Video link to the match over at Youtube : https://youtu.be/UFvsLpGAzek



No cagematch page for this match/event.



Who’s Who?

Ultimo Guerrero

Making his debut in 1990 the first part of that decade he would be off the radar. His first wide exposure coming in the short lived Promo Azteca promotion that ran for a few years in the late 1990′s before making his way to CMLL in 1998 where he has been ever since, doing independent dates as well.

At this point the gold on record for Ultimo Guerrero was the CMLL World Tag Team Champion which Ultimo was in his 2nd reign with. His longest with his more common tag partner Rey Bucanero, who makes an appearance here at ringside. Ultimo being the de facto leader of his rudo stable Los Guerreros del Infierno.Ultimo had also captured at the tail end of 2002 the CMLL World Light Heavyweight Championship which he would hold for the next couple of years.

3-0-0 was his luchas de apuestas record at the time. His 1st unmasking being Mr. Aguila at 1998′s CMLL Anniversary while the other was less important unmasking Difunto II in 2001 and Cuchillo in late 2002.

So this match is before Ultimo Guerrero was such a standard bearer for CMLL. Which would be more cemented in the coming years.

La Parka

La Park made his debut in 1982 a decade before AAA would be founded. He would hold no titles in that time. Before the La Parka(The reaper) gimmick Parka was most notably Principe Island a mask he lost in 1987 to El Hijo del Santo. ending his 5-0-0 streak. I’m sure he had his fans, but he wasn’t super well known at all as those gimmicks his first decade in the business.

1992 came around and the AAA walkout happened. Antonio Pena, the leader and head booker of AAA who use to be a CMLL booker came to La Parka with the idea for the gimmick. The skeleton based loosely on the Day of the Dead tradition Mexico practices each year. The character was a hit out of the gate and the first major match was vs Lizmark at the first ever Triplemania for Lizmark’s Mexican National Light Heavyweight Championship. Not covering that match because I talked about it last year when highlighting Lizmark.

That belt would be around Park’s waist before too long. That and the WWA World Light Heavyweight Champion were the only 2 belts Parka had held at this point in 2001. He held the Mexican National Light Heavyweight Championships 3 times and the WWA title 2 times.

1992 to 1996 he worked with AAA until 1997 came around and the peso crashed. Like many people he left the company at that time following many other luchadors to bolster WCW. Where despite becoming a household name and one of the most memorable guys on the roster… he never really won any accolades. After his run in WCW he would return to Mexico working indie and CMLL dates from 2000-2008.

Which is when clashing between La Park and AAA happened. They debut a new La Parka while he was doing dates for WCW as La Parka Jr. the two didn’t clash in the late 90′s because Parka wasn’t working with CMLL or rival companies instead being a WCW ad for their character and working US indie dates. So around this time in the early 2000′s La Parka would go from that name to La Park which is what he has used for the last 15 years or so.

This match is one of many indie dates La Park did in the early 2000′s after WCW which raised his stock and took him from a person CMLL called in from time to time, to someone who they used more regularly on TV as demand for the chairman grew thanks to some of the classics he had in smaller promotions outside of CMLL and AAA ontop of having more mainstream exposure from his time in WCW when they were using luchadors most weeks.

How is the match?

Fantastic, another great brawl from La Park though obviously missing the blood that was in the Santo match from 2 days ago. I think this match is a good one for anyone worried that La Park needs blood to make a brawl work. Since CMLL hasn’t had blood for some years. This brawl is up there with the Santo one, with the main thing keeping it from being as good is all the run ins. With the tail end of the contest seeing Tarzan Boy, Rey Bucanero and someone else? I want to say Olimpico, but it’s hard to tell from how far away the camera is.

It’s a great match between these two and another match for La Park to put on his resume and get more used by CMLL. Ultimo Guerrero was already full time on the CMLL roster, but this was a great singles match for him to show CMLL he was more than a tag team expert. While this wasn’t for his CMLL World Light Heavyweight Championship, it was around the time he had just won that and was being positioned as a singles competitor as well as a tag team champion.

I think La Park here is more impressive than in his bout vs Santo. Where I think Santo was more positioned to steal the show. This sequence though makes La Park look like a million bucks and goes off without a hitch! Really great work from both men there and Ultimo Guerrero is praised as one of the best bases in the business for a reason. He does a good job working with complex sequences like this that could easily be fumbled by a single slip or miscommunication.

I don’t think the run-ins make the contest suddenly bad. A big reason for this is that at the end of the contest La Park outsmarts Ultimo Guerrero making all the interference bunk. A roll up is enough to put away Ultimo in the closing moments despite his team helping, using a baseball bat and low blowing La Park. Making La Park not only seem resilient, but also rather cunning. Another great match as this month of May comes to a close.