SHIMMER Women Athletes – Volume 13 – 2nd June 2007
I don’t have the highest of expectations for this particular SHIMMER release. Of course I always enjoy my trips into SHIMMER’s back catalogue, and there are a few matches on this card which do look pretty enticing…but the sheer logistics of this weekend’s taping make it unlikely that anything is going to knock me out of the park. Having competed a two-show tournament within the space of 24 hours earlier in the afternoon, this talented roster comes back together for one last evening show – with some of these ladies competing in their fourth and fifth matches of the aforementioned 24-hour period. It seems a huge ask for the likes of new SHIMMER Champion Sara Del Rey, Lacey, Sarah Stock, Daizee Haze and more to hit the ring again – and those four are all involved in marquee matches on this DVD. Stock and Haze compete in a battle of the losing tournament semi-finalists, whilst Del Rey joins forces with the popular Nikki Roxx to face the Minnesota Home Wrecking Crew in the main event. The big draw on this show is another grudge match between Allison Danger and Cindy Rogers. With nothing settled in the No DQ showdown at Volume 12, the evening show sees them do battle again in a Dog Collar Match. Dave Prazak will have Danger alongside him for commentary for the rest of the show. We are taped, once again, in Berwyn, IL.
Alicia vs Serena Deeb
This is something of a grudge match. Deeb missed Volume 11 yesterday night and had to forfeit her slot in the SHIMMER Title Tournament. The opportunistic Alicia took advantage of that and seized the spot for herself – advancing to the Quarter Finals before falling to eventual winner Sara Del Rey. Serena survived a car accident and is able to compete today, and now looks to prove that she is superior to the woman who stole her tournament spot.
The crowd also seem fatigued as this show starts. Maybe they are just fed up of sitting through Alicia’s matches. Prazak and Danger promote this as a ‘must win’ match for Alicia if she wants to keep her spot. She begins as if she is feeling the burden of such pressure and is extremely tentative during the early lock-ups. Deeb dominates, working hold after hold with her opponent seemingly powerless to resist her skills. Five minutes in and her arm is being picked apart, although the pace is so painfully slow you can feel the energy slipping out of this tiring audience like a lengthy wet fart. Alicia crotches Serena on the top (without a hint of arm selling in sight) then delivers a cumbersome basement dropkick. She then uses her arm to choke Deeb as she crawls around on the mat. I don’t mind Alicia’s gimmick (it’s preferable to Daffney screeching for no reason) but the problem is she can’t work for sh*t. A chinlock comes next – a terrible decision since another resthold bores the fans still further, and yet again exposes her total lack of selling. Serena responds by going after Alicia’s nose, which is ironic how much her own nose would change cosmetically over the course of her career. A-Bomb blocked into the Spear, giving Serena the win at 10:13
Rating - DUD - A particularly poor way to start the show, and one that put the final nail into the coffin of Alicia’s brief SHIMMER career. This was ponderous, meandering and almost completely devoid of any kind of focus – generally making it the most abysmal of choices to kick off a show when you already have the issue of fan fatigue after three shows in less than a day. This needed to be fun, fast-paced and action packed, not tedious and poorly wrestled in almost every way. If you’re intent on watching this show there is no reason whatsoever to prevent you from skipping straight over this one. Even the most ardent of Serena Deeb/Straight Edge Society fans won’t get much joy from it.
Malia Hosaka vs Josie
These two women have previous. Hosaka, as part of The Experience, has enjoyed bullying some of the lesser-travelled, less experienced wrestlers like Josie over the previous SHIMMER shows. We saw the animosity between these two spill over during a four-way match at Volume 10 when they brawled to the back rather than concentrating on winning the match in question. Failure to win that one proved particularly costly for Josie as it came on the back of an extended losing streak and caused her to miss out on a Volume 11 booking and spot in the title tournament. She returned at Volume 12 with a much needed win over Alicia, and now wants some payback on Hosaka.
Josie sprints down the aisle and doesn’t wait for the introductions to get her hands on Malia. The wily veteran wisely spends some time on the outside trying to kill Josie’s momentum – and shows even more experience by returning to the ring and trying to work the mat rather than let Josie build up any speed. A spinning heel kick followed by a Warrior Splash gets 2 for the old pro as all of her opponent’s early fire starts to fizzle out. Josie hits a T-bone suplex as the crowd heckle the timekeeper for announcing that five minutes have elapsed when we’d barely past three. The Chicago-native Josie is desperate to pull out a win and looks increasingly devastated every time she fails to put Hosaka away. That over-enthusiasm is her undoing as she naively walks into a hurricanrana and loses at 06:08
Rating - * - Another quite unremarkable match, albeit I appreciated Hosaka’s psychology and veteran tactics in the face of the generic babyface fire that came her way in the opening minutes. This one rather died a death based on the fact that Josie just isn’t over or good enough to hold up her end of the deal. Everything she did was either super basic or poorly executed, which is why she continues to languish right at the very bottom of the SHIMMER totem pole.
Lexie Fyfe vs Eden Black
With one member of The Experience having earned a singles victory, we now move to the second. Like Malia, Fyfe will be keen to rebound from their team’s first ever loss at Volume 12. Her opponent is a tough little cookie, and a real polar opposite to her in every way. Lexie is methodical, calculating and controlled in everything she does, where as Eden is wild, excitable and thoroughly unpredictable. Will Black’s chaotic style be enough to unsettle the skills of a veteran adversary here?
Fyfe puts down a marker by slapping her fiery opponent across the face. Eden rather surprises her back though, by breaking out some World Of Sport-inspired chain wrestling rather than her ‘indy-riffic’ moveset we usually see. It’s a really smart approach from Black, shunning the American indy stuff she normally does that Lexie has experienced before and instead utilising her British heritage to thwart the veteran. Fyfe uses her power to muscle her way back into the contest and muscles her all over the ring with a flurry of vertical suplexes. Black’s back starts to suffer and she barely manages to escape the Attitude Adjuster at the five minute mark. She tries a desperate Garden Of Eden but barely manages to get her grip before Lexie is in the ropes. A hectic crossbody off the top scores…before Jezebel looks for an ill-advised hurricanrana and eats a nasty powerbomb. GARDEN OF EDEN! LEXIE TAPS! From absolutely nothing, the gutsy Eden Black pulls out the win at 07:44
Rating - ** - Another match which won’t win too many prizes for excitement, but I actually enjoyed much of this. Black continues to surprise me every time I see her. She is a very rough diamond and probably not worth her flight fees at this point but she brings an energy to the table that very few of her contemporaries on the roster do. I loved the idea that she’d try to work a British style her because Fyfe has so much experience to counter her usual indy-riffic spots, and likewise I liked the idea that Lexie would destroy the back of a smaller opponent who is so reliant on flamboyant, anarchic offence to score victories. In the end both women come out looking strong here – Lexie having dominated, and Black for having survived a real beating before putting another opponent away to the increasingly feared Garden Of Eden submission.
Portia Perez vs MsChif
This is without a doubt the biggest match of Portia’s SHIMMER career thus far. She increases her stock with every show that passes, even if she isn’t accumulating many victories as yet. Some of her in-ring performances have been eye catching, and her ability to work a crowd is amongst the best in the company. This is a real test as she faces main eventer MsChif – who is still rebounding after only making the Quarter Finals in the tournament this weekend.
She isn’t that much shorter, but for some reason Portia seems dwarfed by MsChif and Daffney as she prepares to start the match. Daffney actually remains in the ring and tickles her…prompting Perez to sit down in the middle of the ring and sulk. Kicks from Perez only for a guttural scream from Chif to force her from the ring. Daffney chases her around the ring with a cardboard cut-out of MsChif too which is quite funny. A sit-out powerbomb nearly puts the Canadian away so it’s to her credit that Portia refuses to get counted down and instead fires back with another impressive flurry of kicks. School’s Out gets 2! MsChif hits a powerbomb then destroys her with elbows and knees in the corner. OBLITERATION! MsChif wins at 06:20
Rating - ** - A fun little match, and by a long way the most enjoyable Daffney has been in SHIMMER so far. Portia is a rising star and what I particularly liked here is how she was presented as a tough, credible worker even whilst she was effectively nothing more than an enhancement talent for MsChif. As I’ve said previously, Perez is ready for a more prominent role in SHIMMER…
Alexa Thatcher is called to the ring to be interviewed by Becky Bayless. She is another one who has been in a car accident recently, suffering a broken foot which is why she wasn’t competing this weekend. Alicia is out for the millionth time this weekend, with one particularly blunt fan yelling ‘I wish you’d been in a car crash’. She gives the broken foot a few kicks just to be a dick…
Cheerleader Melissa vs Ariel
Much like Portia in the preceding match, this is a big opportunity for Ariel. Her loss to Alicia at Volume 11 was the low point of her SHIMMER career, and she may well feel a growing sense of frustration at her inability to break out of the midcard pack. If she is somehow capable of pulling off a shock over Melissa tonight it would complete a pretty remarkable turnaround over the course of two shows. The Cheerleader herself is still smarting from a first round exit in the title tournament, so in turn will view this match as the first rebuilding step in her own singles career.
ELBOWS BY MELISSA! And I mean she lays them in thick! The Berwyn audience seem genuinely concerned for the popular Ariel’s welfare…then audibly gasp in delight as she rallies and knocks the Cheerleader to the mat with a flurry of dropkicks. Mounted elbows from Melissa next, dialling the aggression up as she vents more frustration following her first round tournament exit. KNEE TO THE F*CKING FACE! HOLY SH*T! Did Ariel piss her off backstage? Next she applies a chinlock whilst raking her fingers across the unfortunate Portuguese Princess’ face…then gives her some disrespectful slaps as she collapses to the mat. Melissa smirks and tries to bully her opponent but Ariel refuses to quit. She returns with some slaps of her own then comes at Cheerleader with a torrent of pinning combinations. CURB STOMP! This is a massacre yet somehow Ariel keeps kicking out. She dodges a running elbow and hits some HUGE chops of her own! Air Raid Crash blocked, so Melissa hits the Samoan drop instead. STRATUS-FACTION by Ariel gets 2! She thinks about the Ariel-Go-Round but eats a SHOTEI! RUNNING AIR RAID CRASH! Melissa wins at 10:13
Rating - *** - I wasn’t sure what to expect from this. I like both women but wasn’t sure quite how they’d mesh together. I shouldn’t have worried – it turned out to be one of the most outright FUN matches in SHIMMER history. Melissa held nothing back in beating the sh*t out of poor Ariel. I like how her babyface ‘turn’ has been handled in that, other than a few poses and high fives, Melissa doesn’t actually do anything differently. She still wrestles like a bad ass machine who wants to flat-out murder her opponents – and fans love her for it. What made this intriguing was that fans also really like her opponent. From the minute her music hit you could hear the concern the fans had for Ariel. As such, this was the perfect match for the audience – giving them exactly what they wanted with Cheerleader at her brutal best and Ariel taking all her best shots as a plucky underdog. There has been some poor stuff on this DVD…this was like a breath of fresh air.
BREAKING NEWS – Amazing Kong returns at SHIMMER Volume 14, the first ever SHIMMER event to take place outside of Illinois.
Sarah Stock vs Daizee Haze
No woman has worked harder this weekend than Sarah Stock. She made a stunning debut at Volume 11 by eliminating both Cheerleader Melissa and MsChif from the tournament, before finally succumbing to defeat herself in an excellent semi-final bout with eventual-winner Sara Del Rey. The lucha libre standout has made a lasting impression on the SHIMMER audience…but has one final engagement with a main event level star before leaving us for the time-being. She meets the other losing semi-finalist, Daizee Haze. It’s been a rough weekend for the Haze too, so this one becomes as much a war of attrition and a test of who has more in the tank than it does about wrestling skill. This match also has something of a reputation thanks to Hornswoggle making a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo to dance during Daizee’s entrance.
Stock refuses to dance and shows she means business by aggressively shunting Daizee to the ground. This one is interesting because Haze usually uses her speed and lucha influences to get the better of her opponents…but tonight she is wrestling someone miles better than her at that. It means she has to adopt a radical change in strategy and actually tries to work the mat with the Dark Angel instead. Her change in approach is dramatically demonstrated as she tries a lucha armdrag but is easily swatted aside by the CMLL wrestler. The Haze is a ferocious competitor on the mat though and is clearly the aggressor every time they break into an extended sequence down there. Gradually Sarah works her way into the contest and begins demonstrating her own ability to run through strings of submission holds on the canvas. It’s quite mesmerising watching these two seamlessly go back and forth. Haze makes a mistake, trying another lucha armdrag…and this time eats an OCEAN CYCLONE SUPLEX! With her back already hurting her that move could prove decisive and Stock knows it. She is all over the spine now, ditching the elaborate submissions and opting for simple, rugged knees and elbows to the injured body part. RUNNING DROPKICK TO THE HEAD! Stock has gone up a gear here and the Haze is struggling to live with her. She counters a superplex with a gourdbuster…and dives out of the corner with a missile dropkick! Prazak points out how much weaker her execution was than normal in that move thanks to her injuries. TORTURE RACK! LA REIENERA! Stock gets 2! Showing how much fresher she is than Daizee, Dark Angel effortlessly springs off the ropes into a sunset flip for another nearfall as poor Haze rolls around on the ground looking thoroughly miserable. La Tapatia locked in! Haze has seen enough – breaking out a surfboard of her own then sacrificing her own body to hit a senton bomb. Heart Punch countered…powerbomb countered! HEART PUNCH! YAKUZA KICK DUCKED! OCEAN CYCLONE…DAIZEE COUNTERS! NECK DROP TIGER DRIVER BY STOCK! SHE WINS! A memorable debut weekend is complete as Stock gets another win at 18:07
Rating - **** - This may well be my favourite match of the entire weekend, which is a phenomenal achievement considering how much work these two athletes have already put in so far at these tapings. Stock has been a revelation, filling the gap left by Rebecca Knox as the uber-talented foreign-based superstar able to fly in for shows and be so damn impressive she is instantly accepted as a main event player alongside SHIMMER mainstays like Melissa, Del Rey and Daizee. The Haze has been mightily impressive herself recently. Some of my favourite matches of hers are when she gets taken out of her comfort zone and has to wrestle matches differently. That’s why I loved her match with Kong, and this one was very similar. She couldn’t do her sloppy lucha bullsh*t because Stock would wipe the floor with her, so she devised a different strategy and tried to out-wrestle the Dark Angel. This is a woman who hung with Rebecca Knox in technical wrestling clinics so we know Daizee can WRESTLE with the very best. And she almost pulled it off, before Stock used a combination of her own immense mat skills plus her ability to step up through the gears to a quality level that Daizee just couldn’t match. Stock wound up wrestling for more than 60-minutes across these three shows, in less than 24-hours. The fact that she saved something THIS good for last is quite amazing. She needs to come back soon.
Cindy Rogers vs Allison Danger – Dog Collar Match
I know Dave Prazak wants us to look at these shows as individual events in their own right, rather than ‘taping weekends’. But, before considering this match in isolation – please remember that earlier in the same day these two tough women were competing in a seriously physical No DQ Match at the V12 taping. We saw Danger pick up the win there, only to be assaulted after the match by her hated nemesis. Rogers is determined to get to the top of SHIMMER by any means necessary and has made no bones about being willing to step all over her former friend to get there. Will this be the match that sees her further trample all over Allison’s reputation, or the match where Danger forcibly slaps her back into line?
Some of the smack talk between these two as the collar is fastened between them is delightfully juvenile. Rogers is an absolute dick throughout and fittingly starts the match by ramming the chain into Danger’s crotch. She whips her across the spine with it too, then ties her heels together as she makes her first attempt to touch the four corners. When Allison puts a stop to that she gets a chain-wrapped punch to the stomach! The Woman Of Honor spends most of the first five minutes flat on her back desperately trying to stop Cindy from touching various turnbuckles – eventually rolling out of the ring to prevent her making further progress. That move comes back to haunt her as Rogers uses the chain to jerk her head-first into the ringpost! She is having a great time now, wrapping the chain around Danger’s FACE before grinding it against the steps. Allison has pulled a Corino and is busted open! Not that Rogers shows any mercy of course, she simply puts the chain around her first and looks to open the cut up some more. It takes all the energy has for Danger to sprint across the ring and drag her opponent to the ground to prevent another turnbuckle touch. She gets viciously choked with the chain and reduced to total unconsciousness. The arrogant Cindy smiles broadly and saunters through three turnbuckles…before finally being hauled back just when she seemed sure to seal the victory. Haymakers are exchanged, Danger swinging punches from one knee such is her disorientated state due to fatigue and blood-loss. Cindy tries to throttle her again, this time adding a leglock to her attempts to choke out her rival. With the unconscious Allison on her back, she marches to three turnbuckles in turn – but is completely unaware that Danger has touched each corner too! All of a sudden it’s a rush to the final turnbuckle. STO INTO THE TURNBUCKLES BY DANGER! But that meant Cindy actually touched the final corner first! She wins at 15:08
Rating - *** - I wasn’t in love with this. The stipulations felt really out of place and I felt like they were restricting what these two could do in the ring together rather than enhance it. However, that seems particularly mean-spirited so instead I’d like to focus on how damn hard these two have worked across the last two shows. They have beaten the hell out of each other, and I love how each match in their feud is so unashamedly tough. None of them feel like traditional wrestling matches, and with each one that passes you are left in no doubt as to the animosity between them. My favourite part of this was how it eschewed most pro-wrestling formalities altogether – meaning it wasn’t particularly pretty but it damn sure felt like a dirty, rough fight between two heated enemies. Much as with Stock/Haze, the mere fact that Cindy and Allison were able to work a match like this after the gruelling taping schedule they’d already worked was pretty miraculous. There aren’t many matches like this in SHIMMER history so far, so this one certainly stands out as memorable even if it wasn’t my favourite match ever.
Minnesota Home Wrecking Crew vs Sara Del Rey/Nikki Roxx
This comes as a direct result of what we saw in the SHIMMER Title Tournament final at Volume 12. With Del Rey seemingly on the brink of victory, Lacey ensured the ref was knocked out then summoned her tag team partner Rain to interfere on her behalf. The tournament nearly ended in extreme controversy as Rain’s interjection almost cost Sara the match. Nikki Roxx led the charge to rescue Del Rey and restore the honour of the championship (Allison Danger was there too, but could barely walk after her Street Fight with Cindy earlier in the show) – eventually dragging Rain away as Del Rey brought home the gold. Now all the players come back together for the final act in a marathon weekend. Lacey will be desperate to avenge her title loss to Sara and earn an immediate rematch. Rain and Roxx don’t get on, and Lacey has history with Nikki too. Pride is at stake, as well as the chance to notch reputations at the expense of the newly minted SHIMMER Champion. Who leaves with their hands raised and their heads held high?
Lacey sprints across the ring and knocks Del Rey straight out of the ring. The two tournament finalists are soon involved in a heated brawl on the floor as Roxx and Rain (who met in the tournament too) start in the ring together. Sara mows both Home Wreckers down with a double crossbody! Rain vents her frustration by braining Nikki against the guardrails behind the ref’s back, handing the MHWC the advantage. With the SHIMMER Champion successfully restricted to the apron we see the tag team experience and fluidity of Lacey and Rain come to the fore. They isolate Roxx, beating her all over the ring as Sara gets more and more pissed off. Lacey, of course, is a joy to watch in this role – combining some surprisingly violent things (like huge kicks and actually BITING her opponent’s face) with a few hilariously catty and offbeat comments to the crowd, the ref, and anyone else who will listen. Bubba Bomb rolled into a Masterlock/dropkick combo for 2! Finally Roxx escapes, bringing in an intense Death Rey who absolutely kills Lacey with a running boot and nearly wins it in an instant with a bridging German on Rain. DOUBLE TORNADO POLISH HAMMERS get 2 for the babyfaces! Barbie Crusher blocked into a (sloppy) lungblower combo by the Home Wreckers! Nikki counters the Rain Drop into a snap suplex…and in comes Sara again. DOUBLE ROYAL BUTTERFLY ON BOTH HOME WRECKERS! BARBIE CRUSHER ON LACEY! Sara pins Rain at 11:52
Rating - *** - Perhaps understandably this wasn’t the finest of SHIMMER main events. BUT, in the context of an absolutely brutal weekend for these women (particularly Sara and Lacey), this was about as good as you could expect. They went out there, worked a classic southern formula tag, had some fun with the crowd then put together an exciting finish. Del Rey deservedly ends the weekend standing tall, but crucially didn’t pin Lacey – setting up their rematch at the Florida show next month.
Tape Rating - ** - I think this rating is perhaps a little harsh, but when you consider that we are supposed to treat these as standalone shows, probably fair. In the context of a gruelling weekend however, this show was, on the whole, a really entertaining end to the tapings. Stock/Haze was outstanding, the main event was fun, Melissa/Ariel was unexpectedly violent and Rogers/Danger produced one of the more memorable grudge matches in SHIMMER history. For the SHIMMER completist there is a lot to like here. For the selective viewer, this is skippable. Volume 12 stands head and shoulders above V11 and V13 from this weekend. I’m going to end with special commendations to Sara Del Rey, Lacey, Daizee Haze and Sarah Stock. Those four women went SO far above and beyond what could possibly be expected of them to deliver the goods across all three shows this weekend. Stock killed it in all four of her matches. How Sara and Lacey were still walking going into the main event of V13 I’ll never know. And Haze is so small, yet never backed up an inch and was in the ring almost twenty minutes deep into her V13 match with Sarah Stock, somehow finding it within herself to produce one of her finest SHIMMER performances to date. In a weekend where SHIMMER were forced to run without a huge number of their top names those four seriously stepped up to produce the goods and make sure we still got plenty of quality bouts.
Top 3 Matches
3) Cindy Rogers vs Allison Danger (***)
2) Cheerleader Melissa vs Ariel (***)
1) Sarah Stock vs Daizee Haze (****)