Alberto el Patron Went Missing for a Bit

Scant few things are more terrifying than missing persons stories. The sheer number of people who vanished off the face of the earth seemingly is not terribly high, but each of those individual cases cause so much pain and uncertain longing from the people who are close to those who go missing. At least in the case of an untimely death (God forbid), the loved ones of the deceased have a body and the knowledge of what happened so that they can get closure. Missing persons cases do not provide that, and they can tear at people for extended periods of time. They're terrible and I don't wish them on anyone, and for about 24 hours from Sunday into Monday this week, wrestling looked like it was going to have a case on its hands with a high-profile person.

Alberto el Patron (formerly del Rio in WWE) was scheduled to appear at the Bustin' for Autism event Sunday night for Lone Star Wrestling and Clutch City Productions. He was given an advance and everything, but when the show rolled around, he was nowhere to be found. It's not the first time a high-profile wrestler has no-showed an independent wrestling gig, and it won't be the last. Sure, Clutch City Productions were miffed at the slight, but el Patron has always refunded promoters his advance for any show he's had to miss. But the story took another turn when attempts to contact him first from Lone Star Wrestling and then friends and family went unanswered. el Patron's radio silence continued into late Monday.

By that time, people started to get really worried and started to compare the situation to the last time a high-profile wrestler no-showed a big event and went incommunicado. I thought the comparisons to [REDACTED] were far-fetched, but the worry was still palpable. Again, missing persons cases get scary after an hour, let alone a day. However, Toque Filtrado, a Mexican columnist and a representative of Asistencia Asesoría y Administración, el Patron's home company, released this announcement via Twitter:

A pesar de algunos rumores que lo ponían como 'desaparecido', el luchador Alberto 'El Patrón' se encuentra en casa, según fuentes de AAA.

— Toque Filtrado (@ToqueFiltrado) July 13, 2015

Roughly translated, it means "Despite some rumors that put him as 'disappeared', the fighter Alberto 'El Patron' is at home, according to sources from AAA." el Patron (or at least his representatives) have also contacted Lone Star Wrestling and given the company an explanation of what happened. To its credit, LSW has decided not to release that reasoning and let el Patron reveal it himself. All's well that ends well, right? I suppose.

Still, it's weird how all this unfolded. People in the know are saying this is nothing big, and they could be right. But it's still highly concerning the pattern of no-shows by el Patron (he also didn't show up to the New England Fan Fest a few weeks back). Hopefully, it's just something minor and not the sign of depression or something else serious with his well-being. But for now, everything has returned to normal.