They carried Super Porky away on a stretcher.
Thousands of people, crammed around the wrestling ring, screamed encouragement for the fallen warrior, a 308-pound walrus of a man stuffed into chocolate-colored tights, as six burly security guards strained to lug him off.
"POR-KEY! POR-KEY!"
In the ring, Super Porky's two tag-team partners still were taking a beating. The same three wrestlers who had body-slammed him into unconsciousness (or at least a stage version of it) were putting the big hurt on his buddies in a routine that was a cross between a Three Stooges skit and a Hulk Hogan brawl.
It was a classic night of Lucha Libre, the campy professional wrestling spectacle that is Mexico's most-watched sporting event after soccer and whose popularity is growing rapidly in the United States. Lucha Libre wrestlers now attract sellout crowds in Los Angeles, Chicago and other U.S. cities. They have appeared in U.S. commercials for Toyota and Burger King, and their likenesses are showing up on everything from children's lunchboxes to video games.
The sport also inspired the animated children's show "¡Mucha Lucha!" It is among the most popular shows on the Cartoon Network and Kids' WB network, the latter of which reaches 92 percent of all U.S. homes with a television set. Two weekend Lucha Libre shows on the Galavision cable network, which reaches 80 percent of Hispanic households in the United States, more than doubled their adult male audiences in the past year, a network spokesman said.
Going mainstream
Just as enchiladas and Cinco de Mayo celebrations were once virtually unknown in the United States, Lucha Libre has gone mainstream with the explosive growth of the U.S. Latino population, said Javier Martinez, an English professor at the University of Texas at Brownsville. According to the U.S. Census, there are now an estimated 40 million Hispanics in the country, about two-thirds of them of Mexican descent.
"The imagery of Lucha Libre is spreading throughout American culture," said Martinez, who discusses the wrestlers in classes that examine literature and culture.
Lucha Libre, which translates roughly as "free fight," is a sport that combines genuine wrestling skill with outrageous showmanship. It was originally inspired by U.S. professional wrestling in the 1930s. The wrestlers are known for their masks and tight-fitting Lycra costumes. While they occasionally whack each other with a folding chair, they mainly stick to well-choreographed, remarkably acrobatic moves.
Each match is designed to be a struggle between good and evil. The Bad Guys, called rudos, usually wear black and taunt the crowd, which loves to taunt them back. The Good Guys, called tecnicos, wear brilliant candy colors that make them look like Power Ranger action figures come to life. The crowd cheers them on and they generally win, but not always.
"It doesn't matter who wins or loses, as long as it's a good fight, as long as it's hot," said Jesus Reyes Gonzalez, who fights under the name Mascara Año 2000 (Mask 2000), one of the snarling bad guys whose flying body slams sent Super Porky to the showers.
The sport has even inspired a subculture of political activists who advocate their causes dressed in Lucha Libre garb: Super Barrio, champion of the rights of Mexico's poor; Super Ecologist, fighter for environmental causes; and Super Gay and Super Animal, masked crusaders for gay and animal rights.
Lucha Libre has become increasingly popular with Mexico's salaried middle class and, as it spreads north of the border, among well-off people from Houston to Toronto. But here in Mexico, its most fervent supporters are from the working poor, known in Mexico as the "popular classes."
The Arena Coliseo is a sagging old joint in the heart of one of central Mexico City's toughest neighborhoods; over the front door, weeds grow out of the "L" in Coliseo. Men with shotguns guard the day's ticket revenue, even though the most expensive ringside seats sell for less than $5, and all children under 10 get in for about a dime.
Jose Montaño sat in the crowd one recent night with his young daughter on his lap. He's a merchant in Tepito, a violent district where daily life can be a stressful grind. He said he comes to the Lucha Libre every week to distract him from his problems and work out his frustrations through the wrestlers in the ring. "I forget everything when I come here," he said.
All around Montaño, people munched on microwave popcorn and pink-frosted doughnuts and swilled sodas and beer as they hollered for Dr. Wagner and Mr. Niebla (Mr. Fog), the two Good Guys left in the ring after Super Porky was carried away.
Growling meanies
They also screamed unprintable comments about the Bad Guys' mothers.
That only egged on the growling meanies, who wore black spangles, shiny black jackboots and Alice Cooper eye makeup. They climbed turnbuckles and hurled themselves through the air like falling refrigerators. They landed on (actually, next to) the wobbly Good Guys, who by now were crawling around on the canvas, beaten and powerless without Super Porky.
The bad guys sneered, taunted the crowd and flexed their big biceps.
One man in the crowd, a skinny little guy in his fifties, looked like he was about to dive into the ring after them. A woman yelled so hard she was spitting.
Reyes, the wrestler known as Mascara Año 2000, relishes his role as a Bad Guy.
"I get to hit more, and be hit more -- it's fun," he said in an interview before the match. "I like it that people get to let out their anger by yelling at me and insulting me. People forget their problems when they come here. It's the same for me. When I come in I can be very tense, but afterwards I feel very calm."
He said the hero vs. villain aspect of the sport was a primary draw. "In soap operas it's the same -- it's always good against evil," he said. "If all the wrestlers were the good guys, nobody would care who won."
At 47, Reyes weighs a fit 220 pounds, most of which he seems to carry on his enormous chest. He's been wrestling since 1977, when his brother introduced him to the sport. The brother had gone to Los Angeles as an illegal immigrant and had fallen in love with U.S. professional wrestling. When he came home, he decided to join Lucha Libre and talked Reyes into becoming a wrestler, too.
The other night, Reyes was busy stalking the canvas and drop-kicking the two remaining Good Guys -- including Mr. Niebla, a crowd favorite known outside the ring for his charitable work with disabled children.
'Therapy for these people'
"There's sympathy, anger, happiness, sadness . . . it's all the things that the popular classes deal with all the time," Mr. Niebla -- real name, Efrain Hernandez -- said in a pre-match interview, as fathers and children lined up for his autograph. "This is therapy for these people."
Hernandez said he's always been a nervous person, but feels transformed when he becomes Mr. Niebla. "When I put on the mask and step into the ring, it changes my character and my emotions. I look out and I feel the happiness of all the people, and there's so much adrenaline," he said. "All my nervousness is gone, and I am somebody different."
That night in the ring, he became a punching bag, and was further humiliated when the Bad Guys chased him and his partner right out of the ring, up the aisles and into the locker room, abruptly ending the match.
As for Super Porky, whose real name is Jose Alvarado Nieves, he claimed the next day that despite his suffering a sound defeat and a dislocated jaw, it had been a good night.
"It feels great when I make the people happy," he said.