Posted on by bdamage1
Brian Damage
There have been quite a few wrestling wars between promotions throughout the years. Of course, the most famous just might be the Monday Night War between WCW and the WWF in the mid to late 1990’s. A little talked about ‘offshoot’ of that promotional war was the battle for the much coveted Hispanic demographic. With both wrestling companies feverishly trying to top one another, it didn’t just stop with their television shows Nitro, Raw, Thunder and Smackdown. It also trickled down to the luchadors with both WCW and WWF playing the game…’Whatever you can do, I can do better.’
The first shot fired, was when Konnan was signed to a WCW contract. With his signing, Konnan helped bring in guys like Rey Mysterio Jr, Psicosis, La Parka and other luchadors. The style of Lucha Libre was presented to a wide national audience with all of Turner broadcasting’s available outlets. Granted, ECW had done it before WCW…but on a much smaller scale. The lucha libre matches proved to be very popular stateside and it forced the WWF to respond.
In early 1997, the WWF headed into a working agreement with AAA wrestling to counter what WCW was doing with luchadors. Unfortunately, the WWF’s use of the luchadors didn’t work out nearly as well as they were in WCW. Despite the initial missteps in the WWF/AAA relationship, Vince McMahon was determined to try and out do WCW.
In November of 1998, the WWF introduced Los Super Astros…an all Spanish wrestling show that aired on the Spanish language channel Univision. The WWF hired promoter Victor Quinones to be the pseudo booker/liaison for the talent. Quinones was able to strike deals with talent from both CMLL and AAA. The WWF’s Spanish announce team of Carlos Cabrera and Hugo Savinovich did the commentary and featured wrestlers like Super Crazy, Antifaz Del Norte, El Hijo del Santo as well as Puerto Rico’s Los Boricuas.
With the creation of Los Super Astros, Eric Bischoff felt the desire to counter WWF’s new show by creating his own Spanish only program. Bischoff turned to Konnan who had been pestering Bischoff to do a show like this for well over two years. It was Konnan who spearheaded this new project for WCW. With that, WCW’s ‘Festival de Lucha’ was born. Bischoff was able to secure a pilot episode to air on Telemundo (which was the network rival to Univision).
In a press conference with both Bischoff and Konnan…they talked about the concept of the show. It would consist of mainly trios (Six man) matches and would incorporate wrestlers and luchadors seen on WCW television as well as non contracted talent from Mexico and Puerto Rico. They even went as far as to say that a trios title would be introduced down the road. In a bit of a surprising move, Konnan hired Julio Cesar Rivera and Armando Quintero to be the announcers for the pilot episode instead of using the regular WCW Spanish announce team of Miguel Alonso and former WWWF champion Pedro Morales. It turned out, the reason they weren’t used…was because Monday Nitro and Thunder were not aired in Latin countries. Therefore, Alonso and Morales were only used on pay per views and were not familiar with all the talent on this new show.
The pilot for Festival de Lucha was filmed at the Heart O’ Texas Fair Complex in Waco, Texas on January 27th, 1999. In typical WCW fashion…it was a case of “go big or go home.” An elaborate set was created and featured an authentic mariachi band with dancers. There was also an advertised appearance by the boy band Menudo. This idea was a far cry from Super Astros which basically shot their episodes before episodes of Monday Night Raw and had no special sets built for it.
The problems with Festival de Lucha running out of the Heart O’ Texas Complex was the building was old and worn down. Some went as far as to call the place “a dump.” The complex had a capacity of 10,500…but during the time of the pilot episode being filmed…major renovations were going on in the building. Much of the seating was reduced to roughly 6,000 or so. Sadly that didn’t even matter as only 2,433 fans purchased tickets to this event.
Similar to Super Astros, Festival de Lucha did not only feature luchadors, but wrestlers from Puerto Rico as well. The main feud was between the Mexicans versus the Puerto Rican rudo (heel) team named the Associated Caribbean State managed by none other than Jimmy Hart. A total of three shows were filmed that day and were presented to Telemundo to look over.
While the show was in post production, word came down from Telemundo that they were passing on the program. Just like that, WCW and Konnan’s pet project was no more. Instead of attempting to fine tune the show and try to sell to other networks….it was completely shelved. Perhaps the decision was made easier when WWF’s Super Astros show was canceled in June of ’99. Subsequently, the lucha libre war that was geared to happen between WCW and the WWF…never actually happened.
The entire card for Festival de Lucha was as follows:
1. Silver King, Venum, and Kendo defeated Villano V, Felino, and Super Boy
2. La Parka, Super Calo, and Salsero defeated Damian, Halloween, and El Mosco de La Merced
3. Blitzkrieg, Raul, Piloto Suicida defeated Villano III, El Texano, and Rey Mysterio Sr.
4. Konnan, Rey Mysterio Jr., and Hector Garza defeated Juventud Guerrera, Pirata Morgan, and Psicopata
5. Salsero, Raul, and Piloto Suicida defeated Juventud Guerrera, Felino, and El Mosco de La Merced
6. La Parka, Kendo, and Blitzkrieg defeated Psychosis, Kaz Hayashi, and Ron Rivera
7. Villano III, Villano V, El Texano, and Rey Mysterio Sr. defeated Pierroth Jr., Ricky Santana, Fidel Sierra, and Psicopata
8. Konnan, Rey Mysterio Jr., Hector Garza, and Silver King defeated Chris Jericho, Lenny Lane, Johnny Swinger, and Norman Smiley
9. Konnan defeated Disco Inferno
