Starting in 1997 and every year since then the Mexican Lucha Libre, or professional wrestling, company Lucha Libre AAA World Wide has held a Rey de Reyes show in the spring. The 1997 version was held in February, while all subsequent Rey de Reyes shows were held in March. As part of their annual Rey de Reyes event AAA holds the eponymious Rey de Reyes tournament to determine that specific year's Rey. Most years the show hosts both the qualifying round and the final match, but on occasion the qualifying matches have been held prior to the event as part of AAA's weekly television shows. The traditional format consists of four preliminary rounds, each a Four-man elimination match with each of the four winners face off in the tournament finals, again under elimination rules. There have been years where AAA has employed a different format to determine a winner. The winner of the Rey de Reyes tournament is given a large ornamental sword to symbolize their victory, but is normally not guaranteed any other rewards for winning the tournament, although some years becoming the Rey de Reyes has earned the winner a match for the AAA Mega Championship. From 1999 through 2009 AAA also held an annual Reina de Reinas tournament, but later turned that into an actual championship that could be defended at any point during the year, abandoning the annual tournament concept. The 2015 show was the 19th Rey de Reyes show in the series.
Storylines
The Rey de Reyes show featured eight professional wrestling matches with different wrestlers involved in pre-existing, scripted feuds, plots, and storylines. Wrestlers were portrayed as either heels or faces as they followed a series of tension-building events, which culminated in a wrestling match or series of matches. The Rey de Reyes show was originally scheduled to take place on March 15, 2015, at the Plaza de TorosNuevo Progresobullfighting arena in Guadalajara, Jalisco, however, when Guadalajara was hit with a rainstorm, AAA postponed the event for 24 hours and moved it indoors to Auditorio Benito Juarez in Zapopan, Jalisco. The following day AAA announced that they were not able to get all permits in time for the show due to it being it being a national holiday, and once again postponed the show to Wednesday March 18 instead. At the same time they announced that the announced match between El Patrón Alberto and Brian Cage had been cancelled. El Patrón Alberto later stated that he was legally obligated to compete in Australia later in the week and thus was not able to work the Wednesday show for AAA. After the March 16 show was postponed most of the wrestlers and AAA staff traveled back to Mexico by bus. During the trip one of the buses crashed into a stalled truck in Zinapécuaro, Michoacán, killing one member of the AAA staff, Irma Osorno, while several other staff members were either taken to a hospital or received medical attention at the scene of the accident. Due to the tragic accident AAA dedicated the entire show to the memory of Irma Osorno.
