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Great Lucha

A blog by ohtani's jacket in General

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Entries in this blog

Vintage Negro Casas of the Day #8

Negro Casas, Black Magic y Mano Negra vs. Mocho Cota, Bestia Salvaje y Emilio Charles Jr., CMLL 5/13/94   Jesus, Cota, Salvaje and Emilio! Check out the mugs on those three.   This was rudos contra rudos and started off with some nifty matwork between Black Magic and Salvaje. It's been a while since I've seen Bestia look good in a match and I was instantly reminded of what an underrated talent he was. It was also the best Smiley has looked on the mat in CMLL, which was a nice surprise. Mano

Atlantis vs. Ultimo Guerrero

Atlantis vs. Ultimo Guerrero, mask vs. mask, 9/19/14   This was the most emotional mask match in lucha since the Atlantis/Villano III bout in 2000. The work was simple and effective. It was mostly built around nearfalls, and got better as the match went along, but the match itself didn't really matter. The result and the post-match afterwards were all about the emotion of a mask match.   Jose Fernandez reckoned that Ultimo Guerrero kayfabed his family about the result and it's easy to believ

Villano III

Villano is a guy whose prime is almost completely missing. We have bits and pieces of it -- matches he had in EMLL, matches he had in Japan, matches that aired in Japan or were filmed by Japanese crews, and a few handhelds of his apuesta matches -- but mostly we're left with ring results and pictures, and Jose Fernandez' bio.   By the time the UWA got television, he was nearly 40. Forty is not old by lucha standards, but it's not considered most workers' physical peak. Judging by the footage,

El Hijo del Santo, GOAT?

It's early days in the once a decade revisit of the Smarkschoice Greatest Wrestler Ever poll, but so far plenty of people have Santo pinned as their number one luchador. Santo's an easy pick, but is it the right pick? I cued up a half dozen matches to see how much greatness I could find.   El Hijo del Santo y Black Shadow Jr. vs. Octagon y Fuerza Guerrera, Monterrey 12/15/91   Relevos Suicidas is such a waste of time. Even in a bout like this where the action isn't so bad it eats up what wou

Doubting El Dandy

Nothing bugs me more in lucha than the lack of critical appraisal that El Dandy and other all-time greats receive. I can understand there not being as much evaluation of Dandy as workers we all grew up on, but to me it's a sign that he's not taken that seriously. Of course when you watch El Dandy for the first time, as many people did on the 1990 Pro-Wrestling Only Yearbook, you're struck by how good he was -- one of the best in the world that year, and possibly one of the best of all-time -- bu

Vintage Negro Casas of the Day #7

Negro Casas, Babe Face y Rambo vs. Villano I, Villano IV y Villano V, UWA 3/6/92   This was a blast. I know I've said this a thousand times but these 1991-92 UWA television matches were so much fun. This was clipped, but even the sped up version was great with exchanges so good they're like candy.   Casas started off by wrestling Villano IV. If you're cut from the same cloth I am, you're going to want to watch this when you hear they wrestled. It was rad. Casas was rocking this black trunks/

Vintage Negro Casas of the Day #6

El Dandy/Piloto Suicida/El Brazo vs. Negro Casas/Loverboy/Kung Fu (Los Angeles, CA 9/19/92)   Vintage Casas of the Day gets requests!   This WWA handheld was a request from Pro Wrestling Only poster Gregor. Gregor doesn't post much, but I've always admired his taste in lucha and his penchant for seeking out the hidden gems like we do on the Great Lucha blog, so I was rapt to get a message from him.   Lucha house show matches are no different from other promotion's house shows. They're ba

Vintage Negro Casas of the Day #5

El Dandy y Negro Casas vs. Corazon De Leon y Ultimo Dragon, CMLL 7/16/93   Whose bright idea was it to give this 40 minutes?   People often complain about how short and meaningless the first two falls in lucha are, but three falls of equal length makes for really dull matches.   When Jericho was in it was wrestled like an American match. When Ultimo was in it was wrestled like a Japanese match. Dandy was a technico and Casas a rudo, but the match wasn't remotely story driven. It was a wo

Vintage Negro Casas of the Day #4

Negro Casas/El Felino/Dr. Wagner Jr. vs. El Dandy/La Fiera/Corazon de Leon, CMLL 7/23/93   This was the epitome of a nothing match.   It began with some sort of sit down talk between Casas and Felino with heel commentator Arturo Rivera serving as mediator. They seemed engaged in a philosophical debate over whether Casas was still a rudo, which I'm sure is riveting if you understand a word of Spanish, but perplexing if you don't.   How could Casas and Felino remain on the same side when Ca

Vintage Negro Casas of the Day #3

El Dandy/Pierroth Jr./Chamaco Valaguez vs. Negro Casas/Mogur/Black Magic, CMLL 7/30/93   This was a fun Arena Coliseo style match. You won't find too many guys at their best at Arena Coliseo as it was very much the secondary show to the main Arena Mexico cards, and the matches were more about heat than great work, but when the crowd get behind a match as they do here, it makes for a fun environment where the charismatic workers can really shine.   Smiley was in his element here really lappin

Vintage Negro Casas of the Day #2

Negro Casas/El Satanico/Bestia Salvaje vs. El Dandy/Ultimo Dragon/Apolo Dantes, CMLL 8/14/92   I mistakenly thought this was part of the Casas vs. Dandy feud, but it was actually part of the build to the Bestia/Dandy title match, the Anniversary Show hair match, and the Casas vs. Dragon title fight.   Dandy was such a stud he had issues with all three rudos here, but the match has got to rank as a disappointment given the talent involved. The footage was joined in progress during a lackadais

Vintage Negro Casas of the Day #1

If you ask me, people watch too much maestro Casas and not enough of his vintage work, so here's a new feature on the Great Lucha blog that will hopefully encourage people to check out his glory years.   Ciclon Ramirez, Oro, Ultimo Dragon vs. Bestia Salvaje, Felino, Negro Casas, CMLL 3/12/93   This was part of the three-week build to the 3/26 UWA World Middleweight Championship bout between Casas and El Ultimo Dragon. Casas vs. Ultimo Dragon isn't the first match up that springs to mind when

Virus vs. Fuego

Virus vs. Fuego, CMLL World Super Lightweight Championship, 6/15/14   This was a tremendous match and my working MOTY at this point. Virus was outstanding and showed once again why he is without peer not only in CMLL but in the whole of Mexico really. Fuego deserves credit for his part in the match as well. It would be easy to put all the focus on Virus & Kid, but Fuego put in about as assured a performance as you can expect from a kid.   The opening exchange saw them work from a tie-up

Getting further caught up

Silver Star vs. Charles Lucero, UWA World Middleweight Championship, 6/22/14   This was a beautiful match. The type of match you could easily imagine Lucero having in his prime. Really authentic lucha maestros wrestling; the type of title match wrestling you don't see much of these days. To be fair, it probably wouldn't go over too well at Arena Mexico, but it's great to see two practitioners carrying on the art form as there aren't too many connections to old school Monterrey left anymore. Th

Getting caught up

First up, let me just say that I LOVE the new colour scheme on the Arena Mexico ring. I think it looks fantastic and makes good matches seem even better.   Barbaro Cavernario vs. Cachorro, CMLL 4/18/14   I thought this was an excellent lightning match; much better than the Cavernario v. Hechicero workrate sprint where they tried to hit all the highs of a 20 minute lucha match in 7 minutes or less. Here we got a straightforward build from pure lucha exchanges to high risk moves and nearfalls.

Satanico vs. Pierroth

Satanico vs. Pierroth Jr, CMLL World Light Heavyweight Championship, '92/93   This was from sometime during Pierroth's year long reign as CMLL World Light Heavyweight champion, which began in March of '92 and ended in April of '93. Pierroth's Los Intocables group feuded extensively with the Infernales during this period. Pierroth had several title defences against Pirata Morgan, a match against MS-1 in Puebla, and this match which appears to have been broadcast on some sort of local Tijuana te

Dandy vs. Llanes trios

Atlantis/Ringo Mendoza/El Dandy vs. Mano Negra/Javier Llanes/Black Magic, CMLL 2/15/94   My buddy Raging Noodles once had a prank played on him that there was a trios match leading into the El Dandy/Javier Llanes singles match where Llanes worked over Dandy's fingers or something to that effect. It was a neat prank, but Noodles my boy, here's that trios you always wanted to see.   As with most gems, we get a great set of intros. I never realised what an ugly blighter Llanes was. He had this

Virus, Cachorro & Hechicero vs. Negro Casas, Cavernario & Dragon Lee

Virus, Cachorro & Hechicero vs. Negro Casas, Cavernario & Dragon Lee, CMLL 5/23/14   Everybody's talking about this as a Match of the Year Candidate, but for a trios with four good workers in it, I thought it was pretty disappointing. The only parts that were exciting or genuinely engaging were during the finishing stretches, and the work in between was clumsy and unfocused.   The opening fall was a perfect example. Dragon Lee is a young guy and can't mat wrestle. If you have him wo

More 90s stuff

El Dandy/La Fiera/Ultimo Dragon vs. Negro Casas/Black Magic/Jaque Mate (5/17/94)   This was just a 15 minute, straight falls win for the technicos, with a bit of dissension among the rudos, but man were the Casas/Dandy exchanges good. They had an opening mat exchange that was very reminiscent of their work from '92; where the purpose of each hold was to show who's boss. Casas would take Dandy down face first to canvas and slap him in the back of the head or pull his hair, and Dandy would use h

Charles Lucero vs. Blue Panther

Charles Lucero vs. Blue Panther, WWA World Middleweight Championship, Lucha Libre Azteca 5/9/2004   This was a good match, but not a great one.   Much of that boils down to expectations. When I first heard there was a Panther vs. Lucero singles match, I started wondering what it looked like and how they worked it. I practically booked the thing in my head. I had fantasies of a match that resembled the 1992 title match between Santo and Espanto Jr, forgetting that these two workers are well p

Recent matches

Rush vs. Shocker, hair vs. hair, CMLL 3/21/14   This wasn't your papa's hair vs. hair match, but then what is these days? I was ready to write this off as another CMLL apuesta match that fails to keep the traditions alive, but they actually won me over with their physicality. It wasn't as measured as an old-school hair match where they flail about selling, but they hit each other hard and there was even a bit of hard way blood. They rushed through it even quicker on TV, but at least there was

Charles Lucero matches cont.

Galactar y Rico Rodriguez vs. Alberto Dos Rios y Charles Lucero, ACM 3/9/14   I didn't pay too much attention to what the other guys were doing, but when Lucero was in, he showed he could still work rapid fire lucha sequences, at least with the younger guys. So, I guess the slower exchanges in the title match had more to do with Silver Star's bumping than Lucero's timing. These one fall Monterrey tags are completely unnoteworthy, but it's good to see Lucero is an even more complete worker than

Charles Lucero matches

El Ninja, Hector Garza y Ruben Juarez Jr vs. Blue Fish, Charles Lucero y Gato del Ring, Monterrey 11/11/92   Yep, early 90s Charles Lucero is awesome. You knew that it would be, but here's the confirmation.   This was a fun Monterrey trios that took place a few months after Garza's debut. Lucero was about as close to his prime as we have on tape, Gato del Ring was one of those awesome Monterrey style journeymen who usually do all the wacky gimmicks, and Blue Fish is a legendary Monterrey rud

Silver Star vs. Charles Lucero

Silver Star vs. Charles Lucero, WWA World Middleweight Championship, ACM 3/2/14   Charles Lucero is quickly becoming a must-see worker for me. At present, I'd rate him as the second best maestro in the country behind Virus.   This was a really old-school style title match worked on a stained and faded canvas in front of a tiny Monterrey crowd, and carried all of the traditions of UWA style Monterrey title matches. Watching this, it was easy to imagine what it must have been like to watch Luc

Lizmark matches

Lizmark vs. Ulises, NWA World Light Heavyweight Championship match (CMLL 4/13/90)   Solid albeit unspectacular title match between Lizmark and a then masked Tony Salazar. The opening matwork was built around a number of Lizmark takedowns, as he worked toward the submission he was looking for. Both workers played around with an armbar theme before promptly dropping it, no doubt displeasing those looking for some sort of continuity in their wrestling. Salazar brought back the armbar during the p

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