CMLL
CMLL (FRI) 04/03/2026 Arena México [CMLL, Excelsior, Kaiser Sports, thecubsfan]
1) Galaxy & Shockercito b Minos I & Minos II
10:22.
2) Okumura, Shoma Kato, Yutani b Brillante Jr., Capitán Suicida, Fugaz
12:50
3) India Sioux, Marcela, Thunder Rosa b Olympia, Persephone, Princesa Sugehit
11:56. After the win, Thunder Rosa demanded that Salvador Lutteroth let her know if they were going to offer her a contract or not. Lutteroth came to the ring to make it official – Rosa was the latest to sign a CMLL/AEW dual contract.
4) Neón b Templario [lightning]
8:49. Neón appeared to have suffered a leg knee injury but continued (and won) the match
5) Máscara Dorada b Flip Gordon, Averno [CMLL Universal, semifinal]
14:31. Dorada advances to the final on 04/24.
6) Kevin Knight, Místico, Speedball Mike Bailey © b El Clon, Hechicero, Volador Jr. [AEW TRIOS]
19:09. First defense and first match with Volador as part of the Don Callis Family. He lost to Mistico all the same.
This was a sell out
The trios title match was easily Great. Just total action, a match that never felt like it lasted too long, even going close to twenty minutes (and going hot from the start), and the teams meshing well against each other and with each other. I’ve been a bit lukewarm about Mistico in this AEW title trio. He’s the big star, he’s the one AEW is trying to present as a legend, he may make a difference in some markets, but also Mascara Dorada might have better AEW matches in that same spot. Mistico totally worked in that spot on this night, in front of his audience, and working with the guys who know him best (and also el Clon, who’s faced a million Mistico clones.) The crowd was awed by Bailey and Knight, but Mistico’s work was smoother and more impressive here than it had been elsewhere. He was also the show’s biggest star. There were a few moments that didn’t work for me, but those were well outweighed by the good. Definitely a match to go track down if you haven’t seen it.
The AEW trios champs and Mascara Dorada talked post-show. Mistico, before even getting a question, said that the Sky Team wasn’t broken up, they’re still teaming. He’s also teaming with Speedball and Kevin Knight but the CMLL team is not done. Mistico said he talked to Dorada and Neon to make sure they understood that too. Dorada’s idea was that they should just add Jetspeed to the team and make it a five-person group. That didn’t seem to be the plan yet.
I thought most of the undercard matches were good, though none hit similar heights. Neon and Templario have a better match in them, though they both could use an opponent that brings them out of exhibition mode and into a more serious fight. I was really just watching that to see if Neon had two working ACLs for the last half after his leg got twisted underneath him on a dive landing; he finished, but we’ll know in time. The Universal tournament match was such a Dorada exhibition that my US wrestling brain expected the victory to be stolen from him. Instead, he just looked like a star and won. (So much for all in on Averno.) Brillante stood out positively more than usual in the second match, though Yutani might have been the best one there. The crowd liked the mini opener. The women’s match was the biggest struggle, coming across as slow, and the execution was not on par with the rest of the show.
Thunder Rosa and CMLL announcing the dual contract was the big news on the show, then posted an official contract signing on Sunday. I didn’t think this audience knew Rosa well enough to treat it as a big deal, but the announcers and the promotion made it seem very important.
Edgar Noriega returned from his hiatus and still seems to be the lead referee here. There remain strong rumors that his role behind the scenes has been greatly reduced, with the idea that he was unlikely to stick around as only a referee. For now, he does seem to be sticking around.
CMLL (SAT) 04/04/2026 Arena Coliseo [CMLL, Infobae, thecubsfan]
1) KeMalito & Periquito Sacaryas b Chamuel & Tengu
10:56
2) Cobarde Jr., Espanto Jr., Guerrero Maya Jr. b Hijo del Pantera, Pantera, Pantera Jr.
10:02.
3) Xelhua b Solar I [lightning]
9:09. CMLL aired this match in black and white.
4) Garra Negra, La Jarochita, Thunder Rosa b Keyra, Sanely, Zeuxis
9:13.
5) Calavera Jr. I & Calavera Jr. II b Hijo del Villano III & Villano III Jr. © [Arena Coliseo TAG]
17:53. Villanos fall on second defense (first was 12/2024). Calaveras become 14th modren champions.
6) Kevin Knight & Speedball Mike Bailey b Ángel de Oro & Niebla Roja
13:08. Jetspeed asked for a title match. (CMLL announcers knew it was for the CMLL titles, not the NJPW Strong ones.)
7) El Clon b Soberano Jr., Místico
15:51. After beating Soberano, Clon signaled that he’d like a title match with Mistico.
This was a sell out.
The Villanos end their title reign with another heated title match. The difference was that the supporters of Los Calaveras were just as loud as those of Los Villanos. Both teams are flawed; they tend to do stuff without really understanding what they’re doing or how it works together. Sometimes that’s delightful, sometimes it can be rough. It was plenty enough for those fans to make a lot of noise and turn, by statute, the least meaningful championship in CML into a big-time feeling match. Most of what they did worked pretty well. This was the first time that the adjusted rule set, where only one team member had to be pinned, played well for the finish. The surprise pin couldn’t have been a match-ending spot before this year, and it seemed to get a great reaction. Hechicero talked about wanting to defend his heavyweight title often, just like Claudio did, but not being able to do so during his first reign. CMLL similarly missed the boat by not having the Villanos do these kinds of title defenses on a regular basis. Maybe they’ll run this one back again.
I don’t think the top two matches could follow. Angel de Oro & Niebla Roja – who are the CHAVEZ brothers, not the SANCHEZ brothers – and Jetspeed was good but not much more than that. It made more sense when it was obvious they were going to come back a week later. Clon, Soberano, and Mistico were another disposable three-way, a fine enough effort with no real thought put into it – just every three-way match ever. WOR had it as one of the best matches of the year, and I can’t even grasp where that’s coming from. CMLL didn’t say Clon/Mistico would be next week, but next week is AAA TV in Mexico City week so it probably is happening.
The women’s match was much better than Friday; Keyra and Garra Negra made a lot of difference. Xelhua/Solar I was good, which is as good as it can be hoped for at their respective stages to their career. Xelhua can work with Solar, but they’re not going to go deeper than the llave exhibition. Panteras were great fun as a trio and I couldn’t believe they lost that match. Opener was all KeMalito.
CMLL (SUN) 04/05/2026 Arena México [CMLL]
1) Último Dragóncito b Mercurio [lightning]
2) Diamond, Eléctrico, Fuego b Disturbio, Inquisidor, Robin
3) Dragón Legendario, Rey Bucanero, Stigma b El Elemental, Okumura, Shoma Kato
4) La Jarochita & Thunder Rosa b Olympia & Persephone
Thunder Rosa surprised Persephone and pinned her.
5) Euforia, Niebla Roja, Valiente b Esfinge, Star Black, Star Jr.
6) Kevin Knight, Místico, Speedball Mike Bailey b Gran Guerrero, Stuka Jr., Último Guerrero 
If I were able to see this show on a CMLL streaming service, I’d be able to tell you it was an unusually well-attended Sunday Arena Mexico event. I’d be able to tell you that CMLL cleared 10K on for Easter. I’d say the crowd was very into the main event, with Mistico easily the biggest deal. I’d be able to tell you that the match was pretty good for a Sunday match, though I’d say Friday was better. Unfortunately, this show was recorded but not placed on CMLL’s expensive streaming service and there’s no way to see the match, not even a little icon you could click on for a Google Drive.
CMLL (TUE) 04/07/2026 Arena México
1) Acero & Aéreo vs Full Metal & Rostro de Acero
2) Espíritu Negro & Rey Cometa vs Disturbio & Robin
3) India Sioux, Marcela, Skadi vs Candela, Metálica, Princesa Sugehit
4) Capitán Suicida & Xelhua vs Vegas Depredador & Virus
5) Dragón de Fuego, Dragón Legendario, Dragón Rojo Jr. vs Averno, Euforia, Mephisto
6) Máscara Dorada, Místico, Neón vs Hechicero, Soberano Jr., Volador Jr.
Sky Team together in the main event. The Dragons haven’t been together much lately. Match 4 is a really good mix of people.
Tonight’s Puebla show is a sell out.
CMLL (TUE) 04/07/2026 Arena Coliseo Guadalajara
1) Avispón Negro Jr., Balder, Último Ángel vs Estrella De Jalisco, Shezmu, Temerario
2) Átomo & KeMalito vs Chamuel & Tengu
3) Amon-Ra, Continental, Kaiju vs Ángel del Bien, Astro Oriental, Lince del Bajio
4) El Tapatío, Gallo Jr., Ráfaga Jr. vs Arlequín, Makará, Prince Drago
5) Adrenalina, Brillante Jr., Draego vs Calavera Jr. I, Calavera Jr. II, Persa
6) La Jarochita & Tessa Blanchard vs Sanely & Zeuxis
7) Atlantis, Dulce Gardenia, Templario vs Gran Guerrero, Stuka Jr., Último Guerrero
Forgot to get this one on Friday. Guadalajara main eventer Dulce is back. So is El Tapatio.
Guadalajara says they’re running a special Friday show soon.
Mistico is making an unexpected return to NJPW at the end of the month. He’s on shows from April 29th to May 4th. He’s just doing random tag matches, though there’s a chance his match on the 4th (w/Desperado versus Kosei Fujita & Robbie Eagles) turns into a junior tag team match if the TMDK wins their title match. I think he’s on the tour because old rival/friend Tiger Mask IV is getting his likely last ever IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship match but that’s just a guess.
NJPW announced the full field for their Best of Super Juniors, which starts May 14th. Titan and Valiente Jr. are in the same A Block. They’ll wrestle DOUKI, Kosei Fujita, Master Wato, Ryusuke Taguchi, Robbie X, Francesco Akira, Nick Wayne, and Jun Kasai. Valiente Jr. is probably finishing last in that group, but that’s fine for him right now. Titan figures to be in the top mix, yet is a long shot to advance. Only one person per block moves on.
Ring of Honor says their next PPV will be Friday May 15th. Sometimes, not always, that includes CMLL participation.
Updated Slam Fest card
CMLL , SLAM FEST (THU) 04/16/2026 Palms Theatre, Las Vegas, Nevada
1) KeMalito & Perico Zakarías vs Chamuel & Tengu
2) Blue Panther vs Último Guerrero
3) Máscara Dorada & Neón vs Capitán Suicida & Flip Gordon
4) Persephone vs ? [CMLL WOMEN]
5) Místico vs Hechicero
I presumed this was it when they announced the last two, but then I was reminded that Soberano Jr., Atlantis Jr., and Templario are left from the group that was announced. A three-way doesn’t move me much, but this is a pretty good lineup from what they’ve got to work with it. I think I’d rather see Mistico/UG and Panther/Hechicero, but focusing on the people with the highest profile on AEW TV is probably the better ticketing-selling move. (It is great that the idea to draw international fans is to have an all-Mexican card, when that has definitely not been the idea in Arena Mexico this year.) There’s no hint as to who Persephone is wrestling; I’d guess it’ll be someone outside of CMLL.
Denise Salcedo has an interview with Mascara Dorada. I presume the recent run of CMLL interviews with international press are related to Slam Fest shows.
I haven’t really caught up with all the WrestleMania weekend lineups yet; I’ll try to do that soon, but you can find the full list of everything over on Voices of Wrestling.
El Universal has a brief profile of Kira & Skadi.
AAA
This week’s AAA TV
- Important takeaway: while both trios’ matches had the feel of Lucha World Cup teams, Spanish commentary only barely touched on that concept – it didn’t come off as the usual hard sell when something like that is coming. (My impression is the English commentary was the same.) The commentary itself appeared to be redone after Rey de Reyes – there were shots where you could see the announcers at the desk during matches, and the “wrong” person would be talking compared to what we were hearing. Maybe plans changed, maybe they’ll still announce something later on, but those matches were presented on this episode as “here’s some new trios” for the night.
- That made this a very non-essential episode of AAA from the Showcenter, which is actually keeping in AAA’s traditions. Charly Dempsey was just taking Epydemius Jr.’s spot.
- Mesias, Lince Dorado, Mecha Wolf beat Kento, Nobu San and Takuma [11:08]
- This was a rudo/rudo battle where both teams played tencico, but that’s not even really the dynamic at this point. The new AAA match structure is pushed/non-pushed. The Puerto Rican team is pushed (relatively), so they took 70-80% of the match. Tokyo Bad Boys got in highlights spots, and it went over 10 minutes, but it was also not in doubt who the better team was meant to be. I need to come up with a name for this style of match because they’re already happening a fair amount.
- The Monterrey crowd saw Mesias as the biggest star and rooted for the Puerto Rican team, which they happily played into. There was no mention or suggestion Mesias or Mecha would be going after el Ojo after Dorian betrayed them; that angle served its purpose and is long forgotten now.
- There was also no overt sign that – even with more recent commentary – that AAA was shying away from Mecha Wolf. The prior AAA would cut wrestlers out of the YouTube uploads if they had done something they found objectionable. It doesn’t seem like AAA is doing that here as of yet. Mecha Wolf has only been accused in this case, not charged or convicted, so they may not go as far.
- Flammer defeats Sussy Love [4:03] to retain the AAA Reina de Reinas championship
- Sussy Love did well in the (perhaps edited) four minutes she got, but they also did no video or interview to introduce her, just what they could squeeze in during her walk to the ring. She has a new very WWE entrance so that gave them a bit more time than usual.
- They’re really pushing the Flammer championship celebration as the longest reigning AAA Reina de Reinas champion ever. That crowd is going to pop for whatever WWE person shows up to interrupt it, but it feels like they think they have a big one.
- Axiom, Dorian Van Dux, Elio LeFluer beat Charlie Dempesy, Nathan Frazer, Tristen Ángels [11:53]
- maybe they were going to do
- The only vignette on this show for these matches was one with Axiom and Frazer, establishing that they both agreed to be in this match without realizing they were on opposing teams, but this wasn’t meant to be teasing, just a break-up again.
- I think this vignette happened because these fellows were at SmackDown, and WWE could get it filmed there, and they didn’t have as much time to do stuff for everyone else. (AAA’s backstage interviewers didn’t appear present on this taping – we only saw Pimpi as a comedy bit in that role.) It reinforced the impression that this AAA show is currently for WWE fans, people who followed Dempsey and Axiom through NXT, and need reassurance that they’re not re-doing that angle. If you were an AAA viewer who wasn’t already watching WWE, you’d have little idea who Frazer was or what this discussion was about. I think it’s good they’re carrying over that history into AAA, but it’s an obvious tiering when the special WWE guest stars get their history highlighted and the carryover AAA do not. If they had Mesias talking for 30 seconds about how he didn’t need El Ojo anyway, Lince and Mecha are the real guys he can count on and that Axiom/Frazer vignette, it would’ve been good. Or they could’ve bagged the vignette when they realized it would stick out, and had the announcers tell the story. Telling that story for this match itself was important – it built to the tag partners fighting – but when the only story you’re telling on the show is about the people who don’t really work there, then you’re also telling a story about how much viewers should invest in the rest of the show.
- It was a really good match! The crowd really liked it. The people involved should be proud of their effort, the AAA management crew should be proud of putting it on, and it should get a lot of attention.
- It’s also a match that would’ve gotten much more attention if it were on WWE TV, NXT, or SmackDown. It may not have made great sense to be on those shows, but it didn’t make much sense to be in AAA for certain, and it got over for sure anyway. It’s also a match that seemingly happened the way it did because it didn’t have as many restrictions as WWE TV matches seem to have, which makes you wonder why those restrictions should exist? Or why hasn’t there been a similar AAA TV match of Mexican wrestlers without those restrictions? There’s no reason these six men should have to go to another country and presumably the least-well-viewed live-action TV show in the WWE group of shows* to have a match of this quality when they have about eight hours of WWE to have that same quality. And maybe if they did get to have that match somewhere in those eight hours, people wouldn’t be complaining about the half dozen WWE things they seem to be complaining about this week, and maybe we’d get to see Radioactivo or Extasis or whoever’s Drago this week get to have their chance to have their own version of that match. Never has such an obviously and undeniably great match frustrated me more than this one did.
- 90% of the comments I get here of late are people who care about AAA and only AAA, which tells me a) there’s not enough wrestling people covering AAA right now because you wouldn’t be here if you could find a solid option that wasn’t as cynical about the whole entireprise as me b) this section is going to get comments upset with me be mean about AAA and I’m repating myself to cut that off early – I’m being mean towards WWE. If WWE thought matches like this were the way to go, they’d be doing them on WWE TV and WWE would be better and probably AAA were better. WWE seems not to think these matches are the way to go, and so AAA seemed like the way for people in WWE to make the case that there are other options, as the sacrifice of doing a third AAA match this episode. I’d like AAA to have lots of matches like this one. I’d also like the focus of AAA to be AAA.
- * – i dunno what Main Event does, don’t @ me
- There were a couple of Penta promos that didn’t communicate new info but did remind that he and Vikingo have the title match next week.
- There was a scripted line in there about WWE forging new superstars in AAA. They used a photo of Faby Apache in there because they didn’t have a new superstar to feature. In all truth, they are absolutely forging new stars, but those stars are guys like Grande Americano and Omos, and that doesn’t quite fit the image they want to project. It’s not a shame that AAA isn’t forging any new Mexican wrestlers; they’re pretty successful right now just maximizing what they have. It’s also a bullet point on a mission statement for this takeover that hasn’t happened, but they’re going to pretend it has happened because that was the plan.
You should go out of your way to see the great trios match and then question why you are seeing that great trios match on AAA.
There’s a photo going around on Facebook of signs WWE posted at AAA shows asking fans not to tape the shows. I can’t confirm they’re real, though they seem consistent with WWE’s policies. They were also probably AAA’s policies, but no one paid them much mind. I don’t expect arena personnel to throw people out for filming, but it’s just that a few of them might be asked to leave.
An outdoor free show with AAA wrestlers in Chihuahua – the city – drew between 5,000 and 8,000 fans. This appeared to be a Pagano-led event, though it may also have been political: the mayor of Ciudad Juárez, who’s thought to be running for governor, made an appearance at the show wearing the gear of his political party (MORENA.) The mayor and Pagano are friends, and it actually comes off as if the Juarez mayor might have been behind the lucha libre show as a way to increase his state-wide profile. The Ciudad Juárez showing up seemed to cause the mayor of Chihuahua to appear as well.
Other Notes
Segunda Caida watched some 1982 LA Lucha.
There were two Arena Neza shows this weekend; the one on Saturday drew well, and the one on Friday had a bunch of apuesta matches, none of which seemed to be the most important. Maybe that was the fight in the crowd. I would not recommend getting into a fight in Neza. Maybe it was luchadora Andresa el Rey, who suffered a terrible broken nose (or maybe jaw or maybe both); she seemed in bad shape in an arena not known for taking care of the wrestlers. Fresero seemed to be in terrible condition, but that barely qualifies as news.
