Mistico

Luis Ignacio Urive Alvirde was born on December 22, 1982, in Mexico City, Mexico. His father is Manuel Almanza, a former wrestler who used the ring name Dr Kaaronte. All of his brothers are or were active luchadors, and his uncle, Tony Salazar, is a CMLL booker.

On April 30, 1998, he debuted on the wrestling scene as Dr Karonte Jr., a name he inherited from his father. Two years later he changed his ring name to Astro Boy in memory of his older brother, the original Astro Boy, who had passed away a few months earlier.

In 2004, he was reintroduced as Mistico, an orphan disciple of the wrestling priest Fray Tormenta. He won the 2004 ‘Gran Alternativa’ tag team tournament with veteran El Hijo del Santo as his partner, which led Mistico to be nicknamed El Principe de Plata y Oro (the Prince of Silver and Gold in English). After this, he was involved in a feud against the top heel groups of the promotion, ‘Los Guerreros del Infierno’ and ‘La Furia del Norte’.

He defeated Guerreros’ member Averno to win his first title, the ‘NWA Middleweight Championship’ on February 11, 2005. His first single main event match was against Guerreros’ leader Último Guerrero, which he won and went on to form a tag team with newly turned face Dr Wagner Jr.

By the end of 2006, Mistico was turning out to be the biggest wrestling star in Mexico, starring in eighteen major CMLL show events. He lost the ‘NWA Middleweight Championship’ match to Black Warrior on May 12, but won their mask versus mask rematch on September 29 in the main event of the ‘CMLL 73rd Anniversary Show’. He won his first ‘Leyenda de Plata’ this year.

The first offer for a contract from WWE came in 2007, but he had to turn it down due to his commitments to CMLL.

Urive, as Mistico, is the four-time ‘CMLL World Tag Team Champion’ (twice in 2006 and twice again in 2008), two-time ‘NWA World Middleweight Champion’ (2005, 2007), one-time ‘CMLL World Welterweight Champion’ (2007), and one-time ‘Mexican National Light Heavyweight Champion’ (2007). He won CMLL’s most prestigious annual tournament, ‘Leyenda de Plata’, thrice consecutively in 2006, 2007, and 2008.’

’Pro Wrestling Illustrated’ listed him at #3 position in their list of the top 500 wrestlers of 2007.

’Wrestling Observer Newsletter’ named him the Best Box Office Draw, the Wrestler of the Year, and Best Flying Wrestler in 2006. He was also hailed as the Best Box Office Draw of the Decade (2000-2009) by the newsletter.

While working for ‘NJPW, he won the promotion’s ‘IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship’ in 2009.

He and Sin Cara Negro received a ‘WWE Slammy Award’ for double vision of the year in 2011.