But everything Latin Lover did - outside of a cool bad landing dropkick on the floor to MS-1 - looked like it was done by a guy who should not be in a ring in front of paying customers. Watching him hit light clotheslines below the boobs or his weird Roadblock moonsault bumps to the floor was enough for me, but watching Valente doing several flawless classic lucha bumps to the floor made me fully understand his turn, even before the dropkick. And let's hear it for my boy MS-1, the least acclaimed of Los Infernales but a helluva show here, outshining Satanico and Pirata, huge aura, big top rope splash, throwing harder punches than his celebrated brethren. 

Latin Lover/Kato Kung Lee vs. El Sanguinario/El Mercenario Plaza De Toros Monumental mid-1992

MD: It's worth going through all of this just so we know someone's covered it. Rob had pointed out a number of new matches on this channel and I can report back that there's not a lot to see here. Lover still had his mask at this point and he was over with a part of the crowd as the new idol/sensation, and I'd even say his stuff looked a little better here, maybe because Sanguinario was flying into it so well, but this was fairly straightforward. At one point in the segunda when the rudo beatdown abruptly start, he got lawn darted into the seats and that was pretty satisfying and Kato Kung Lee got to do his stuff right at the end to entertaining effect but the VQ was rough for the most part and the opening exchanges were pretty subdued. Unless you really want a glimpse of what early Lover looked like, I'd say this is probably a skip.

ER: If any of you are out there reading this and still wondering what early Latin Lover looked like, picture the worst Lenny Lane match you've ever seen and now picture Lenny with less polish. 

Mr. Niebla vs. Guerrero De La Muerte Arena Coliseo 12/17/96

MD: Just the tercera here. We come in with Guerrero in charge, first with a camel clutch and then tossing Niebla off the top. He has a cool little bit he does where he winds up with his foot for leverage before tossing him too. He then starts slapping the piss out of Niebla, which only enrages Niebla and enables the comeback, which included a great moonsault from the apron to the floor. On the way back in though, Guerrero pulls off Niebla's mask. The ref buys that it was an accident and the match continues (which I've rarely ever seen actually).They rolled into a stretch from there, including a big top rope dive to the floor and then wiping out over the top in a Jerry Estrada bump by Guerrero which was followed up by Niebla having to shift directions to hit his tope. Guerrero caught him on a rana attempt and dropped him with a power bomb for the win though. A good fall. Shame we don't have the whole thing.

ER: Fantastic one fall tercera look at the things that made Guerrero de la Muerte a special worker, one who we've likely highlighted much less than other special workers from this era of special workers. This was Guerrero's fall. Niebla got a couple cool tecnico moments: a big Asai moonsault (the way he slingshots himself to the apron made it look like he was going to go even crazier, like Gran Metalik or Taka) and a tope with hardly any run up, just switched directions when he saw where Guerrero was running. Guerrero was great at setting it up, his backdrop to the floor superb, holding onto the top rope to get full extension and holding it for a full arc. It looked like he was captured in a vert ramp trick on the cover of Thrasher. 

But the fall was all about building to those few big Niebla moments and letting Guerrero run wild with the rest. Even Guerrero gets a big dive, hitting an awesome full arms out plancha. Both were excellent at catching the others' dives. I'm with Matt in that I don't think I've ever seen a mask removal deemed "accidental", and in this case Guerrero was definitely Up To No Good with the mask removal. The way it happened was so sick. He had the mask partially removed and had a handful of the mask's jawline so he could hold Niebla in place while punching him in the face. Niebla began to fall after taking punches and the mask came off in Guerrero's hand. An accident, in that he wasn't attempting to rip his mask off, he was merely using the mask to punch his opponent in the teeth!

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Found Footage Friday: GARZA~! DRAGON~! BLONDY~! CHICANA~! LOVER~! GUAJARDO

Blue Fish/El Sanguinario/Gato del Ring vs. Hector Garza/Ruben Juarez Jr./Franky CMLL 1992

MD: It's a real testament to the footage we've gotten over the last few months that it's been so long since I chipped away at Roy's Monterrey uploads, but here we are. This is a blurry, staticy undercard match with some local guys (like Blue Fish) and Garza as the star of the future very early into his tenure. And it was fun straightforward lucha trios action.

The rudos controlled as we came in, really laying a beating on Franky. The commentary noted how he was such a flyer that he even flew well when he was taking a back body drop. He flew well into the stands when they tossed him in and followed it up with a chair too. Nice mugging from the rudos, solid stuff. The comeback was spirited like you'd want with Garza looking great to the point where Franky couldn't quite keep up. He would throw a dropkick off the apron to the floor in an attempt to do so though.

Then the tercera had holds broken up with matter-of-fact hard shots. It worked well and built to a big Garza flip dive before Jaurez got the win. My favorite bit in it was Juarez not able to get a monkey flip going and Garza having to leap behind him to flip them both. Pretty novel spot. I like Garza from later in the decade fine even if I think his real strength was as a rudo stooge later on, but there was something dynamic and exciting about him all the way back here. 

Fabuloso Blondy/Rick Patterson/Sangre Chicana vs. Ultimo Dragon/Cesar/Apolo Dantes CMLL 1992

MD: This is one of those ones that we'd probably never really even look at otherwise. It has a big chunk missing due to static in the middle and a Mil Mascaras commercial between the segunda and tercera. But it also has Ultimo Dragon doing maybe the coolest thing I've ever seen him do, rearing back and hitting a Yoshiaki Fujiwara style headbutt onto Rick Patterson. 

That was during the tecnico comeback in the primera. They'd been literally pulling Apolo (listing says their father Alfonso, but I think it's Apolo) apart until the tecnicos rushed in. Blondy was post-hair match but he and Patterson made for two solid big lugs with Chicana to add the flair of violence. Post-static we come right back to Blondy clocking Apolo with a chair and the tercera was a beatdown exacerbated by the fact that Cesar had decided he wasn't going to get along with his brother and Dragon. Instead, after watching for a bit, and right when Dragon was making a comeback, he clocked him allowing the rudos to pin him. Post-match he tossed a chair right in Dragon's face and paraded around the ring. 

ER: I really liked all the tecnicos going after Rick Patterson's meaty hamstring. Cesar ends the primera grabbing him by the chin and throwing two swift kicks, Ultimo sweeps his leg out with one in the segunda, and Patterson is very entertaining selling them. He treats them lethally and it shuts him down every time. When Dantes hit his, Patterson didn't even retaliate, he just got up and limped exaggeratedly back to the apron. It's funny seeing Blondy and Patterson in there with the smaller Cesar and Dragon, and I think Apolo was really good at selling the chokes and clubs of Blondy, getting dragged around on his knees and choked with a cable on the apron. The Cesar turn on Dragon was angry enough (for reasons I do not understand) that I'd love to see a singles match that surely doesn't exist...yet. I wanted to see Dragon work BIG against the big men but that didn't happen. Matt is 100% right about his Fujiwara headbutt, though. I have watched hundreds of Ultimo Dragon matches and I have never seen him rear back and headbutt someone like that. Funny, in classic Dragon style, that this violent piece of offense came one minute in and nothing else he did matched that energy. 

Bronco/Latin Lover/Valente Fernandez vs. Sanguinario/Rene Guajardo Jr/Canadian Butcher CMLL 1992 

MD: Pretty complete match with a few interesting wrinkles. Pairings for the primera were Bronco and Guajardo, Lover and Sanguinario, and Fernandez and Butcher, but we got a lot of Fernandez and Guajardo throughout too. They were pretty perfectly matched up even in look and both were over. Pretty much everyone was over here. Even Butcher (Brett Como/Black Dragon/Ultimate Dragon) was over due to his very unique look (a mullet and a mohawk, but the mohawk was just one patch of hair gelled to stick up two feet like a unicorn horn) and a pretty astonishing 1992 Monterrey Shooting Star Press towards the end of the segunda.

Bronco danced about and Guajardo had some great, great punches, the sort of punches that make you want to ask around and say "Hey, do we know as a community that Rene Guajardo, Jr. had some great punches?" because I don't remember people ever talking about that. A lot of the story here however, was making Lover look good. This was shortly after the gimmick's debut and the match went out of its way to make him look strong. Certainly whenever he was in, women screamed, and there was one point in between caidas where he was getting beaten on the floor that two stepped forward to protect him. He ultimately had the comeback (or at least set it off) and was the last man standing after Bronco wiped out on a brutal missed dive where Butcher just walked away and they pinned Fernandez. It was ultimately three-on-one at that point but he got his share of near-falls before Sanguario finally got the better of roll up reversals. Fernandez still felt like the star of the moment but there was a torch passing element here. 

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Found Footage Friday: ALL APUESTAS

 
Stuka/Latin Lover vs. Valente Fernandez/Sangre Chicana Monterrey 6/92

MD: Lover still had his mask here (He'd lose it a couple of months later in a tag to Sangre Chicana and Sanguinario, and then immediately thereafter would have the below Fernandez singles match. Sheesh). It took me about a fall to figure out what was even going on here, which is blurry old lucha chaos for you. This was a tag where the losers of the fall had to fight each other over the mask. Also we come in mid stream with the rudos beating Lover down until Stuka streaks in from off screen wildly, knocks Fernandez out of the ring and clocks him with a chair. He'd get bloodied thereafter and they'd take the fall with a gnarly mutalock styled double armhold and Lover hitting a sunset flip on Chicana.

Stuka continues on Fernandez between falls, posting him but Fernandez turns the tables on him, tosses him into the seats, and gets some revenge with a chair. He's really good at this, this being standing around a bloody mess in the ring with a chair menancing Lover until Stuka rolls back in so he can absolutely crush him (he then crushes Lover for good measure). Very quick but impactful segunda that should have presented Lover and Stuka with a high, high bar to overcome for the rest of the match.

Weirdly, that's not quite what happened. Lover came into the terera strong, fighting back against Chicana, and Stuka chased Fernandez around. The tercera didn't quite have the drama I would have wanted, but Fernandez eliminated Lover with a great Reinera and then hit a huge dive. Stuka followed up by fouling Fernandez in front of the ref to set up the singles match.

The commentators said that even though they had been partners, now it was time for a fight to the death given the stakes, and that's how Stuka took it certainy, coming in hot, tossing Lover into the stands, hitting him with a chair, and ripping at the mask. Fernandez tried to get involved a little, and that let Lover fight back reversing a toss and sending Stuka flying into the stands in revenge, opening him up. Back in the ring, they went all out for an exciting finishing high-speed finishing stretch, lots of rope-running and nearfalls. Stuka finally missed a flip dive off the top and Lover locked in an armbar with the leg behind the head for the win. Post-match Stuka, who had increasingly lost it as the match went on, really lost it and took a runner, but multiple luchadores brought him back to have his head shaved. I could have used a little more flash in the tercera of the tag but overall this was more than spectacle enough.

Valente Fernandez vs. Latin Lover Monterrey 9/27/92

MD: This is almost completely bullshit but it's so consistent to it that it's ok. Fernandez charges in at the start but Lover fires back. Fernandez escapes around the ring and crotches over on the rope on the way in. He really doesn't look back with the fouls, all the way into the tercera as he controls most of it, with a spattering of rudo ref assistance along the way that cut Lover off after a big quebradora counter in the segunda, for instance.

What made it work was the triple combination of Fernandez being a total jerk (his celebration in the arms of his second (Sanguinario maybe?) after winning the primera with another foul for instance), Lover fighting back with fire whenever he had a chance, and plenty of blood. There were some big tope suicidas in the tercera and while we couldn't really see them due to the camera angle, the blood all over the floor from Lover put them way over the top emotionally. They felt monumental because we were left with the image of guys just laying around in splatterings of red (I'm not 100% convinced it's blood; it might just be the floor, but I'm going to go with it).

In general though, plenty of bullshit. Fernandez bullied the ref into compliance, hit him errounously though little came of it. He took a swipe at Lover's second and then, in a key moment, took out his own with a dive as Lover was able to move. The finish was fairly definitive with Lover just needing a clear enough path to plant Fernandez with an Alabama slam out of the corner. We're in Monterrey in the 90s and we got what we got accordingly. A bit too much BS but you can't say it didn't work.

Solar vs. Flama Azul Arena Naucalpan 1991

MD: This was very much a tale of two matches. The first two caida were a little more subdued and then everything picked up bigtime in the tercera. The setting with big colorful "LUCHAMANIA" banners in the traditional WM font and canned audio that meant we never got a real sense of the crowd didn't help matters.

Flama Azul got an early advantage without really doing anything underhanded or even definitive to get it. They started clean enough and he was just able to lean on Solar, a combination of him being able to keep up with him technically and having a bit more girth. There was some mask ripping and viciousness but for the most part, nothing was boiling over. That meant that the comeback didn't hit too hard, even though Solar had this way of rushing into the quebradoras instead of just waiting for his opponent to get to him. He makes them look more dynamic than anyone else and he was able to grind down with the knee and get a submission out of one.

Things opened up in the tercera, first and foremost, Flama Azul's skull as Solar continuously drove it into the post. There was a muddy, mess sense of violence here, a lack of pretty spots as they just crashed into each other grabbing and poking and swiping however they could. Just a real sense of animosity that had been missing from the match so far. Eventually, Solar was able to drive forward with one more backbreaker and put Flama down. This would have been better if we had a better sense of the crowd as, once it really got going, the dissonance between the bright colors and the nasty violence really made things pop.

PAS: So much of my experience with Solar is him doing his touring Maestros stuff with Negro Navarro at the end of his career, seeing him at the beginning of the 90s working Naucalpan in this kind of grimy small arena apuestas match is pretty great. It got more escalatingly ugly and violent as the match went on, especially the parts where Solar was trying to crack open Azul's skull like a walnut. This is some of the earliest Arena Naucalpan footage we have, and I love that it was always like this. Nothing fancy, just blood mixing with spilled beer and two guys rolling around in it. 

ER: So this was an outright classic, right? I'm a Solar fan. We all are. I've been there live and seen him do his front flip into the ring in his early 60s, I fell in love with the maestro matwork the first time I saw him, and yet I don't think I have ever seen Solar in a match like this. This was Solar in a damn fight and Solar as a damn rock star. Have I ever seen Solar get reactions like this before? I don't believe I have. The second the propulsive, motorik guitar groove of whatever his excellent entrance theme hit, Arena Naucalpan went crazy and it continued going crazy for a half hour. This felt like a real important apuestas match before Solar got anywhere close to the ring because the crowd made this match feel like real stakes. I have been to mask matches in Mexico before. The loudest one I was at was El Hijo del Santo vs. Super Parka in 2003, and maybe because it was in an open air bull ring rather than the closed in confines of Naucalpan, but this match was so much louder. Solar was swarmed like Mil Mascaras. "That's the guy who unmasked Dr. O'Borman a million years ago," somebody said, maybe. I loved Solar as an old man. I hardly knew his long superstar peak, but Naucalpan reacts to 1991 Solar like Hijo del Santo in El Toreo and I'm hyped. 

I can't pretend to know anything about Flama Azul, but I love him. I don't think we've ever written about him before. You'd think one of us would have covered him at some point but I couldn't find anything. Flama Azul feels like a Segunda Caida guy. He looks like a real piece of shit. Look at this Scumbag El Dandy. He has the body of a co-worker who gets takeout most days of the week, with messy hair and a perfect mustache. I love how he punches at Solar's face and body, love the violent mask ripping, love the damn referee holding Solar by the mask from the ring so that Flama can punch him in the face, repeatedly. Solar takes great prolonged beating, takes multiple backdrops on a hard mat, and the noise in that arena made it feel like people actually thought Solar was in danger of losing his mask, one of the five greatest masks in lucha history. The beating comes to a head when Solar is run along the apron and bounced into the ringpost and spills into the crowd, reinventing the ringpost bump in the early 90s. 

Solar does no matwork in this match. This is not the time for it. He does nothing you would ever call "smooth" in this fight. No, he fights back and spends the rest of the match wrecking Azul's back with the coolest fully controlled quebradoras I've ever seen. Solar was lifting and spinning Azul like pizza dough, bringing him down on his knee in a way that looked like he was controlling every single part of the landing. He just kept lifting and turning and slamming Azul into his knee, the quebradoras a triumphant tecnico show of strength that only got better the more he did. Solar's tope was incredible, his victory hard fought. Azul continued being a piece of shit after the match, refusing all handshakes and storming off to the rudo's locker room before his first trim. I liked the way he argued with no theatricality. He never looked like he was being a rudo for the benefit of the fans who loved or hated rudos, he felt like he was just an asshole that was trying to renege on a friendly wager, getting upset when he actually has to pay for dinner. 

Extra highlight is our post-match barber. He had no electric clippers but just watch the quick work he makes of Azul's hair with a pair of scissors. He was snapping off clumps of hair with real speed, handing off a huge handful to Solar for him to parade around. This man could scissor shear a sheep in a sheet. 

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On Brand Segunda Caida: Pierroth in WWF!

Man, what might have been. By 1996 WCW had some of the best luchadors in the world, and they were becoming popular attractions on WCW undercards. Naturally, WWF brought in some of the leftover luchadors to compete, even though most of the luchadors WWF brought in couldn't really work the same style that was the actual reason for WCW luchadors becoming a popular attraction. It was a move inspired by any well-intentioned mother who bought her teen a pack of Yu-Gi-Oh cards because he played Magic: The Gathering. It's an attempt, but with no actual knowledge behind the attempt. "This is a card game and I know you like card games" = "Here are Mexican wrestlers and apparently people like Mexican wrestlers now". It was misguided and done with seemingly no knowledge of why they were doing it. This was NBC's "Joey", a Friends spinoff made by people who seemingly had never seen an episode of Friends and had no clue why people enjoyed the Joey Tribbiani character. It was a short-lived experiment that only lasted a couple of months, yet somehow the AAA luchadors got a showcase trios on the Royal Rumble card. A couple of the guys brought in seemed to be pushed above the others: Hector Garza (who makes sense as he was a hunky guy in his 20s who could do a nice tornillo) and...Pierroth.

Since one of the duties of Segunda Caida is to champion any luchador using the Pierroth name, WE obviously understood their intentions. But it was kind of odd. Pierroth then was the same age I am now, which feels old to be getting a new name push in WWF. While other luchadors got a showcase match at the '97 Rumble, Pierroth was actually IN the Rumble. This man was the Champion of Champions, according to Jim Ross.

We won't actually go over the Rumble match here, as I know his elimination is still a touchy subject for many. Some believe that Pierroth was never officially eliminated, as he wasn't properly told the rules before the match, and they feel he shouldn't have been punished for "eliminating himself" with a plancha, and should still technically be an active entrant 22 years later; others, are wrong. Let's take a look at the bizarrely, briefly pushed 38 year old masked brawler, WWF Superstar Pierroth!


Pierroth vs. Matt Hardy WWF Superstars 12/22/96

ER: This was a really cool match, paced quick as hell and getting absolutely no love and attention from the crowd. Pierroth came off real mean, hard punches, quick snapmare followed by a stiff kick to Hardy's back, hard lariat, back elbow, a cool Rock Bottom before that existed in this fed, just came off like a real badass. He really looked like a great brawler. Hardy came off as crazy as his brother, hitting an unexpected split legged moonsault...but then he unexpectedly upped the crazy, hitting an Asai moonsault after springboarding to the TOP rope, BARELY rotating in time to not land straight on his head. I'm not sure what was supposed to happen, but Hardy started selling instantly and Pierroth got right up. It looked like the moonsault landed (albeit with Hardy possibly bouncing off his forehead to get there), but they had other plans I guess. Pierroth hits a solid contact pescado, really landing heavy, AND - and this is important - for those of you itching to know, Pierroth's finisher in the WWF was a cool folding powerbomb. If I was a kid and saw this I would want to see more of both guys, and then be confused when I only saw Pierroth a couple more times on TV.

Pierroth/Cibernetico vs. The New Rockers WWF Raw 12/23/96

ER: This was weird, and really cool! Vince and JR were really amusing on commentary, pointing out how the fans don't really know who to cheer for because they don't know the luchadors and they don't like the New Rockers. Vince also points out we haven't seen much flying from the Mexican team, and JR actually goes off on him: "You know, that's just an unfair stereotype about Spanish athletes. Some of the best ones are high flyers, but many of them aren't. Look at Perro Aguayo, a great brawler!" JR goes full Mike Tenay and shuts Vince right up. Marty Jannetty was a really great wrestler all throughout the 90s, and Al Snow vs. Pierroth is a match up I didn't know I wanted but clearly I do. Pierroth again works stiff, and Snow is a guy who will work stiff back, and I dug the chops they were throwing at each other. Snow bumps really big for Cibernetico, taking a cool armdrag reversal and then going down like a shot for a hard dropkick to his chest, later taking a soft but somewhat reckless tope that saw both crash into the guardrail. Jannetty threw two really nice punches including a cool short uppercut, and a fantastic flying fistdrop, and I dug Pierroth throwing a bunch of short arm chops to him, knocking him down with a chop but always holding onto an arm to drag Jannetty back up for more. Pierroth hits a killer release powerbomb and a splash with a hard landing to win. Pierroth has a 2 match winning streak in WWF! JR fully advertised that Pierroth was in his late 30s, pointing out that he had been wrestling over half his life at 20 years. This guy is really going places in late '96 WWF!

Doug Furnas/Phil Lafon vs. Pierroth/Cibernetico WWF Superstars 1/5/97

ER: This is particularly notable, because Pierroth grabs the mic and talks trash before the match, and then grabs it *again* to talk more trash after the match, the match he had just lost due to DQ. This is a total hidden gem of a tag. This one should be a syndicated classic. Can Ams were dangerous guys who always had the potential to eat up an opponent, but Cibernetico and Pierroth were fine if the Can-Ams wanted to try that. Pierroth starts this by going right after Furnas with hard chops and a stiff corner lariat. It's part of a great sequence where Pierroth gets Irish whipped chest first into the opposite buckle, then bumps forward out the ropes after eating a Furnas lariat to the back of the head. It was one of those airtight sequences that you could picture Arn or Bobby doing in a tag. He then went right in and took down Kroffat with a clutch single leg, felt like he was directly going after both Can-Ams strongest suit and it made him come off like a total badass. 

Furnas takes this monster Sgt. Slaughter bump over the corner after Pierroth dodges, and then when Furnas makes it back in Pierroth throws a fantastic punch right to the nose. Goddamn this match rules. If Pierroth knew of the Can Am's tough guy reps, he clearly did not care. Cibernetico was pretty raw (and well, never got Actually Good), but here he had some young guy stupid in him and that's a plus. He throws some kicks to Kroffat that looked like they earned him receipts, took a wild Furnas overhead belly to belly, Kroffat snap suplexed him as hard as he could, chopped him across the collar bones, tossed him hard with a snap back suplex, rough stuff. Cibernetico earned his keep. Pierroth and Furnas have a cool little violent brawl on the floor, Pierroth taking a great bump out there and an awesome chest first posting. We even get an excellent bullshit finish when Cibernetico pulls the ref into the way of a Kroffat crossbody. Can-Ams couldn't go over these two in 1997, because Pierroth was Too Fucking Strong. Ref called the DQ on Cibernetico, but this was 50% Kroffat. His body hit the ref. I'm calling Pierroth's WWF W-L at 2-0-1. 

Pierroth/Heavy Metal/Pentagon vs. Hector Garza/Latin Lover/Octagon WWF Raw 3/10/97

ER: Yep, you're right, this is total Weirdsville. Our luchadors were being presented strongly on television for a couple weeks leading up to the Rumble, then they had a featured trios at the Rumble to start the new year, Pierroth and Cibernetico got to actually be IN the Rumble match, and then...they disappear only to show up 2 months later, and then never again. This is your swan song boys. Go out in a blaze of glory. And by entrances alone, you can already call this a win. Latin Lover is wearing his cuffs and collar, Heavy Metal looks like a total sleaze star in leopard print tights, stringy hair hanging over his face, and an expression that makes him look like he's about to pull out a switchblade. So this is already great. But there was nothing these guys could have done. On paper they got 8 minutes, but it wasn't a fair 8 minutes. Everyone here works hard and they're actually starting to win people over and starting to get reactions...and then they show "That Woman" Chyna in the crowd and cut away from the ring for 90 seconds while she is removed (she had been showing up and causing problems, attacking Marlena and getting in the ring to confront Bret), then the moment they remove Chyna and go back to the ring, they cut to a split screen for a great (but also 90 second) Brian Pillman promo. Luchadors were doing dives, but Pillman was busy talking about the witching hour and there were just way too many things fighting for attention (this era of Raw had constant split screen cutaway promos, the screen action always felt very hectic).

Heavy Metal mostly paired off with Garza, Pierroth mostly paired off with Latin Lover, and Octagon/Pentagon did their thing, and it worked really well! Metal and Garza pushed a really fast pace. They're the guys who really started to get a reaction, doing fast armdrags, Metal did a big handspring elbow and did a fast rolling dropdown to take our Garza's legs, Garza landed on his feet on a moonsault and then hit a springboard crossbody, and people were finally making noise. Pierroth was good at actively yelling at fans in the front row to get them involved (it works) and throwing tons of hard short chops to Lover. LL's chest is red shortly into the match because of Pierroth, and that's a good thing. Heavy Metal takes a humongous Jerry bump to the floor, the dives all look good (even in split screen) and of course we cap it off with Garza's tornillo knocking everyone down like pins. The only thing weird about the ringwork is Latin Lover doing a frog splash to someone who wasn't even there (Metal had been standing for some time) and Metal just rolls him up with la magistral. That could have been cleaner. Still, the match was really fun and if the fed actually wanted to promote lucha, fans would have easily gotten into it. There's no reason they couldn't have just put them exclusively on Superstars or something, have occasional feature matches on Raw, it would have worked. But, most importantly, Pierroth wraps up his WWF career with a dominant 3-0-1 record.

JR referred to Pierroth as "The Champion of Champions" in every single one of his 4 featured matches. Clearly JR knew class when he saw it.

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MLJ: Guerreros del Infierno B-2: Héctor Garza, Latin Lover, Tarzan Boy vs Rey Bucanero, Satánico, Último Guerrero

2000-06-17 @ Plaza de Toros, Ciudad de México, Distrito Federal
Héctor Garza, Latin Lover, Tarzan Boy vs Rey Bucanero, Satánico, Último Guerrero

5:03 in

B match (thus not a comp one). Chronologically, the Villanos and IWRG Niebla (http://segundacaida.blogspot.com/2014/08/mlj-los-guerreros-flashback-los-nuevos.html) trios match that I looked at back in August comes before this. So, I'm almost a year into the journey now and I still get a kick out of how much I just don't know. It's not even obscure things like how Inquisidor is the brother of Polvora (thanks, Jay Cordingley), but big things.

For instance, did you know that there was an big 25,000 people outdoor AAA vs CMLL stadium show in 2000? Probably. You probably did. I sure didn't. I'm going to liken that to not knowing that WWE bought WCW and ran the invasion angle in 2001 for a relatively new American wrestling fan. I do think that there are lucha hot points, namely the early-mid 90s (with the emergence of Rey and Psicosis and AAA and before the Mexican economy collapsed and a lot of the big names went to WCW) and the mid 00s (with Perros del Mal and the rise of Mistico) and the period in the middle is a bit more of a black hole.

Case in point, I actually couldn't find a ton about this show (called Padrisimo: Father's Day seems like a day for big shows in Mexico) in English. Best I came up with was that Televisa insisted upon it and CMLL agreed, kicking and screaming. It's actually a pretty fun looking card with an atomicos main event, though dulled a little bit by how many guys would jump back and forth in the years to come.

This was the second match on the card and Garza, Lover, and Tarzan Boy were all currently AAA talent. I know Garza and Lover had been through CMLL first (not sure about Tarzan Boy). They were a pretty logical trio though, as they all had that pretty boy look. The key to figuring out who was who here (since with the video quality and far shots and the fact they're all in white, it can be hard) is that Garza has the long pants, Tarzan Boy has the white kneepads, and Lover has the darker kneepads. They all get pretty big entrances, with Lover's the most ridiculous. The first match in the tag tournament with GdI that I'll cover on Weds has Tarzan Boy. I've seen a bunch of TB/Toscano matches but all after his rudo turn so I'm having to deal with the damn Tarzan Boy song being stuck in my head now which is a new problem for me. I hadn't realized he actually came out to that. Satanico came out with his Nuevo Infernales, but to We Will Rock you. they all had awesome jackets. I can't find any photos from the entrance and the VQ isn't screenshot-worthy, so you'll just have to take my word for it.

This was only one fall and it didn't last that long, but the tecnicos were perfect Infernales opponents in that they were all high flying babyfaces who could take a beating. And they did, getting rushed early. A lot of the key GdI spots were already in the equation, including the alley oop body drop and the corner clotheslines ending with the senton de la muerte. There were more of these trademark unit moves too, ones I hadn't seen, like Satanico hitting a drop toehold and his partners sliding out to kick the head protruding on the apron, and them outright sliding their opponent to the floor.

The comeback was another staple, the two-guys-letting-their-partner-backflip so that he could corner charge spot, where it works twice but is countered the third time. Here it was countered with a ducked clothesline and a powerbomb by Lover to eliminate Bucanero, only for him to get taken out by Satanico being deft in turning a roll up into a submission. Then we had some Ultimo Guerrero vs Hector Garza, which was fun, as these two would be big rivals many years later and this was the first time that I can find that they were against each other.

It all broke down into a spot fest with the tecnicos sort of interchangeably leaping from high places. It finished fun with Satanico rolling up Garza, but using the ropes. The CMLL ref counted it. The AAA ref argued. They shoved each other. Garza took advantage of this and  hit his corkscrew moonsault from the top to let both sides claim victory if they so wanted.

Definitely a fun match in an amazing setting. I love seeing Los Nuevo Infernales as a full unit, especially against opponents who were so fitting for them.

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MLJ: 2010: A Garza Odyssey 21: Héctor Garza, Terrible, Texano Jr. vs La Máscara, Máximo, Volador Jr.

Taped 2010-06-04 @ Arena México
Héctor Garza, Terrible, Texano Jr. vs La Máscara, Máximo, Volador Jr.

5:16 in

http://youtu.be/9WmEfVHzI8c

http://youtu.be/LFvfbwcU61w

http://youtu.be/yksgFHVHT0c

Oh CMLL, you crazy, hapless diamond. So, this is the last show before Sin Salida (this was a Friday. That was a Sunday), which, as we remember, was the show CMLL was putting up against a pretty stacked Triplemania (LA Park vs La Parka over the name La Parka). The theme of the show was CMLL vs Invasores. Past Garza and the visiting Giant Bernard who was not actually affiliated with the group, I don't think there was one Invasor on this Friday card (it did have the Virus vs Valiente lightning match though). Nor did it have CMLL ally Rayo de Jalisco, Jr. Or... look, I'm boggled. There's just no build at all. It's maddening. A lot of the build in this specific match was because Latin Lover was at ringside, and that seemed thematically on point. Maybe he'd join Los Invasores. Maybe he'd be loyal to CMLL. Hector Garza, leader of the invaders, was right there after all. They had a history, and lo and behold, at the end of the match, they hugged and then Garza clocked him. Aha! He'd be a force at Sin Salida after all, right? No, not right. He didn't show up again until November! There HAS to be some crazy internal power struggle between the people who book the outer shows and the ones who book the Arena Mexico shows but I've got no idea. It all just hurts my head.

There was a match, though, and I really love the Texano, Terrible, Garza trios. They were made for each other and balanced one another very well. Moreover, by this point, they'd worked together a couple of times and were more in sync. This was your stereotypical modern CMLL trios. They teased a few feeling out exchanges. At a key moment, the rudos swarmed. There was an extended beatdown that carried into the segunda and lasted until a bit of miscommunication let the tecnicos take a quick fall. Then they reset in the tercera for some exchanges, tecnico shine, dive cut offs and pay offs, and the finish. I've seen this match dozens and dozens of times and I bet most people reading this have seen it more, and I don't care. It works. When done well, it's great. It's the bread and butter of modern CMLL and there's a reason why they go back to it. It's sort of the "southern tag" of CMLL and so long as the characters are good and the work is spirited, I could watch these all day. Maybe I'll feel differently after a few more years. I know so many of you have been drowning in this stuff week in and week out for a decade now, but I'm not there yet. It's not fresh to me anymore, but it's still a lot of fun, and in that regard, this match delivered.

Things of note: Kemonito came out on his own (or maybe right before Maximo) and had a little stuffed Kemonito with him. He got beaten up a little after the primera but we mostly missed it. They showed Latin Lover a lot. One of the best spots was during a comeback where it looked like Mascara was going to take out Garza either with a dive, but instead slid out, faked a punch, and shook Lover's hand.

 I really miss the tecnico fans. Look at these guys in their pink shirts cheer for Volador. CMLL seems to have driven them away for the most part now and it's a shame.

As noted, TGT's tandem offense was great. They crotched Maximo and then dropkicked him out. They did this really neat toss out of the corner into the Garza kick.

That took out Mascara. Then they brutalized Volador with a catapult, kick to put him over Terrible's knees, moonsault from the ropes back in. It was hugely ouchworthy and the two tandem moves ended the fall.

The comeback was fun but not super memorable. There was miscommunication. Mascara hit a clumsy roll up. Again, I'm not necessarily in this for smoothness and beauty, so it's ok. The reset was fine with some fun stuff. I loved this Volador spot where he hit a rana and landed on his feet, driving Garza out, who then shadowpunched hilariously.

I don't love Volador or Mascara but at least with the former, I'm perfectly fine watching him get beaten up and then hitting some flashy things on the way out. On the other hand I alawys love Maximo/Terrible interaction, especially when they do spots like having Maximo leap off the apron, Terrible catch him and then crush his spine on the pole:

That was followed by Volador getting tossed and eating the best kick I've seen this week.

This all ended with Mascara getting a kick in on Commandante, to keep some heat, and then walking into a flip up double powerbomb and a splash to end the match (I'm not quite sure how since he wasn't the captain but whatever).

Post match they do the super-heated Latin Lover thing that didn't go anywhere and certainly didn't build to the big show on Sunday.

CMLL: booked by stuffed Kemonitos? 

You tell me.

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MLJ: Mocho Cota in 1993 III: Villano III/Solar/Latin Lover v. Jerry Estrada/Mocho Cota/El Cobarde II

Taped 8-6-93
Villano III/Solar/Latin Lover v. Jerry Estrada/Mocho Cota/El Cobarde II

I'll be honest. The plan was to watch Monday's match and then Wednesday's match and then follow it up with the Satanico vs Lizmark title match. In watching those, though, Cota vs. Lover really stole the show and since we don't have an apuestas match between them (I think it never happened for one reason or another; he might have left), I figured I'd finish off the week by going back to the other match we do have in 1993.

This hadn't been as appealing to me on paper, though. I'm not sure why. Maybe it was because I have no idea who Cobarde II is. Cobarde means coward which is a pretty fun gimmick actually. Cobarde I died in 83 at age 35. I'm guessing this was his brother. He had a good physical presence but I didn't really get a great look at him here. This was lacking Satanico though, and didn't have the pull of Eddy. It was still enjoyable for what it was, even if there was a certain level of mastery missing from it.

Estrada was fairly amusing. He took one Hamrick bump (as opposed to an Estrada bump which he didn't take) and most of his offense consisted of moving out of the way so that his opponent landed on his face. That happened a lot actually. Solar, on the other hand, had this really great quebradora (which, up there with Ingobernables, is one of the two words I always leave a letter off of and I don't know if it's a good thing or a bad one that no one ever calls me on it.), where he brought the guy up onto his shoulder and turned with. No one in CMLL does it now regularly, from what I've seen and that's a shame. Of course, he did it and did it and did it here, so it got a little old too. Villano III was just past 40 here but I've seen better outings from him, before and after this. As a guy to help hold up a match, he was fine though.

We didn't get full entrances here, but the valets were still there, with Estrada's looking about as trashy as possible for this point in human history. Cota had a crazy technicolor robe. Lover never had any girls with him which seems to be against the gimmick unless the idea is that they didn't want the women in the crowd to get jealous. This was yet another match where the rudos rushed to take the advantage right at the beginning, after everyone was announced. I'm not sure if that is better or worse than the ambush on the ramp we see all the time now.

The pairings were Estrada vs Villano, Cobarde vs Solar, and Lover vs Cota. There was a fun early moment where they held Lover so that Cota could slap his chest a few times like Tarzan and chop him. This is my last Cota match for a while so I'm going to be liberal with the gifs.

There was also a good amount of the heel ref stopping the tecnicos from running in and saving which is still something I find offputting since I almost never feel like the tecnicos being unable to make the save needs to be explained in any other lucha I watch. It's one of those things that SHOULD be a problem on paper but through the traditions and norms that they work in, usually always works out very organically as they switch up the beatdown as guys leave the ring. Most trios matches I've seen don't work a Face-In-Peril style of heat segment but instead an equal opportunity ebb and flow style. I don't think this is any more successful than that, especially since, after a while, Lover just rolled out of the ring anyway.

Eventually, the tecnicos mounted a comeback after Estarda lacklusterly hit Cobarde by accident. Solar posted Estrada on the outside. Lover hit a big suplex on Cota and then tossed him by his hair. Then he punched him through the ropes, which again was gif worthy.

They cycled through some pairings after this, with Estrada (looking like a poor man's Marty Jannetty) going against Solar. It was pretty clunky but at least full of character. Next came Villano and Cota and this was actually really good, with some good chain shtick. Cota even went up for a leap into a power bomb which led to Lover flying in to pick up a pin and then another awesome but completely extraneous quebradora by Solar after the other two had been pinned.

Between falls Lover poked Cota in the chest causing Cota to cower, only to do a taunt when Lover turned around and then put his hands behind his back afterwards. Then he hid behind the ref, ran off, and taunted again. It deserves two gifs.

The segunda had its fun moments admidst the clunkiness. There was a weird exchanged between Estrada and Villano where they just ducked each other's moves or put their head down to get hit over and over again. That ended with the Hamrick bump and a dive tease. The did a good job keeping Lover from beating on Cota too much. He had one opportunity after knock him out with a kick but Estrada came in from behind to hold him on the floor. Cota also did a really nice cheaty dropkick using the ropes while on the apron when Solar's head was held in the corner. Cobarde's big moment was getting shrugged off on a monkey flip attempt by Solar and then letting him catapult him through the second rope before eating a tope. Eventually all of it sort of oozed into a finish with more missed moves between Villano and Estrada before Villano locked on an Octopus for the win. Post match, Lover kept grabbing Cota's beard in order to tease hitting him.

Fun match but definitely not smooth and not up to the level of the two that would follow it.  I think these three matches actually go much further in helping the case for Cota than hurting it though.

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MLJ: Mocho Cota in 1993 II: El Satanico/Fishman/Mocho Cota v. El Rayo de Jalisco Jr./Lizmark/Latin Lover

Taped 10.9.93 @ Gimnasio Olímpico Juan de la Barrera, Ciudad de México, Distrito Federal
El Satanico/Fishman/Mocho Cota v. El Rayo de Jalisco Jr./Lizmark/Latin Lover

On paper, this seems pretty comparable to the match I reviewed on Monday. Grundy was a drag on that one, even if there were a few specific things he could do well. Here we have Rayo, and the impression I've gotten from the few matches of his I've seen, are that he's a big ham, and an attention hog, maybe a proto Wagner, Jr (though they're pretty close to the same age and I find Wagner more charismatic and able to back it up better). Fishman always struck me as someone who was perfectly acceptable in a trios match, but I should watch some of his singles matches at some point. He was into his 40s here but then so were Satanico and Lizmark.

As before the entrances were great. Cota had some sort of horror mask and sort of an Imperial Guard valet. Fishman came out to We Are the Champions with a girl in fishscales. Satanico, amazingly, came out with these red klansmen of doom. Lizmark was out there with a cape and Tirantes, and Latin Lover instead of coming out with two women, came out with none, but at least he had some flamethrower thing.

This ended up being just two caidas but it had everything you might have wanted from it, a massive, violent beatdown, the tease of a comeback, and then the actual one. I won't go through everything but I loved the beatdown. The rudos took right over by charging forward and they played the numbers game well. Cota hit his fireman's carry into a hotshot again and it looked even better this time. They held onto Lizmark's mask straps to hold him into the corner so he couldn't fight back. Unsurprisingly Rayo made sure to fight back as much as possible before getting overwhelmed. My biggest problem with this was the heelishness of the ref which really took the heat off of the wrestlers and put it on him. I like the modern CMLL style more where the ref is just hapless and helpless in the face of rudos being rudos so it's not his fault, it's theirs.

Towards the end of the caida, after being cut down at every point, the tecnicos rallied. Lover, instead of coming in directly through the ropes when it was his turn, ran around the ring (and the heel ref) to stage a quick ambush. Everything broke down to crazy brawling with Cota and Lover mounting and hammering each other. Eventually, though Cota hit some massive headbutts to gain control of the mount, symbolically cutting off the comeback and letting the rudos pick up the primera.

Cota kept on shining to start the segunda. He measured Lover with knees and bit at his wound and was all over him until the tecnicos charged back again. It was a pretty rousing comeback with quebadoras and a powerbomb and Lizmark palming Satanico in the face, mask ripping, chair shots, the works. Cota bled and Lover continuously ripped his face apart.

This continued on for a few minutes, some very solid action with a lot of hate and blood and mask ripping behind it until it built to all three pairings getting highlighted in the ring one at a time. It ended with Rayo and Fishman, and Rayo, furious, grabbing the mask off for the rudo win (on paper at least). Satisfying trios. There was a bit of meandering at times and the heel ref stuff was irritating in a bubble but was probably more tolerable in context.

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MLJ: Mocho Cota in 1993 I: Eddy Guerrero/El Satanico/Mocho Cota vs Lizmark/Latin Lover/Solomon Grundy

Taped 8/27/93 @ Gimnasio Olímpico Juan de la Barrera, Ciudad de México, Distrito Federal
Eddy Guerrero/El Satanico/Mocho Cota vs Lizmark/Latin Lover/Solomon Grundy

I started watching lucha through the DVDVR 80s set. It was very much a run before you can walk scenario where I fell right into really incredible matches without the background to wholly understand what I was watching. I'm still working on that now in some ways, as you can see with my stumblings three times a week here. I came to really appreciate a number of luchadores right from the get go though. Two of those were El Satanico and Mocho Cota.

With Satanico, we have a lot more easily available footage in a number of different settings and against more opponents. We have more payoff apuestas matches and everything from trios wars to insane skits. He's absolutely one of my favorites though, incredibly versatile and really owning his character and truly the baddest of the bad. Cota, we have less of, and I don't think he was as well regarded. He had a stint in jail in the early 90s and upon his release in 1993, he really didn't fit into the workrate paradigm (as OJ points out here). I think a lot of us have come a far way as wrestling fans in being able to appreciate performing and character and the more theatrical elements of wrestling as opposed to just workrate, and Cota, especially at this stage of his career, fits into that mold so much better. That's not to say he doesn't pick up the pace when need be, but he could move the crowd with his antics and he's hugely entertaining. Those tend to be traits that I value in 2015 more than how nice someone's execution is or how quick they move. When I saw these matches listed, they seemed to be leading to a Satanico vs Lizmark singles match, so I thought i'd hit two of them and then go with that, but by the end of the watching I knew I wanted to spend the time with a third Cota and Satanico trios instead.

I have no context here. There's actually one earlier Cota match I see online (Villano III/Solar/L. Lover v. J. Estrada/M. Cota/Cobarde II from 8/6/93) but I just don't have time to hit it as well, even though it probably plays into the Cota/Lover fueding. I wanted to start with this one insetad because it had Satanico and it had a relatively young Eddy Guerrero who I just haven't seen much of in Mexico. Granted, the other one had Villano III and Solar so that might have been fun too and I'm sure I'll watch it eventually. I'm not sure I've ever seen Lover outside of a Royal Rumble appearance and Grundy is some massive guy from the states who is there to basically be a grumpy massive babyface in overalls. A prop.

My first takeaway is how much I love AAA entrances during this period. Everyone had an elaborate entrance with their own themed ring girl. Cota had this amazing robe and a hat that kept falling over as he came out to the Imperial March. It segued right into Panama for Eddy and his gringos locos gear (or at least that's what I think it was) was equally amazing. then, of course, Satanico comes out with fire and brimstone and it's all completely of its time but entirely remarkable. We don't get to see the tecnicos come out unfortunately.

Often times these days in CMLL we get a primera that starts hot with the rudos engaging in a beat down but rarely does it feel as visceral as it did here. There's something flashier now, less violent. There are more moves and less brutality. There's plenty of the latter here. One of the few moves was Cota chucking Lover around with a fireman's carry. The rest was mainly him beating him around the ringside area. They managed obscured fouls and using Grundy literally as that prop, tossing Lover into him. Eddy held his own in this but he mainly had Grundy to beat on so nothing was too compelling. They took the caida with a Cota crab and a Satanico standing submission that I should know the name of, the one that's abdominal stretch-y.

I think Cota shined in the beatdown, through his focus and intensity and willingness to interact with the crowd. He spent a lot of the early segunda just choking the life out of Lover or punching him into oblivion as they cut back to shots of Satanico and Eddy clubbering Grundy on the outside or of Eddy hitting Grundy with endless face pokes. Eventually, though, Grundy's girth was just too much and he reversed a whip into the corner, crushing Satanico (who cried foul immediately). The comeback was a little weird, especially for Cota, who sort of just ambled around the ring beating on Lover still even as his partners were getting routed. They were casually waiting their turn until it was Lover's time to take over. I get what they were doing but it didn't quite work. What did work was Cota dashing out of the ring as his partners were defeated, running through the crowd in order to avoid Lover and a chair. It was amazingly craven and hugely entertaining and frankly, the sort of sentiment I appreciate way more than a lot of really smoothly hit back and forth arm drag spots.

Eventually Lover did get Cota in the ring and he slammed him down hard. Cota rolled right out though. He was stumbling around the ring only to get kicked in the face between the ropes in a fit of perfect timing. What followed was an exasperated laugh at the temerity of it all. I don't know if he wasn't expecting it and thought it was hilarious or was just playing a defiant heel but it was a fun character moment.

The brunt of the tercera was Eddy getting to show off but maybe taking a bit too much offense considering the finish. I thought his body language in trying to wrangle Grundy was very good. At one point, though, he was up on his shoulders, and Grundy dropped back and it was brutal. I thought he recovered a little too soon from that. It was an ebb and flow after that. Satanico and Cota destroyed Lover but Grundy came back with big headbutts. The rudos turned the tide again and used Grundy as a weapon against Lizmark, which was followed by Eddy dropkicking him out (Grundy took a surprisingly good bump). Lover rushed in, making his biggest comeback of the match, really taking the fight to Cota, but ultimately getting tricked up in a victory roll counter for three. One springboard dropkick by Eddy onto Grundy and the rudos picked up the win.

Post match, Lover kept trying to go after Cota, who made a hasty retreat to the stage where, after pulling Satanico up, he did one of the most amazing taunts you'll see this week. Ultimately, this had a ton of good stuff, but was way too disjointed. After one match, I think Cota absolutely still had it. It was just that what he had wasn't what a lot of the hardcore fanbase was looking for in 1993. I think his performance here holds up really well in a more post-workrate 2015 though.

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