Manuel began his career at 14, working initially as Brillante Jr. In 2007, he was hired by CMLL and performed as La Sombra, winning the 2007 Torneo Gran Alternativa and the 2011 Universal Championship. He also performed at New Japan Pro-Wrestling and was one of the founders of the mexican Power Stable Los Ingobernables, from which a more popular Japanese branch later flourished. His stint in CMLL came to an end after he lost his mask in a Lucha de Apuestas against Atlantis.
In 2015 he was hired by the WWE, and began performing in the NXT brand as Manny Andrade, before settling onto Andrade "Cien" Almas as his ring name. Initially a face wrestler who could never connect with the audience, he turned heel and got Zelina Vega as his manager, getting a proper propulsion to his career ending with him conquering the NXT Championship, losing the title to Aleister Black on NXT TakeOver: New Orléans, before being called to the SmackDown brand on the 2018 Superstar Shakeup. In 2019, he was drafted to Raw during that year's Shakeup. However over the next few years he was constantly underused, rarely appearing on TV (especially after Vega was released from the company in 2020) and in early 2021 he requested his release. Despite initially refusing to grant it, the company reconsidered and he was released on the 21st of March. After much anticipation about where he would end up next (including an appearance in AAA), he became All Elite on the 4th of June as "Andrade el Idolo". On July 31, 2022, he tag-teamed with his real-life father-in-law Ric Flair for what was promoted as Flair's last-ever match.
Among his accolades, as La Sombra, he's 1x NWA World Welterweight Champion, 2x NWA World Historic Welterweight Champion, 1x CMLL World Tag Team Champion (w/Volador Jr.), 1x CMLL World Trios Champion (2/La Máscara and Máscara Dorada), 1x IWGP Intercontinental Champion and 1x NWA World Historic Middleweight Champion. As Andrade "Cien" Almas, he's 1x WWE NXT Champion and 1x United States Champion. He also never missed the PWI 500 ever since entering in 2007, his best rankings being 2010 (91), 2013 (52) and 2018 (13).
Tropos Tranquilos
- Finishing Move: The Hammerlock DDT (known as "El Ídolo" in AAA and AEW). He's later added his wife's finisher the Figure 8 (bridging figure 4 leglock)
- I Have Many Names: Andrade, Andrade "Cien" Almas, Andrade El Idolo, Andrade "El Ídolo", Brillante, Brillante Jr., Guerrero Azteca, La Sombra, Manny Andrade, Rey Azteca
- Likes Older Women: In 2022, he married Charlotte Flair, who's three years and a few months older than him. See also "Wrestling Family" below.
- Masked Luchador: Formerly. And unlike some of his ilk that unmask, his past as a luchador was referenced and discussed on commentary. He even made his entrance to NXT TakeOver: Philadelphia being played in by a full masked mariachi band and wearing his old mask, which he removed before entering the ring.
- Signature Move: A running double knee strike to the head of an opponent seated in the corner. A top rope moonsault feint into a standing moonsault. A feint front kick into a back elbow
- Theme Naming: "La Sombra" means "the shadow" in Spanish, while "Cien Almas" means "hundred souls" in the same language.
- Wrestling Family: With his marriage to Charlotte Flair, he became the son-in-law of Ric Flair and brother-in-law of Ric's surviving son David Flair (and Ric's late son Reid Flair). Also, Conrad Thompson, the husband of Ric's older daughter Megan, is the host/moderator of several wrestling podcasts, and co-organized Ric's "Last Match" in 2022. Andrade's father also a wrestler known as Brillante.
- Bash Brothers: With Místico.
- Evil Mentor: To Tetsuya Naito, who was part of the original Los Ingobernables during his stint in Mexico before returning to Japan and forming Los Ingobernables de Japon. This means that rather than Sombra being an expy of Naito as some may think, Rush and Andrade pretty much taught Naito how to get over.
- Face/Heel Double-Turn: CMLL set up a revelos suicidas between two teams of rivals at their 80th anniversary show, which lead to La Sombra and Volador Jr getting
X-Pac Heat when they lost to Atlantis and Último Guerrero, as the latter had a longer, more heated feud and fans were more interested in seeing them in the resulting Lucha de Apuestas for their masks. However, Volador Jr was already a rudo, so booing hardly affected him and fans felt sympathy for him after he was forced to unmask, leading to him becoming a tecnico, while La Sombra became more violent and short tempered as a result of being booed at the biggest show of the year, becoming a rudo, (sort of). - Nominal Hero: Only avoided being officially designated rudos by the latter's sheer insistence that he and his teammates La Máscara and Rush were merely "Los Ingobernables, técnicos diferentes", and that the other técnicos they typically opposed like Volador Jr. and Místico were still their brothers. This resulted in them becoming Tweeners in the sense that they could feud with both tecnicos and rudos alike.
- Power Stable:
- "Los Ingobernables", with Marco Corleone, La Máscara, Rush and Tetsuya Naito.
- "La Ola Lagunera", with Black Warrior, Blue Panther, Dragón Rojo Jr., Misterioso #2, Último Guerrero, Ephesto and Stuka Jr.
- Power Trio:
- "Los Comandos del Aire", with El Sagrado and Volador Jr.
- "La Generación de Oro", with La Máscara and Máscara Dorada.
- "Super Sky Team", with Místico and Volador Jr.
- "Los Indeseables", with Rush and La Máscara.
- Red Baron: “Prince of CMLL”.
- Alliterative Name: His 'proper' ring name in WWE, Andrade Almas.
- Arch-Enemy:
- Has had several major rivals in NXT over the NXT Championship, namely Drew McIntyre, Johnny Gargano, and Aleister Black.
- His first feud in Smackdown was against Sin Cara.
- Also in Smackdown, Rusev Day (Rusev and Lana and Aiden English).
- 2019 saw him feuding with Rey Mysterio, Apollo Crews and Humberto Carrillo.
- Beard of Evil: He's been mostly a Heel and one of his distinguishing physical traits is his beard.
- The Bully: He often picks on other wrestlers who are weaker or meeker than him such as Ho Ho Lun and Rey Mysterio.
- Bullying a Dragon: Tried to bully Drew McIntyre and was crushed by him in a match.
- Continuity Nod: While perhaps not attracting attention to the same level as, for example, former members of Bullet Club in WWE, he still carried several mannerisms of his former Los Ingobernables stable in Mexico, such as the Tranquilo taunts and the raised fist symbol.
- Face–Heel Turn: After he and Cedric Alexander lost in the first round of the 2016 Dusty Rhodes Tag Team Classic, Almas viciously attacked Cedric out of frustration and anger due to his losing streak and the crowd's consistent hostile reaction to him.
- Heel–Face Turn: On the April 5 episode of SmackDown, Andrade turned on Dominik Mysterio by helping Rey Mysterio, turning face for the first time since 2016. This led to a match at WrestleMania XL, where Andrade teamed with Rey to defeat Dominik and Santos Escobar.
- I Shall Taunt You: His in-ring antics are incredibly cocky. He'll even pass up opportunities to attack if it means he can mock his opponent.
- Only One Name: "Cien Almas" was dropped as of the January 15, 2019 episode of SmackDown.
- Platonic Life-Partners: With Zelina Vega. They have been allies since 2017 and their relationship is clearly professional.
- Red Baron: "El Ídolo", or "The Idol".
- Shout-Out: His entrances at Andrade El Ídolo has him coming out dressed as Batman villain Black Mask.
- Took a Level in Badass: Since Zelina Vega joined him as a manager, he started winning more, with Vega either psyching him up or cheating on his behalf. Although coupled with this, his skill in the ring became more apparent as well, and was eventually paid off with an NXT championship reign as well as being one half (along with Johnny Gargano) of the first five-star match awarded by Dave Meltzer under the WWE banner in six-plus years (Cena v. CM Punk, MITB 2011)
- Worthy Opponent: After Cedric Alexander defeated him, Almas congratulated him and shook his hand. The next episode they were one of the first teams announced for the 2016 Dusty Rhodes Tag Team Classic. Unfortunately this respect didn't last long, as noted above.
- You Are Number 6: Plus Bilingual Bonus. 'Cien' is Spanish for 100.
