Andrade “Cien” Almas is the new NXT Champion and the heat is flowing from Full Sail University. Almas defeated fan favorite Drew McIntyre, and the pulse on social media is divided. While almost everybody agree Almas is an excellent performer, lots of fans think that he doesn’t deserve to carry the prestigious title, calling him the first “transitional” champion on NXT – many believe Adam Cole is the number one contender, taking the lead for the championship at the next Takeover. Drew McIntyre was expected to take a good run as a champion since he came with great fanfare from his indy run and dethroned the Glorious One, Bobby Roode, a thing which the fandom was okay with, despite the favoritism Roode had.
El Idolo
Internet wrestling communities vary depending the country. It’s quite notorious that Andrade Almas´ victory over Drew McIntyre (a well known performer since he came to México on his first run at WWE) was taken with positive reactions by the retracted Mexican fandom, who took his previous losing streak as a humiliating run for Almas. The complaints were consistently about how WWE was wasting the talent of the man formerly known as La Sombra. Andrade Almas had two great matches against Johnny Gargano, but that barely got any recognition from Mexican fans.
On his Facebook account, Almas occasionally publishes updates, training or just posing. But comments on his posts got from messages that call him a “wasted talent” (and ask for a return at Arena México) to people just having fun at his expense because he was being paired with Zelina Vega, talking for him with Andrade Almas acting like a silent hand.
But this past Saturday in Houston, Andrade Almas defeated Drew McIntyre in a victory that, like Randy Orton‘s RKO, seemingly came out of nowhere. They were happy for him, celebrating the former Ingobernable being champion of the prestigious brand. Some others, the harshest detractors, suddenly seemed to lose internet services since Sunday and silently lurk for the day Andrade “Cien” Almas loses the championship to spit venom again.
Ingobernable
One thing is true: A big number of fans don’t really follow NXT, and as such, a big number of the Mexican fandom trashes WWE (for several reasons, but that could be a whole other article). The ones who follow NXT or any other WWE brand, usually don’t take a loud voice on forums and FB groups but people are now very well aware of Andrade Almas having a great opportunity to show off and Mexican fans will be following his every moves now – he is one of the most beloved luchadores in México, and this will make interesting WWE again to them.
Some of the fans who have followed him since his NXT arrival two years ago, see in him the lost link in the chain that Eddie Guerrero left on Latino community aspirations of representation at the WWE.
Almas certainly has the charisma and ability but still, there´s a long way to go, although he is doing it with good step, a chilled step, you know… just tranquilo.
