Hugo Savinovich

Savinovich was 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 gang member in the streets of New York in the late 1960s and early 1970s. He joined the sport under the guidance of Angel "El Toro" Maldonado. Mexican wrestling promoter Arturo Mendoza took him to Puerto Rico, where he lived for close to 14 years.

Savinovich began his wrestling career in working for promoter Arturo Mendoza who ran wrestling shows in the west area of Puerto Rico. Arturo Mendoza noticed that Savinovich had very good skills to be a wrestling announcer. Moved on to the World Wrestling Council in 1978. He was originally a "tecnico" (the Spanish wrestling term for a "face", or "good guy"); after breaking up with Mendoza and his original wrestling partner, Little Chief Cherokee, he joined the local World Wrestling Council franchise in Puerto Rico, Capitol Sport Promotions (owned partially by Carlos Colón), where he gained notoriety for being one of the "rudo" 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 gaped 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 commentator for wrestling matches, using a loud and fast narrative style -which he pioneered, since called "estilo lucha libre" ("wrestling style") in Puerto Rico.

He would tour the United States for Western States Sports and Mid-South Wrestling in 1980 and Japan for All Japan Pro Wrestling in 1984.

Hugo managed some the most notorious heels in professional wrestling such as Abdullah the Butcher, Ox Baker, The Sheik and Buddy Landell until he had a fallout with Barrabas Sr becoming a face in 1984.

Savinovich eventually became a partner at World Wrestling Council, only to split with Colón a few years after in a rather acrimonious business disputes with the company management forced him to leave and joined the rival American Wrestling Federation.

In 1991, Savinovich would come out of retirement after seven years and feud with Billy Joe Travis, which would last a couple years in WWC and AWF.

Savinovich later became an announcer in the World Wrestling Council when he replaced Rickyn Sánchez when Sánchez left WWC in the fall of 1984. He remained there until November 1991 when he joined the American Wrestling Federation who ran opposition against the World Wrestling Council.

In 1994, Savinovich accepted an offer from the World Wrestling Federation to work as a Spanish announcer. He was paired with Carlos Cabrera to host the Spanish language versions of Raw, SmackDown, Superstars, NXT, and pay-per-view (PPV) events. Savinovich and Cabrera had a show at WWE.com called WWE En Español (WWE in Spanish), which lasts about 30 minutes; it is a recap of Raw, SmackDown, NXT, and pay-per-view events. 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 previous years, while working for WWE on their pay per views, the area in which he works with Cabrera, commonly known as the Spanish announcers' table, has become a staple in professional wrestling. It is a convenient device for wrestlers to execute dramatic moves on, such as the Piledriver or the Pedigree. The moves almost always result in the destruction of the table.

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 a chair shot. He was unable to continue with the Spanish broadcast and Cabrera had to finish the show by himself. Savinovich and Cabrera provide live Spanish commentary for all weekly shows from the WWE Television Studios in Stamford, Connecticut and are at ringside for PPV events. This practice temporarily ended in mid-2006. Originally due to the addition of the now-defunct ECW brand, the announce teams of all three brands were present for tri-branded pay-per-views (Royal Rumble, WrestleMania, SummerSlam, and Survivor Series). During this time, Savinovich and Cabrera provided commentary for these events from the WWE Television Studios but were still placed at ringside for brand-exclusive PPV events.

When the brand-exclusive pay-per-view concept ended in 2007, the announce teams of all three brands were placed at ringside for all PPV events. Beginning in 2009, a single three-man announce team, composed of announcers from the two current brands, was designated for pay-per-views. Savinovich and Cabrera returned to ringside for PPVs at The 25th Anniversary of WrestleMania in 2009. However, they were not reinstated full-time until WrestleMania XXVI in 2010.

Also in 2009 Hugo Savinovich returned to the World Wrestling Council after a 17 years absence and the 2009 WWC Anniversary Card was dedicated to him.

On October 19, 2011 Savinovich announced that he was leaving WWE.

Savinovich was a guest commentator at the AAA Triplemania XXI. Also at that event, Savinovich was in El Mesias' corner in a match against Blue Demon Jr. for the AAA Latin American Championship. During the inaugural season of Lucha Underground in 2014, there were two versions of the commentary shot, an English version with Matt Stryker and Vampiro, and a Spanish version that was broadcast on Unimas, with Savinivoch doing the play by play. Vampiro did the color commentary for the Spanish version also. In resent years Hugo Savinovich has been announcing for AAA in Mexico and promoting pro wrestling in Florida and throughout South America and Puerto Rico.[2]

In early January 2019, it was reported that Savinovich had signed with All Elite Wrestling as a Spanish commentator. He worked the events Double or Nothing and All Out along with Alex Abranthes and Dasha Gonzalez. He’s currently AEW’s Spanish correspondent in Latin America.

Hugo Savinovich currently works for Lucha Libre Triple A in Mexico as a Spanish Commentator. He also works for GWE in Panamá as a commentator and executive producer. Hugo owns the Pro Wrestling Company Wrestling Superstar along with Darko Navarro in Chile, where he produces multiple events yearly. Savinovich also works for WAR in Ecuador, Imperio Lucha Libre in Perú and for NGCW in Florida as a Producer, Commentator and Main Booker. Besides this, Hugo produces the biggest event in Puerto Rico every year along with Promoter Edwin Vázquez Ortega and Lucha Libre Online.

He was once married to former female wrestler Wendi Richter until divorcing. In 1990 he married Diana Mendéz and has two sons: Jovannie and Genaro. Diana Mendéz died on November 1, 2019 after a long battle with cancer. He is a born again Christian and travels most of South and Central America sharing his Christian testimony.

• Western States Sports
  • NWA Western States Tag Team Championship (1 time) - with Mitsu Ishikawa[3]
• World Wrestling Council
  • WWC Dominican Republic Tag Team Championship (1 time) - with Relámpago Hernández[4]

• Hugo Savinovich on IMDb 
• Hugo Savinovich's profile at Cagematch.net