Backstage Report On AEW Getting Arena Mexico Ban On The Beast Mortos Lifted

The main event of AEW's Grand Slam Mexico event on June 18 was originally meant to see The Young Bucks teaming up with the Death Riders to take on the team of The Opps, Will Ospreay, and Swerve Strickland. However, hours before the event, it was announced that The Beast Mortos would be taking Castagnoli's place in the match, something that raised more than a few eyebrows as Mortos was one of the many luchadors on CMLL's "banned list."

In the latest edition of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Dave Meltzer revealed that the reason why Mortos was on the list in the first place dates back to his early years as a professional wrestler where he worked for CMLL as an undercard talent named Semental. In 2012, Semental went behind CMLL's back and had a tryout for their rival company AAA, who subsequently brought him in, something that CMLL were reportedly furious about to the point where they stated that Semental would never work for the company ever again. Meltzer pointed out that the banned list is taken very seriously, hence why Mortos was not allowed to interact with CMLL talent in AEW up until very recently.

As for how the ban got lifted, Mortos was in Mexico supporting his girlfriend, current AEW TBS Champion Mercedes Mone, when news broke that Castagnoli would not make the show due to private reasons. AEW President Tony Khan reportedly went to CMLL's owner Salvador Lutteroth III requesting Mortos be the one to fill in for Castagnoli as he had nothing to do, and since Mortos is now classed as an AEW talent with no ties left to AAA now that they have been acquired by WWE, Lutteroth agreed and Mortos was allowed to work in Arena Mexico for the first time in 14 years.