Aníbal
Profile
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Biography
Aníbal was born on November 4, 1940 in the state of Michoacán. In different interviews he has done through the years he has stated being born at Zitacora, Topilejo and Michoacán.
When he was four years old his family moved to Mexico City. There he had access to lucha libre, and he idolized Black Shadow and wanted to be a wrestler like him. When he was around twenty years old he started to train at the Gimnasio Baños Gloria and at the Gimnasio San Francisco de Portales, where the instructors were Chico Fernández and Salvador Flores.
He had his first professional match in November of 1963 under his real name, Carlos Carrillo. It was in Cuernavaca, Mor. and he was paid 40 pesos.
Two years later his representant designed a mask for him. He didn't want to wear a mask, but seeing how most of the younger idols were masked wrestlers he finally decided to go on with the idea. He came up with the Aníbal name.
Carlos was an avid reader of history books, and one of his favorite tales was the one of Aníbal - a Carthagenian general, son of Amílcar Barca and brother of Asdrúbal. He conquered the city of Sagunto, crossed the Pyrenees and the Alps, and battled and defeated the Romans. He almost conquered the city of Rome, but he killed himself in a battle after being surrounded by the enemy troops, because he'd rather be dead than waste the rest of his life being a slave.
As Anibal, his "padrinos" during his debut were Mil Máscaras, and his idol Black Shadow.
Anibal's rookie days were in the Arena "Al Gusto" in Naucalpan, he became a hot independent worker in El Cortijo, and in 1966 he signed with La Empresa, EMLL. On October 14, a bit before signing with EMLL, he lost the Distrito Federal Light Heavyweight Title against the popular wrestler now turned referee Pepe Casas.
During the second part of the 60s he wrestled for EMLL but even though he was considered a sensational wrestler from the start he did not become a big name wrestler until 1970, even though by 1968 he already was an Arena Coliseo main eventer.
In 1970, he won the NWA Middleweight Title from Masio Koma and started a multi-year feud with René Guajardo. He was also voted wrestler of the year by the magazine El Halcon, which is an honor he had again in 1974.
He was one of the many wrestlers that on May of 1975 left EMLL to join the newly created UWA was created. Anibal was already a very popular wrestler and had big profile rivalries with people like El Marquez, but his memorable feuds and matches there with Guajardo, Ray Mendoza, Perro Aguayo and others are what turned him into a legend.
He was a big star until the mid 80s, where he sort of disappeared from the scene due to injuries. His style had changed so much because he couldn't wrestle the fast tecnico style anymore. In 1983 he was still doing a huge campaign teaming with Villano III and El Solitario as "Los Tres Caballeros" (The three gentlemen) but in 1984 he turned rudo and formed a regular team with his arch-enemy Dr. Wagner. His last big feud was perhaps in Puerto Rico, where he lost the UWA Junior Light Heavyweight Title to local favorite Invader #3. That was the 15th of August, in San Juan, where the WWC promotion was having his 11th Anniversary Show. Anibal eventually regained the title and lost it on January of 1985 to Negro Navarro.
Anibal's name popped up again strongly on the lucha scene in 1991. He wrestled a lot in Panama and he started to get booked in Arena Mexico shows again. This was because he had agreed to lose his mask to Universo 2000, brother of Cien Caras and Máscara Año 2000, as in EMLL they wanted to elevate Universo and make him a big heavyweight star. However before the match could happen, the Lucha Libre magazine, run by Benjamín Mora, crushed EMLL's plans by unveiling them in the magazine. In fact, Mora crushed almost a whole year worth of big feuds due to his bitterness as they didn't want to do business with him anymore (Mora owed them money). So to protect the integrity of the sport in the eyes of the less educated fans, it was Máscara who feuded with Anibal and took his mask in the end. That was the 13th of December of that same year 1991, and the match sold out Arena Mexico (drawing 18,000). The Anibal we saw in the match was an old unathletic man that was not even close to his past level of performance. After his mask loss he had a short tour all over Mexico and retired. It's said that Anibal really needed the money.
He eventually returned some months later after his good friend Tony Arce convinced him, but his hip was in so much pain that he needed surgery again so he retired for good. Before retiring, he had a last Panama tour where he lost his mask to local legend Sandokán (not the Mexican one) to culminate a 20 years plus feud.
On December of 1993, AAA had an Anibal benefit card because after the surgery he had gone bankrupcy. This card was actually promoted by the "Jose María Álvarez" foundation, which is a foundation that collects money for homeless kids. This was their way to say thank you to Anibal, who in the past promoted countless benefit cards for that asssociation. Everybody that met him will agree that he was a great man and a class act.
An Hijo del Anibal made his debut on October 24, 93 at El Toreo de Cuatro Caminos, but it is believed, though unconfirmed, that this was not a real relative of the original Anibal.
Anibal died on March 9, 1994 at age 53 due to a brain tumor.
Notable Matches
1/29/75 ? Palacio de los Deportes: Anibal beat Rene Guajardo to retain his NWA Middleweight Title.
