Toryumon Mexico & CMLL in Monterrey!
Toryumon Mexico 5/13/06:
This was 'DragonMania', a highly publicized event by Ultimo Dragon that took place in Arena Mexico using a lot of foreigners. The card was such a big deal that some of the talent on the show even photoshopped their own pictures onto the poster! The arena looked really nice and the place looked pretty packed although a lot of tickets were given away for free.
Opener was Devon Moore vs The Hornet. Who? Exactly. The Backseat Boys were supposed to be on the show but Kashmere never came for whatever reason so I guess Moore took his place. Hornet is a local wrestler from Ontario who ironicially enough has a cousin that is good friends with my sister. I found this out like two days after he criticized me over at LuchaWorld for commenting that his match was going to be a dark match. I believe his words were something to the effect of: "Mexico doesn't run dark matches, we're on the main show. You really need to go to Mexico to understand who things work before you comment on stuff you don't know about."
Interesting.
Dark match, a non-televised match at a televised show used to warm up the crowd (compare "house show"). A dark match before the show begins is usually used to test out new talent (often local to the event).
Needless to say... Moore vs Hornet did not make the taped version of this event. In fact, there was a t-shirt released listing all the matches from the event on the back and his was the only one not included. Chris Hero and Claudio Castagnoli had a similar exhibition match on the previous Toryumon Mexico show and I'm sure both would have no problems admitting they worked a dark match and in fact would be proud they were included on such an event. The moral of the story? This is an example of why some wrestlers will make it and some won't. You don't need to live in Mexico to understand that lesson.
On with the actual event...
Arkangel/Jorge Rivera/Negro Navarro vs Hayato Fujita Jr./Kanjyuro Matsuyama/Shinji Nohashi: Billed as a teachers vs students match of course. Joined in progress with some nice work going on. Navarro was SUPER OVER and getting pops for anything he did to the Japanese kids. Nohashi blew a double team spot with Arkangel and Rivera but Rivera took over and covered nicely. Then the teachers took over for a short time before the students fought back and there was some more nice work. Navarro busted out this CRAZY submission on poor little Nohashi which the crowd went nuts for. Fujita Jr. wasn't too impressive and kinda stayed out of the way. Matsuyama ended up shoving Navarro into the ringpost but then got nailed by a pescado from Arkangel. Nohashi followed with a bullet tope suicida. Rivera got a nice nearfall but then fell victim to a satellite choke type maneuver by Fujita. Crowd did not enjoy that the students went over. Good opener though.
Dark Angel and India Sioux vs Hiroka and Mima Shimoda: One of the better tags I've seen from the women in Mexico so far. Dark Angel in particular was on top of her game and busted out this CRAZY handspring onto Hiroka's shoulders into a spinning armdrag move. TEN BILLION STARS! India also looked great and her wrestling was acceptable as well. Crowd was really into this and cheered all the participants when it was over. As if I even needed to say it - MILLION TIMES BETTER than the Nidia matches on the past shows.
Dragon Scramble: This was quite the mess. Lots of veteran luchadors involved so Dragon could remember his old UWA/Hamada's UWF days but they were mixed with some Japanese rookies and the fact this was a Dragon Scramble instead of a straight forward match didn't help. They were some highlights like seeing 60+ year old Matematico limp to the ring but then bust out two nice armdrags. Cuchillo blew up just trying to make it down the steps at Arena Mexico which is bad since he was booked to survive till the end. El Hijo Del Fantasma looked the best and nailed Black Terry with a tope suicida plus he survived to win the match. Unfortunately his win didn't get much of a pop b/c he was facing Cuchillo who was a mess and couldn't even be bothered to execute the finishing small package correctly. Crowd couldn't understand why the ref was counting even though both guys were clearly on the apron(pretty much) during the small package. Fredo lists Mano Negra in this match although I don't remember seeing him.
Brazo De Oro/Brazo De Platino/Passion Hasegawa vs Nozawa/Mazada/Takemura: Crowd LOVED this. Your standard Brazo match with a ton of comedy and Platino taking Porky's place so he got to get over the most. Hasegawa fit in well and added his own comedy which the crowd loved. The rudos did an amazing job playing along and not trying to steal the show from the tecnicos. There was a dive train at the end with Platino doing an INCREDIBLE somersault flip off the top rope onto everyone. He won the match with that same move but inside the ring this time onto all three rudos as they lay on the mat side-by-side. I'm sure somewhere backstage were some U.S. indy guys watching this and thinking "my match was ten times better, I did a shooting star press!"
El Averno/El Mephisto vs American Gigolo/Trent Acid vs Brutte Issei/Shigeo Okumura vs Milano Collection A.T./Kazuchika Okada: Either Gigolo forgot to get a haircut or he was going for the Ric Flair 80's look. If it's the latter, he acheived it. Much to my surprise, Milano came out with TZUKI in the monkey outfit which was awesome to see. As usual the monkey provided a ton of awesome action and comedy during the match. He did two CRAZY dives as well. The early part of the match contained your usual generic comedy spots that are in these types of matches. The Americans were seemingly never allowed in the ring on their own early on and just allowed to participate in these comedy spots. Venezia(the monkey) ended up taking on Issei and giving him a frankensteiner sending him outside and then nailing him with a flip plancha through the first and second rope! Huge pop for that! Averno/Mephisto then took over and started beating everyone up. Not sure where the Americans disapeared during the beatdown. They ended up flinging Okada over the top onto his partner and got DQ'ed. Next elimination was Issei accidentally splashing his own partner in the corner and then he got rolled up by Gigolo. So it was down to Milano's team vs the Americans. Acid looked pretty good in the short time he got in the ring. He ended up taking a frankensteiner off the top rope from Venezia and then catching an asai moonsault! Once again, crowd loved it! Milano and Gigolo then got in the ring and they messed up a spot. Then Milano whipped Gigolo into the ropes and appeared to be going for his bridge into an enzuigiri but Gigolo just stopped running so Milano(seemingly frustrated) just smacked him hard twice and kicked him in the face, then slammed him down and nailed his asai moonsault twisting splash for the finish. Perfectly entertaining match as they didn't try to do too much, all the eliminations made sense and the guys that had no business being heavily involved in the match were kept hidden nicely. I've always been a fan of Acid(one of the few I guess?) and he looked good every time he got in the ring. Shame he didn't get more time.:( Why hasn't Gigolo worked for PWU yet? You would assume that was one of the conditions of Acid being invited over. I think Ultimo ended up working one or two PWU shows though... but I'm not sure. Too many promotions in PA to keep track.
La Mascara vs Hajime Ohara - NWA Welterweight Title Bout: Ugh... a singles match with La Mascara. Exactly what you'd expect. He did his swinging frankensteiner, his spinning backbreaker, his enzuigiri and his tope suicida. Other than that he just sold b/c he has nothing else in his offense and doesn't care to try. Ohara and his equally boring offense ended up getting the win. PLEASE: NO REMATCH!!!
Dos Caras Jr. and Lizmark Jr. vs Mark Jindrak and Johnny Stamboli: Much better than their previous match from March but not on the level of their work together during regular CMLL Arena Mexico shows. Moreso the fault of the Mexicans than the Americans though as Jindark was his usual awesome self and Stamboli used a bunch of amazing moves for a guy his size. I wonder if they were rushed for time as everyone just bolted after the finish. Where did Stamboli disapear to after his CMLL run?
Atlantis/Dr. Wagner Jr./Ultimo Guerrero vs Perro Aguayo Jr./Great Muta/Ultimo Dragon - Relevos Incriebles: Less focus on workrate here and more focus on just each guy doing their own thing... especially Muta. It all came together brilliantly though. Early on they tried to push the idea nobody wanted their partners aside from Atlantis and Guerrero. Dragon worked some nice spots with Guerrero and ended up nailing him with a plancha over the ringpost! Muta started acting wacky at this point and at one point walked into the crowd to have a staredown with a 3 year old kid who burst into tears! AWWWWWWWWWWESOME!:D Muta continued his rampage and stood on the ramp while staring down some other kids. Meanwhile the rest of the guys were brawling all over the place. Just an amazing atmosphere. The end of the match had Dragon do an asai moonsault onto Guerrero. Wagner did a somersault off the apron onto Atlantis. Muta and Perrito didn't seem to have much chemistry going and I forget how but somehow he nailed a silla off the apron onto Atlantis. The finish had Muta pinning Wagner with the Shining Wizard. Great way to end the show.
Pretty good top-to-bottom show with a little bit of everything going on. Was DEFINITELY better than the Arena Mexico show that occured the day before, for those who remember it. Was definitely different from the Arena Coliseo T-Mon Mexico shows which seem to emphasize the trainees more whereas this show was all about star power and special matches. I wonder if there will be a DragonMania 2007?
CMLL 'Impacto En Monterrey' 7/1/06:
This show was WEIRD. The building was extremely dark and in certain matches the announcers would be announcing over the loudspeaker so the entire arena could hear and other times you would hear the announcers but no crowd noise so it seemed like nothing was getting a reaction.
Volador Jr. and Misterioso II vs Emilio Charles Jr. and Hombre Sin Nombre: Volador Jr. looked great. I actually barely remembered Misterioso II teaming with him.:/ Some nice spots and match got a little time but suffered from an odd clip or two during spots which shouldn't have really been clipped. Tecnicos won. Entertaining enough opener.
Mascara Sagrada/El Hijo Del Solitario/Maximo/Satanico vs Pierroth/El Hijo Del Pierroth/El Averno/El Mephisto: I found this to be pretty boring aside from when Maximo was making Averno and Mephisto bump around. Lucha by numbers all the way. If you're booking this show, why not at least fill the undercard with entertaining flyers instead of Sagrada, Solitario and Pierroth who are obviously not even going to bring half their normal workrate for this spot on the card. BAD.
Canek/Tinieblas/Huracan Ramirez Jr. vs Los Villanos III/IV/V: This is 2006, right? I didn't just get transported back to the god awful 1992 UWA days, right? Alushe came out with Tinieblas but barely got involved in the match as you'd expect. Horrible match from everyone involved. Four of these six can barely even bump any more and then there is Tinieblas who just plain CAN'T bump or he'd be dead. Huracan Jr. did a nice tope suicida at the end but then they did a crappy screwjob finish. The promoter who ran this show deserves to lose all his money as these guys are not fourth match type guys and thus there was no need for this match.
Rayo De Jalisco Jr./Mr. Niebla/Heavy Metal/Black Warrior vs Hector Garza/Mr. Aguila/Damian El Terrible/Damian 666: For some reason even though Warrior officially turned rudo MONTHS before this match took place, he was on the tecnico side and refusing to help them which is why they lost the first fall. Who booked this shit lineup? He eventually changed his mind and helped them to tie the falls up. There was a dive train in the third fall with nothing standing out aside from Garza's impressive corkscrew plancha. Rayo Jr. had no place in this match and nobody seemed particularly thrilled to be selling his lame offense. He looks like he put on at least 30 more pounds since his last CMLL TV appearence. Dive train couldn't save this from being awful as well.
El Hijo Del Santo/Dos Caras Jr./Dr. Wagner Jr. vs Atlantis/Blue Demon Jr./Perro Aguayo Jr.: Wow, that's a lot of star power. Maybe too much for one match if you ask me. These guys tried to save things and had a pretty entertaining match although it wasn't on the level you might have expected with these names involved. Santo seemed more toned down than usual and only did ONE DIVE which is unheard of from him in big main events. Lots of comedy in the third fall, especially with Perrito since he really isn't good for anything other than that.:) I think they were building to Santo vs Demon Jr.. Maybe that's gonna be the main event on the yearly big Monterrey show in 2007?
Really disapointing show although I wasn't expecting too much going in. Don't go out of your way to pick this up unless you need every Volador Jr. match there is! Yes, I'm refering to you Henrik!
Toryumon Mexico 5/13/06:
This was 'DragonMania', a highly publicized event by Ultimo Dragon that took place in Arena Mexico using a lot of foreigners. The card was such a big deal that some of the talent on the show even photoshopped their own pictures onto the poster! The arena looked really nice and the place looked pretty packed although a lot of tickets were given away for free.
Opener was Devon Moore vs The Hornet. Who? Exactly. The Backseat Boys were supposed to be on the show but Kashmere never came for whatever reason so I guess Moore took his place. Hornet is a local wrestler from Ontario who ironicially enough has a cousin that is good friends with my sister. I found this out like two days after he criticized me over at LuchaWorld for commenting that his match was going to be a dark match. I believe his words were something to the effect of: "Mexico doesn't run dark matches, we're on the main show. You really need to go to Mexico to understand who things work before you comment on stuff you don't know about."
Interesting.
Dark match, a non-televised match at a televised show used to warm up the crowd (compare "house show"). A dark match before the show begins is usually used to test out new talent (often local to the event).
Needless to say... Moore vs Hornet did not make the taped version of this event. In fact, there was a t-shirt released listing all the matches from the event on the back and his was the only one not included. Chris Hero and Claudio Castagnoli had a similar exhibition match on the previous Toryumon Mexico show and I'm sure both would have no problems admitting they worked a dark match and in fact would be proud they were included on such an event. The moral of the story? This is an example of why some wrestlers will make it and some won't. You don't need to live in Mexico to understand that lesson.
On with the actual event...
Arkangel/Jorge Rivera/Negro Navarro vs Hayato Fujita Jr./Kanjyuro Matsuyama/Shinji Nohashi: Billed as a teachers vs students match of course. Joined in progress with some nice work going on. Navarro was SUPER OVER and getting pops for anything he did to the Japanese kids. Nohashi blew a double team spot with Arkangel and Rivera but Rivera took over and covered nicely. Then the teachers took over for a short time before the students fought back and there was some more nice work. Navarro busted out this CRAZY submission on poor little Nohashi which the crowd went nuts for. Fujita Jr. wasn't too impressive and kinda stayed out of the way. Matsuyama ended up shoving Navarro into the ringpost but then got nailed by a pescado from Arkangel. Nohashi followed with a bullet tope suicida. Rivera got a nice nearfall but then fell victim to a satellite choke type maneuver by Fujita. Crowd did not enjoy that the students went over. Good opener though.
Dark Angel and India Sioux vs Hiroka and Mima Shimoda: One of the better tags I've seen from the women in Mexico so far. Dark Angel in particular was on top of her game and busted out this CRAZY handspring onto Hiroka's shoulders into a spinning armdrag move. TEN BILLION STARS! India also looked great and her wrestling was acceptable as well. Crowd was really into this and cheered all the participants when it was over. As if I even needed to say it - MILLION TIMES BETTER than the Nidia matches on the past shows.
Dragon Scramble: This was quite the mess. Lots of veteran luchadors involved so Dragon could remember his old UWA/Hamada's UWF days but they were mixed with some Japanese rookies and the fact this was a Dragon Scramble instead of a straight forward match didn't help. They were some highlights like seeing 60+ year old Matematico limp to the ring but then bust out two nice armdrags. Cuchillo blew up just trying to make it down the steps at Arena Mexico which is bad since he was booked to survive till the end. El Hijo Del Fantasma looked the best and nailed Black Terry with a tope suicida plus he survived to win the match. Unfortunately his win didn't get much of a pop b/c he was facing Cuchillo who was a mess and couldn't even be bothered to execute the finishing small package correctly. Crowd couldn't understand why the ref was counting even though both guys were clearly on the apron(pretty much) during the small package. Fredo lists Mano Negra in this match although I don't remember seeing him.
Brazo De Oro/Brazo De Platino/Passion Hasegawa vs Nozawa/Mazada/Takemura: Crowd LOVED this. Your standard Brazo match with a ton of comedy and Platino taking Porky's place so he got to get over the most. Hasegawa fit in well and added his own comedy which the crowd loved. The rudos did an amazing job playing along and not trying to steal the show from the tecnicos. There was a dive train at the end with Platino doing an INCREDIBLE somersault flip off the top rope onto everyone. He won the match with that same move but inside the ring this time onto all three rudos as they lay on the mat side-by-side. I'm sure somewhere backstage were some U.S. indy guys watching this and thinking "my match was ten times better, I did a shooting star press!"
El Averno/El Mephisto vs American Gigolo/Trent Acid vs Brutte Issei/Shigeo Okumura vs Milano Collection A.T./Kazuchika Okada: Either Gigolo forgot to get a haircut or he was going for the Ric Flair 80's look. If it's the latter, he acheived it. Much to my surprise, Milano came out with TZUKI in the monkey outfit which was awesome to see. As usual the monkey provided a ton of awesome action and comedy during the match. He did two CRAZY dives as well. The early part of the match contained your usual generic comedy spots that are in these types of matches. The Americans were seemingly never allowed in the ring on their own early on and just allowed to participate in these comedy spots. Venezia(the monkey) ended up taking on Issei and giving him a frankensteiner sending him outside and then nailing him with a flip plancha through the first and second rope! Huge pop for that! Averno/Mephisto then took over and started beating everyone up. Not sure where the Americans disapeared during the beatdown. They ended up flinging Okada over the top onto his partner and got DQ'ed. Next elimination was Issei accidentally splashing his own partner in the corner and then he got rolled up by Gigolo. So it was down to Milano's team vs the Americans. Acid looked pretty good in the short time he got in the ring. He ended up taking a frankensteiner off the top rope from Venezia and then catching an asai moonsault! Once again, crowd loved it! Milano and Gigolo then got in the ring and they messed up a spot. Then Milano whipped Gigolo into the ropes and appeared to be going for his bridge into an enzuigiri but Gigolo just stopped running so Milano(seemingly frustrated) just smacked him hard twice and kicked him in the face, then slammed him down and nailed his asai moonsault twisting splash for the finish. Perfectly entertaining match as they didn't try to do too much, all the eliminations made sense and the guys that had no business being heavily involved in the match were kept hidden nicely. I've always been a fan of Acid(one of the few I guess?) and he looked good every time he got in the ring. Shame he didn't get more time.:( Why hasn't Gigolo worked for PWU yet? You would assume that was one of the conditions of Acid being invited over. I think Ultimo ended up working one or two PWU shows though... but I'm not sure. Too many promotions in PA to keep track.
La Mascara vs Hajime Ohara - NWA Welterweight Title Bout: Ugh... a singles match with La Mascara. Exactly what you'd expect. He did his swinging frankensteiner, his spinning backbreaker, his enzuigiri and his tope suicida. Other than that he just sold b/c he has nothing else in his offense and doesn't care to try. Ohara and his equally boring offense ended up getting the win. PLEASE: NO REMATCH!!!
Dos Caras Jr. and Lizmark Jr. vs Mark Jindrak and Johnny Stamboli: Much better than their previous match from March but not on the level of their work together during regular CMLL Arena Mexico shows. Moreso the fault of the Mexicans than the Americans though as Jindark was his usual awesome self and Stamboli used a bunch of amazing moves for a guy his size. I wonder if they were rushed for time as everyone just bolted after the finish. Where did Stamboli disapear to after his CMLL run?
Atlantis/Dr. Wagner Jr./Ultimo Guerrero vs Perro Aguayo Jr./Great Muta/Ultimo Dragon - Relevos Incriebles: Less focus on workrate here and more focus on just each guy doing their own thing... especially Muta. It all came together brilliantly though. Early on they tried to push the idea nobody wanted their partners aside from Atlantis and Guerrero. Dragon worked some nice spots with Guerrero and ended up nailing him with a plancha over the ringpost! Muta started acting wacky at this point and at one point walked into the crowd to have a staredown with a 3 year old kid who burst into tears! AWWWWWWWWWWESOME!:D Muta continued his rampage and stood on the ramp while staring down some other kids. Meanwhile the rest of the guys were brawling all over the place. Just an amazing atmosphere. The end of the match had Dragon do an asai moonsault onto Guerrero. Wagner did a somersault off the apron onto Atlantis. Muta and Perrito didn't seem to have much chemistry going and I forget how but somehow he nailed a silla off the apron onto Atlantis. The finish had Muta pinning Wagner with the Shining Wizard. Great way to end the show.
Pretty good top-to-bottom show with a little bit of everything going on. Was DEFINITELY better than the Arena Mexico show that occured the day before, for those who remember it. Was definitely different from the Arena Coliseo T-Mon Mexico shows which seem to emphasize the trainees more whereas this show was all about star power and special matches. I wonder if there will be a DragonMania 2007?
CMLL 'Impacto En Monterrey' 7/1/06:
This show was WEIRD. The building was extremely dark and in certain matches the announcers would be announcing over the loudspeaker so the entire arena could hear and other times you would hear the announcers but no crowd noise so it seemed like nothing was getting a reaction.
Volador Jr. and Misterioso II vs Emilio Charles Jr. and Hombre Sin Nombre: Volador Jr. looked great. I actually barely remembered Misterioso II teaming with him.:/ Some nice spots and match got a little time but suffered from an odd clip or two during spots which shouldn't have really been clipped. Tecnicos won. Entertaining enough opener.
Mascara Sagrada/El Hijo Del Solitario/Maximo/Satanico vs Pierroth/El Hijo Del Pierroth/El Averno/El Mephisto: I found this to be pretty boring aside from when Maximo was making Averno and Mephisto bump around. Lucha by numbers all the way. If you're booking this show, why not at least fill the undercard with entertaining flyers instead of Sagrada, Solitario and Pierroth who are obviously not even going to bring half their normal workrate for this spot on the card. BAD.
Canek/Tinieblas/Huracan Ramirez Jr. vs Los Villanos III/IV/V: This is 2006, right? I didn't just get transported back to the god awful 1992 UWA days, right? Alushe came out with Tinieblas but barely got involved in the match as you'd expect. Horrible match from everyone involved. Four of these six can barely even bump any more and then there is Tinieblas who just plain CAN'T bump or he'd be dead. Huracan Jr. did a nice tope suicida at the end but then they did a crappy screwjob finish. The promoter who ran this show deserves to lose all his money as these guys are not fourth match type guys and thus there was no need for this match.
Rayo De Jalisco Jr./Mr. Niebla/Heavy Metal/Black Warrior vs Hector Garza/Mr. Aguila/Damian El Terrible/Damian 666: For some reason even though Warrior officially turned rudo MONTHS before this match took place, he was on the tecnico side and refusing to help them which is why they lost the first fall. Who booked this shit lineup? He eventually changed his mind and helped them to tie the falls up. There was a dive train in the third fall with nothing standing out aside from Garza's impressive corkscrew plancha. Rayo Jr. had no place in this match and nobody seemed particularly thrilled to be selling his lame offense. He looks like he put on at least 30 more pounds since his last CMLL TV appearence. Dive train couldn't save this from being awful as well.
El Hijo Del Santo/Dos Caras Jr./Dr. Wagner Jr. vs Atlantis/Blue Demon Jr./Perro Aguayo Jr.: Wow, that's a lot of star power. Maybe too much for one match if you ask me. These guys tried to save things and had a pretty entertaining match although it wasn't on the level you might have expected with these names involved. Santo seemed more toned down than usual and only did ONE DIVE which is unheard of from him in big main events. Lots of comedy in the third fall, especially with Perrito since he really isn't good for anything other than that.:) I think they were building to Santo vs Demon Jr.. Maybe that's gonna be the main event on the yearly big Monterrey show in 2007?
Really disapointing show although I wasn't expecting too much going in. Don't go out of your way to pick this up unless you need every Volador Jr. match there is! Yes, I'm refering to you Henrik!
posted by Rob at 4:03 PM
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