and from an early age knew that he wanted to be a wrestler like his father.
#Microman wrestler professional#
“But when you enter the arena and start walking down the bridge, you just do what you have to do, which is show everything you know in the ring.Jesús Anaya, born November 22, 1985, is the son of professional wrestler Popitekus, Jr. “That makes you nervous, because you never know what will happen, whether people will like it,” said Microman.
Increasingly, that includes the league’s prized weekend fight nights. They do not earn a regular salary, but they get medical care, health insurance and a guarantee of at least two events per month, according to the CMLL. The Micro Stars started out with abbreviated bouts, but now fight full-length matches just like their bigger peers.
I think it was my happiest day in wrestling,” he said. “I didn’t know people would react like that, that they would back me so much without even knowing me. Microman himself said he did not know just what to expect that day. Everybody in the crowd was going crazy,” he said. “It was Children’s Day, and it was awesome. Their coach, wrestling legend The Last Warrior, remembers it as a revelation. The eight Micro Stars debuted in April 2017 as the third weight category in the CMLL. “But now they are seen as idols, not mascots or buffoons.”īut Gaspar, who is herself just over one meter tall, said there is still a long way to go: social security benefits, pension plans and other support for “life after wrestling.” “Some of them were paralyzed… One even committed suicide,” she said. Kemonito’s generation had no health insurance or benefits, but put up with the job for lack of other options, she said. Twenty years ago, they threw them in the ring with wrestlers who were two meters (more than 6’6″) tall, and they got injured a lot,” Gaspar told AFP. Working conditions and the level of respect have improved dramatically since then in the Mexican professional wrestling league, the World Lucha Libre Council (CMLL), says Catalina Gaspar, an activist for little people’s rights. Microman is the son of Kemonito, who was also a midget wrestler but had a very different career.įor 30 years, Kemonito was a “mascota” for full-size wrestlers, a laughable sidekick who provided comic relief until the real action started. Microman was fighting in the second match of the night - four bouts down from the top of the fight card.īut just having his name on the billing shows the progress he and other little wrestlers have made since his father’s time. “Microman is a wrestler who gives everything he’s got for the crowd,” he said, referring to himself in the third person. Microman, 19, takes it all in with an attitude befitting lucha libre’s biggest little star. “He’s really tiny, but look how he fights!” said another, 30-year-old Felipe Escorza. “Did you see how he held that headstand on top of the ropes? He does it really well,” said one impressed fan, 28-year-old construction worker Juan Carlos Elizalde. The audience went wild in Arena Mexico, the high cathedral of lucha libre.
He then flattened another with an acrobatic headstand kick known as the “Zero Gravity” move. He and his fellow “Micro Stars” were met with a smattering of jeers when they got in the ring.īut Microman silenced them when he climbed onto the top rope - more than three times his height - to execute a high-flying leap straight into the neck of his also small, but larger, rival. Microman wowed a skeptical crowd at one recent bout in Mexico City, where he and two co-stars, El Gallito and Guapito, took on another team of small-sized wrestlers. Mexico’s “lucha libre,” a wildly popular mix of sport and entertainment, long featured midgets and dwarves in a deeply demeaning role: they were “mascotas” - a word that can mean both “mascot” and “pet” - for full-size wrestlers.īut a new generation of little people are now rising lucha libre stars in their own right, and dream of one day headlining the main events on their fight cards.
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