Antonio Peña
| Antonio Peña | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Birth name | Antonio Hipolito Peña Herrada |
| Born |
June 13, 1951 Mexico City, Mexico |
| Died | October 5, 2006 (aged 55) Mexico City, Mexico |
| Professional wrestling career | |
| Ring name(s) | El Genio Espectro Jr. (original) Kahoz (original) Espectro de Ultratumba Dalia Negra The Rose |
| Billed height | 5 ft 11 in (179 cm) |
| Billed weight | 227 ibs (103 kg) |
| Billed from | Mexico City, Distrito Federal |
| Trained by | Rojas Isaías Rodríguez Toño Hernández Espectro I |
| Debut | April 8, 1974 |
| Retired | 1986 (From wrestling) |
Antonio Hipolito Peña Herrada (June 13, 1951 – October 5, 2006) was the founder of the Mexican professional wrestling promotion Asistencia Asesoría y Administración (AAA) in 1992, which today is the largest wrestling promotion in Mexico. Peña's promotion reached its height of popularity in the early 1990s before the downturn of the Mexican economy. Peña's AAA is the promotion largely responsible for bringing the "Lucha" style to the United States, with such wrestlers as Rey Mysterio Jr., Psicosis, La Parka, Konnan and others. Peña was the former head booker of Empresa Mexicana de Lucha Libre (EMLL) before forming AAA. Peña began his professional wrestling career as a wrestler or Luchador, as they're called in Spanish, working under various masks as El Genio, Espectro Jr., Kahoz, Espectro de Ultratumba and Dalia Negra before retiring in 1986 to work with the promotional side of wrestling.
Antonio Peña grew up in a wrestling family in Mexico City, Mexico. His father wrestled as the Luchador Ponzoña and his uncle was the famous original Espectro, a big star in the 1950s and 1960s. Peña was trained by Rojas, Isias Rodríguez, Toño Hernández and his uncle before making his professional wrestling debut in 1974 at the age of 18.
Peña began his wrestling career as the enmascarado (masked) character El Genio (Spanish for "The Genius") on April 8, 1974. After wrestling as El Genio for a couple of months Peña got his uncle's blessing to adopt the Espectro name and began wrestling as Espectro Jr. Peña wore the "venom green" mask and trunks like Espectro, but unlike the original he wrestled barefoot most of the time. As Espectro Jr., Peña blended a good solid wrestling foundation with various psychological antics to create a character, while being a hated rudo (Heel or "bad guy") character drew the crowd's attention and soon he found himself challenging the top wrestlers of the 1970s for both the Mexican National Welterweight Championship and the Mexican National Middleweight Championship, two of the top championships in Mexico at the time. While a gifted performer in the ring backstage he was described as more of a quiet, thoughtful person who would often talk about how he would change Lucha Libre and add more character and showmanship to it. In 1980 Peña decided to change wrestling personas, giving the Espectro Jr. outfit and name to his cousin Jose Elías Pinceno, who has wrestled as Espectro Jr. since then. Instead of working as Espectro Jr., Peña came up with a totally original character of his own called Kahoz (sometimes spelled Kahos or Khaoz), a sinister masked rudo character who invoked various dark spirits as part of his pre-match ritual. Many have likened the Kahoz character to one of Lucha Libre original showmen, Murciélago Velázquez. Kahoz would often carry a bag of live pigeons to the ring with him, releasing them at his opponent and then making it seem like he ripped the head of one of the pigeons and smeared the fake blood all over himself or his opponent. To Peña the Kahoz character was not about winning championships, but about the psychology of the character and actually scaring the audience, so while he did not win any titles as Kahoz it was considered a huge success and he main evented shows all over Mexico. While Peña had the mind for wrestling his body could not handle the heavy main event schedule that he wrestled as Kahoz and by 1985 he gave up the gimmick to work as Espectro de Ultratumba ("The Ghost from Beyond the grave"), giving the Kahoz gimmick to Astro Rey instead. Astro Rey's Kahoz was nowhere nearly as important nor as successful as Peña as Astro Rey lacked the charisma and theatrics of the original. Peña only worked as Espectro de Ultratumba for a short period of time, giving the gimmick to his cousin in 1986. Peña tried working as "Dalia Negra" but his body could not take the strain, forcing Peña to retire in 1986. Peña would briefly wrestle as "the Rose" in 1994 but only worked a handful of matches. Peña's final match at the 2001 Guerra de Titans where he wrestled, and lost to Cibernético.
...
Wikipedia