On Saturday night, the WWE announced through their twitter account that this Tuesday on Smackdown Live in a one-on-one match, Rey Mysterio will be going up against Andrade ‘Cien’ Almas. Last Tuesday, we saw glimpses of greatness when these two Lucha superstars squared off as they were involved in a tag match. However, with a change looming in the air since Vince McMahon and family returned to Raw and Smackdown Live, this could serve as a potential opportunity for Almas to shine. While these two performers have different stories in getting to the WWE, we will take a brief look at Almas’ journey to World Wrestling Entertainment and how others performers have strived in their careers after a program with Rey Mysterio.
THIS is going to be EPIC! @reymysterio will square off with @AndradeCienWWE THIS TUESDAY on #SDLive! @Zelina_VegaWWE https://t.co/eayjoZK6Zt
— WWE (@WWE) January 13, 2019
Andrade ‘Cien’ Almas, whose real name is Manuel Alfonso Andrade Oropeza, is a third generation Luchador is best known for his work in CMLL as a founding father of one of the most popular factions in the world, Los Ingobernables. Together with La Mascara and RUSH, the group formed and never looked back as the popularity sky rocketed their careers in the company, on top of having the hottest selling shirt(s) in all of Lucha Libre at one point.
Formely known as La Sombra (The Shadow), Almas helped form the group in 2014 after realizing a commonality between himself, RUSH and La Mascara, for genuinely being rejected by the fans as babyfaces (technicos in Lucha Libre) thus no longer caring what the fans thought and doing things their own way. La Sombras influence with the faction and the company was strong enough, that it eventually led to the addition of NJPW’s current Intercontinental Champion, Tetsuya Naito becoming an official member of Los Ingobernables while working in Mexico.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ayNOkRmnXhw
While La Sombra would eventually lose his mask and be kicked out of Los Ingobernables on his final match with CMLL, that was not the end of the road for him as he would debut with the WWE in NXT in 2016 and eventually win the NXT Championship and go back to a place he was familiar with being most of his career, at the top. Alamas would eventually debut for the Blue Brand, Smackdown Live in 2018 but has since been struggling on the brand. Enter, Rey Mysterio!
Rey Mysterio, one of the titans of Lucha Libre, returned to the WWE in 2018 after a several year hiatus where we would see Mysterio work for such companies as NJPW, Lucha Underground, and Aro Lucha. Mysterio would help establish big names in those promotions, and even in his prior run with the WWE. A few of those names being Alberto Del Rio, who would eventually become the World Heavyweight Champion, Ricochet (under the alias Prince Puma), who would be involved in a dream match with Mysterio in Lucha Underground and Johnny Impact (who goes under Johnny Mundo in Lucha Underground), who had a very personal rivalry with Mysterio in season 3 of Lucha Underground, which would involve Mysterios son, Dominick in the storyline.
But now we have an opportunity here for Almas and Mysterio. We know that this is not the first time the two have met as they have had one-on-one matches at a couple of house shows and had a television match against one another on the November 6th, 2018 edition of Smackdown Live in a Survivor Series qualifying match. Could this match be the impetus for a bigger program and potential push for Cien Almas? Stay tuned for Smackdown Live this Tuesday on the USA Network at 8:00 PM EST.
