Hugo Savinovich

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Hugo Savinovich

Statistics
Ring name(s)	Hugo Savinovich, El Muñecazo, La Pantera Asesina, El Hijo de Doña Mélida
Born	Guayaquil, Ecuador
Debut	1993

Hugo Savinovich (born February 15, 1959 in Guayaquil, Ecuador) is a former professional wrestler and currently one half of the WWE Spanish announce team where he is the color commentator and his partner is Carlos Cabrera and occasionally Marcelo Rodriguez. When he works with Rodriguez he is the play-by-play announcer.

Before his current stint as a commentator, Savinovich had been a wrestler for many years, performing in many Caribbean countries like Puerto Rico, Panama and the Dominican Republic. He claims that becoming a professional wrestler literally saved his life, as he was originally a punk Latino gang member in the streets of New York in the late 1960's and early 1970's. He joined the sport under the guidance of Johnny "El Toro" Maldonado. Mexican wrestling promoter Arturo Mendoza took him to Puerto Rico, where he lived for close to 14 years. He was originally a "technician" (the Puerto Rican wrestling term for a "face", or "good guy"); after breaking up with his original wrestling partner, Little Chief Cherokee (and with Mendoza) he joined the local World Wrestling Council franchise in Puerto Rico, Capitol Sport Promotions (owned partially by Carlos Colon), where he gained notoriety for being one of the "rude" wrestlers (i.e., "heels", or wrestling villains), with a penchant for flamboyancy and self-promotion that gained him his most famous ring name, "El Muñecazo" ("The Big Baby Doll"). Savinovich is on record as stating that he modeled his role after Gorgeous George, although his looks were particular to him and him alone (long hair with a mullet and David Letterman-like gapped teeth). He did promote his wrestlers using a high-pitched voice and fast delivery resembling that of drag racing radio advertisements in the United States. This also gave him the chance to develop his skills as a color commenter for wrestling matches, using a loud and fast narrative style -which he pioneered, since called "estilo lucha libre" ("wrestling style") in Puerto Rico.

As a wrestler he attained light-heavyweight individual and tag team championship status in the Dominican Republic, New Jersey and Amarillo, Texas, as well as Caribbean and world tag team titles). However, he became more famous for being the sidelining "manager" of some of the rudest wrestlers Capitol ever brought to Puerto Rico and the Caribbean, most notoriously Abdullah The Butcher. He eventually became a partner at Capitol, only to split with Colón a few years after in a rather acrimonious business dispute.

Hugo then moved to the United States and spent five years as manager of some of the rudest WWF performers before the league attained its current popularity. Personal disputes with the league's management forced his return to Puerto Rico, where he spent close to five years at Capitol's rival company, All-Star Sports. His colorful personality and success promoting All-Star led the WWF to reconsider bringing him back, to which Hugo consented.

Savinovich and Cabrera have a show at WWE.com called WWE En Español (WWE in Spanish), which lasts about 30 minutes; it is a recap of RAW and Smackdown! shows, along with coverage of Pay Per Views. The show celebrated its 100th episode in April 2006. Currently, WWE launched a mini show starring Hugo And Carlos called 28 Segundos which consists of the announcers making fun of life. The show is in Spanish and can be found on WWE.com.

In recent years, while working for WWE on their pay per views, the announce table in which he works with Cabrera, more commonly known as the Spanish announcers' table has become a staple in modern professional wrestling as a convenient device for wrestlers to execute dramatic moves on, such as the Piledriver or the Pedigree, which almost always results in the destruction of the table, as it is designed to collapse on impact.

Hugo & Carlos will travel to the PPV site to provide live broadcast commentary in Spanish, however they perform their live Raw commentary from the WWE Television Studios in Stamford, Connecticut

[edit] Trivia

He was married to the famous former female wrestler Wendi Richter

One of the most famous on-air incidents that Savinovich was involved in with WWE was at Wrestlemania XIX, when he "accidentally" received a chair shot to the head from Hulk Hogan in the match between Hogan and Vince McMahon after McMahon ducked out form the chair shot. He was unable to continue with the Spanish broadcast and Cabrera had to finish the show by himself.

His trademark call "Atángana" has become famous in several Hispanic countries in recent years due to his work in WWE.

[edit] Famous Quotes

"Atángana".
"Por poquiiiitooo".
"Dimelo Carlitos (to Cabrera)".
"Me gustó Carlitos (to Cabrera)".
"Fuego..fuego..Susi, llama a los bomberos (Fire, fire...Shushi, call the firemen). "
"La acción al Rrrrrrrrrrrrojo vivo. "
"Aprieta, Aprieta!. "