In March 2011 the Sin Cara character debuted in WWE, but it wasn’t until recently that the company’s investment paid off. Originally portrayed by Mexican star Luis Urive, aka Mistico, the Sin Cara character seemed to be a failure. Years later, the man formerly known as Hunico took over the character and now Sin Cara is a champion.
Urive failed as Sin Cara due to injuries, suspensions and the inability to adjust to the WWE and American wrestling lifestyle. The company wanted the Sin Cara character to succeed. With Rey Mysterio at the end of his career, the new luchadore would make a fine replacement for the Hispanic population. Also, surely WWE wanted to take advantage of the merchandising sales for the masks.
Hunico was spending time both on the main roster and in NXT when he took over full time as the Sin Cara character. So it wasn’t surprising to see Sin Cara wrestle mainly on NXT, though he occasionally would compete on the main roster – usually in a losing effort.
WWE and specially Triple H has done an outstanding job of building up NXT. It is among the best shows to watch on the WWE Network and often times is more enjoyable than Raw and Smackdown. Both NXT and the WWE Performance Center have been created in such a way to help up and coming superstars prepare for the big time. It makes sense for Sin Cara to continue honing his skills down in Florida.
As Sin Cara continues to improve, he has found success as the partner of another luchadore. Kalisto is making waves down in NXT with his impressive high flying skills for such a small guy. Talk about replacing Rey Mysterio, Kalisto is the more likely candidate due to his size resembling Mr. 619 so much.
Kalisto had been teaming in NXT with Ricardo Rodriguez’s alter ego, El Local. The two faced off against the Ascension at the first NXT Takeover event in May, but were unsuccessful. It was clear from the beginning that WWE was not interesting in pushing El Local very far. With Rodriguez’s release, WWE took the opportunity to place Sin Cara in the tag team with Kalisto and dub them the Lucha Dragons.
It’s a win win situation for Sin Cara, Kalisto and WWE. The Lucha Dragons finally find success and win the NXT tag team champions. WWE wins with their marketable tag team who should eventually make their way to the main roster.
It’s a great story for the Sin Cara character and the man formerly known as Hunico. WWE wanted Sin Cara to succeed and finally put the right guy under the mask. Sin Cara should continue to succeed in NXT alongside Kalisto as the young stars rise as the new ultimate underdogs in WWE.
What are your thoughts on the newly found success of the Sin Cara character? Please share your thoughts in the comment section below.
Seth Guttenplan is a math and computer technology teacher for special education students in New Jersey. In his free time, Seth writes about wrestling. Follow Seth on twitter @sethgutt
The following matches were taped on Monday night, September 15, 2014 at the Cajundome in Lafayette, Louisiana for this week’s edition of WWE Superstars.
– Luke Harper and Erick Rowan def. Los Matadores in tag-team action to open up the show. The finish saw Harper hit a side-walk slam for the pinfall victory.
– Sin Cara def. Justin Gabriel in the main event of the show. This was said to be an exciting, crowd-pleasing, high-flying style of match, the exact type you would expect from these two.
The following are results of the NXT Takeover 2 special, which aired on the WWE Network on Thursday, September 11, 2014.
– The Lucha Dragons (Sin Cara & Kalisto) def. The Ascension to become the new NXT Tag-Team Champions in the opening match of the show. The finish came when Kalisto pinned Viktor.
– Baron Corbin def. C.J. Parker in a quick squash match that lasted all of 29 seconds.
– Enzo Amore def. Sylvester Lefort with a rolling reverse cradle, holding his trunks during the pin. Lefort tried to run away after the match, but Big Cass clotheslined him. Louis attacked Cass and Lefort ran off, leaving Louis alone. Cass hit a big kick on Louis. Cass said to Amore, “Enzo, get the bucket!” in Dudley Boyz fashion. He poured the bucket on Louis and Louis ran off.
– KENTA came out to the ring after being introduced by William Regal. KENTA announced that his new name is Hideo Itami. The Acension came out and threw him out of the ring and demanded a tag-title rematch. He came back in and cleaned house of both guys.
– Bull Dempsey def. Mojo Rawley in about a minute with a diving head-butt. After the match, he gave Rowley another diving head-butt for good measure.
– Backstage, Enzo Amore and Big Cass wanted to see somebody bald. They found Louis and Lefort ran away, leaving him alone yet again. Cass attacked him and carried him to the ring. Cass hit him with a reverse atomic drop and Amore took the towel off that was covering his head, revealing that he only had a little bit of hair left and no eyebrows.
– Charlotte def. Bayley to retain the NXT Women’s Championship. The finish saw Charlotte hit a moonsault, followed by a neck-snapper for the pin. After the match, Sasha Banks came out and taunted Bayley and then attacked her. Charlotte ended up making the save.
– It was announced that Hideo Itami (formerly known as KENTA) will be making his in-ring debut on NXT TV next week, which is actually being taped on Saturday night, September 12th.
– Adrian Neville def. Tyler Breeze, Sami Zayn & Tyson Kidd to retain the NXT Championship. The finish saw Neville hit his spectacular Red Arrow on Kidd for the pin after Zayn had hit the running kick into the corner and had the match won, but Neville pulled the referee out of the ring so he couldn’t make the three count. This was definitely a “match of the year” candidate.
The following matches were taped for this week’s edition of WWE Superstars prior to the “season premiere” of RAW on Monday night in Baltimore, Maryland.
– Naomi def. Summer Rae in Divas action to open the show. This was said to be your basic Divas match.
– Justin Gabriel def. Sin Cara in the main event of the show. This was said to be a pretty good match with a lot of high-flying spots.
Former WWE Superstar Alberto Del Rio has been cleared to compete for Mexico’s AAA promotion and will make his return on September 14th.
Del Rio appeared with AAA officials and wrestlers for a Ring & Rockstars 3 press conference on Tuesday at the Hard Rock Hotel Riviera Maya to promote a September 14th event at the venue.
Wrestling as El Patron, he will team with La Parka and Myzteziz (formerly Sin Cara in WWE) in a match against Texano Jr., Averno and El Hijo del Perro Arguayo.
WWE was reportedly attempting to enforce a no-compete clause that would have prevented Del Rio from wrestling elsewhere for the forseable future, but that appears to have been dismissed.
Here’s a (translated) quote from Del Rio, courtesy of SuperLuchas.net:
“It is unconstitutional that you can not work … thanks to lawyers and support of AAA, I can fight without any problems.”
The following matches were taped prior to this Monday’s edition of WWE RAW in Des Moines, Iowa for this week’s edition of WWE Superstars.
– Alicia Fox def. Emma in Divas action to open up the show. This was said to be your basic Divas match. Nothing special.
– Sin Cara def. Justin Gabriel in the main event of the show. This match was supposedly pretty good, with Sin Cara and Gabriel hitting a lot of high-spots.
– The Tickld website has a new article up regarding Batista’s role as “Drax” in the wildly successful “Guardians of the Galaxy” film. You can check that out at Tickld.com.
– The following matches are confirmed for this Thursday’s edition of NXT TV on the WWE Network, which is the “go-home” show for the September 11th NXT Takeover 2 special.
*The Vaudevillains vs. Sin Cara & Kalisto [Number 1 Contendership For Tag-Titles]
*Charlotte vs. Alexa Bliss [NXT Women’s Championship]
*Tyler Breeze vs. Tye Dillinger
*Tyson Kidd vs. Adam Rose
*Adrian Neville vs. CJ Parker
– A fan recently tweeted Goldberg and commented about how he felt WWE “completely glossed over” Goldberg’s impact on WCW overtaking WWE in the ratings during the latest edition of “The Monday Night War” series on the WWE Network. Goldberg responded to the fan by simply saying, “Totally expected.”
– Sin Cara, in his mask, recently appeared on Power 98.3 in Phoenix, Arizona. You can check out video of that interview below.
– After working several matches against each other at NXT live events, Solomon Crowe and Kalisto have formed a tag-team. The two defeated Wesley Blake and Buddy Murphy at the most recent NXT live event. There is no word yet on what this means for the tag-team of Kalisto and Sin Cara.
– Former WWE Superstars JTG and Shad Gaspard wrestled the first match on what they are calling the “Crime Time World Tour” this weekend for the Warriors of Wrestling promotion. The two teamed up with The Blue Meanie to defeat Chachi, Verna and J-George at the Staten Island-based event.
The following matches were taped prior to Monday’s RAW for this week’s edition of WWE Superstars.
– Alberto Del Rio def. Justin Gabriel via Submission after applying his Cross Armbreaker, forcing the tap out from Gabriel.
– Heath Slater & Titus O’Neil def. Sin Cara & Zack Ryder in tag-team action via pinfall. Ryder ended up being the man on his team who had to look up at the lights, as you would expect.
It appears the masked NXT tag team of Kalisto and El Local (Ricardo Rodriguez) has already been disbanded.
Following their loss to NXT Tag Champions The Ascension at NXT Takeover, Kalisto teamed with fellow masked wrestler Sin Cara at last Thursday’s NXT television tapings.
As for Ricardo Rodriguez, he’s been backstage at several recent WWE television tapings and continues to work out at the WWE Performance Center and has been training WWE’s developmental Divas.
– Despite making several claims to the contrary for the past few months, it looks like the original Sin Cara is finally accepting the fact that he doesn’t have legal ownership of his former WWE ring-name. The former WWE Superstar noted recently that he should probably come up with a new name to “break free from his past characters.”
– Below is the official promotional poster for NXT Takeover, which airs live on the WWE Network on May 29th:
– The Miz returned to action on the final shows of WWE’s European tour and could be back on television this week. Miz was away filming The Marine 4 and is rumored to be paired with as his manager Ric Flair soon.
– John Cena and Cesaro celebrated the end of WWE’s European tour last night in Berlin by drinking beers together in the ring. The WWE crew is traveling back to the United States for tomorrow’s RAW from Knoxville, Tennessee.
– The original Sin Cara (Mistico) is now wrestling in Mexico using the ring name El Misterioso (‘The Mysterious.’) After leaving WWE, he had been telling the media that he would be retaining the Sin Cara name.
WWE kicks off their European tour today with their first stop in Glasgow, Scotland. With Daniel Bryan off of the tour due to injury, here is the updated list of talent that is scheduled for this part of the tour: Kane, The Shield, Big E, Rob Van Dam, Bad News Barrett, Big Show, Randy Orton, Mark Henry, Ryback, Curtis Axel, Paige, Layla, Fandango, Cameron, Naomi, Jack Swagger, Zeb Colter, Sin Cara, Rusev, Lana and more.
Originally, Bryan vs. Kane in a “Last Man Standing” match was being advertised, but with Bryan’s injury, that is obviously off the table. As of right now, no new opponent or match for Kane has been announced.
Also advertised for this leg of the tour is a six-man tag-team match featuring The Shield vs. Randy Orton, Ryback and Curtis Axel.
– The original Sin Cara worked an indie event in Mexico City this past Saturday night. He worked as “Sin Cara.”
– During an interview with BleacherReport.com, WWE Hall of Famer Jerry “The King” Lawler revealed that he’s currently negotiating with WWE to bring the Memphis Wrestling tape library the WWE Network.
As previously reported, one source noted recently that Sheamus and Sin Cara were involved in a backstage physical altercation at this week’s WWE television tapings.
As of right now, WWE is pushing the following four retired wrestlers, in order, the most: Hulk Hogan, Undertaker, Steve Austin and Ultimate Warrior. Warrior was higher on the priority list a few weeks ago, but that was due to the fact that he tragically passed away.
For the month of April, more people purchased Warrior merchandise on the internet than anyone else in the company, including John Cena.
The latest internet merchandise numbers, in order, were Cena, CM Punk, Daniel Bryan, The Wyatt Family, The Shield, Evolution and Hulk Hogan.
The latest arena merchandise numbers, in order, were Cena, Bryan, Randy Orton, Warrior, Rob Van Dam, Brock Lesnar, The Wyatt Family, Batista and Sin Cara.
It’s worth noting that Cena was head-and-shoulders above the rest of the top sellers at the arenas, with the second highest person on the list (Daniel Bryan) not even coming close to his sales figures.
– Luis Urive, who is better known to Mexican wrestling fans as Mistico, and to WWE fans as the original Sin Cara, is reportedly close to signing a deal with AAA in Mexico. There’s currently no word on what name he will use since CMLL owns the Mistico name, and WWE presumably owns the Sin Cara name.
– The advertised dark match main event for this coming Monday’s WWE RAW, which takes place in St. Louis, Missouri, is Daniel Bryan, John Cena and The Shield vs. Randy Orton, Batista and The Wyatt Family in a ten-man tag-team match.
– As previously reported, WWE is working on a new Sting compilation DVD that will be released in September. It has recently been confirmed that the project will also be available on Blu-ray.
Following news of his WWE release, the original Sin Cara wrote the following on Twitter:
“Y el chisme de siempre, yo jamás dije q volvería a luchar como mistico, ese personaje es del cmll no mío. Yo le dige a mi amigo Arath de la torre q ya no como mistico q ahora como sin cara estaré en México, gente chismosa. De un momento a otro llega mi liberación de wwe, y ahora si a trabajar en mi México con toda la actitud y ganas del mundo.”
The English translation reads:
“The Gossip continues, I never said I would wrestle as Mistico. That character is cmll, not mine. I told my friend I will not be Mistico, I will be Sin Cara in Mexico. People Gossip. Any moment now, I will get my liberation from WWE and now I will be working in Mexico with all the attitude and enthusiasm in the world.”
The following is a non-spoiler match listing for this week’s edition of WWE SmackDown. For complete spoiler results, click ahead to page two.
– Seth Rollins & Dean Ambrose vs. Drew McIntyre & Jinder Mahal
– Seth Rollins & Dean Ambrose vs. Ryback & Curtis Axel
– Damien Sandow vs. Sin Cara
– Goldust vs. Fandango
– Batista vs. Sheamus
– The Bella Twins vs. AJ Lee & Tamina Snuka
– Jack Swagger vs. Jimmy Uso
– The Miz vs. Mark Henry
– Bray Wyatt vs. Big Show
For complete spoiler results for this week’s WWE SmackDown, click ahead to page two …
