SHIMMER VOLUME 3

Taped February 12, 2006

After only running one taping, SHIMMER is already movin’ on up! The WWE-bound Krissy Vaine and Beth Phoenix have been replaced by veteran Malia Hosaka and well-traveled Rebecca Knox! In addition, Cheerleader Melissa wants another shot at MsChif, and Death Rey continues to prove why she’s the unofficial ace!

Malia Hosaka . . . tortures poor, young, cowgirl upstarts and is awesome for doing so.

Rebecca Knox . . . proves what Don Callis said many, many moons ago, that foreigners are diabolical.

Sara Del Rey . . . isn’t afraid to get her hands a little bit dirty in order to make it to the pay window.

RAIN vs. NIKKI ROXX

If nothing else, this is a good example of how far Nikki has come as a worker since this taping. The match itself isn’t bad, but, aside from the spot where Rain shoots behind Nikki and hits the back cracker, it’s far from smooth. Most of their work is slow and/or a little too obviously cooperative, like they’re both taking it easy to make sure the other doesn’t have to work too hard to get to their next spot. Rain working over Nikki’s back was fine for the most part, although Nikki’s comeback mostly featured her throwing out spots as though she hadn’t just been worked over. It was also nice to see the back work pay off when Rain got the win using the Acid Rain, and they also made a bit of a show out of Rain having to fight just to get Nikki up for the move in the first place. It was a solid match for the most part, but it needed more time and a better performance from Nikki to take it to the next level.

AMBER O’NEAL vs. TIANA RINGER vs. CINDY ROGERS

It sounds wrong to think that Amber O’Neal was the best thing about this match, but that’s exactly what happened. It’s less a three-way match and more like a handicap match with Amber and Ringer against Rogers, which keeps it from looking like the same cookie cutter layout of most other three-ways. Amber is a riot to watch though, she’s not much of a move to move worker, but she’s got her character down perfectly, and she adds a lot of color to the match. She knows damn well she doesn’t have a prayer of beating Cindy and she looks like she’s having a field day when she gets to help Ringer double team her. The best spot is when she and Ringer take turns kicking Cindy in the back, and Amber nearly falls over.

Ringer winds up getting sent to the floor and Cindy eliminates Amber with the facebuster and the personality of the match dies a horrible death. Cindy tries to play up her ‘definition of technician’ moniker with a bunch of cradles while Ringer tries to heel things up with clubbing forearms, but there’s no oomph to anything. Cindy technical prowess wins out with a snap mare segued into the TCB. It probably wouldn’t have had much impact on the match quality itself, but Ringer should really have been eliminated at first, it’d have been fun to see how Amber would have reacted to being on her own against Rogers.

MALIA HOSAKA vs. LORELEI LEE

I try not to throw around too much profanity when I review, but ‘bitch’ is the only word that comes to mind to describe Hosaka (and I mean that in a very positive way). She’s got all the attitude of Lacey, and nineteen years of experience to back it up. When Hosaka is in control, she’s completely in control, she never hesitates to take any shortcut she can, whether it’s choking, arguing with the ref to conceal choking, using the ropes, or using the hair. She’s able to quickly bounce back when Lee surprises her, such as the sunset flip when Hosaka dropped her head too early, Hosaka kicks out and then plants Lee with a big roundhouse kick.

This is probably the best that I’ve seen Lee look, although it probably helps that she’s taking cues from Hosaka. Most of Lee’s work when she’s in control involves her using various submission holds, with plenty of selling from Hosaka to get the crowd behind Lorelei. Lee getting the upset isn’t bad at all, the fans had plenty of reason to want to see her pull off the win, and the Lexie Fyfe run in led to the formation of the Hosaka/Fyfe tag team. Lee using the Oklahoma roll as a finish isn’t bad in theory, but the time it takes her to set it up negates the notion of Lorelei getting the upset out of nowhere.

LEXIE FYFE vs. MSCHIF

This winds up being a lot like the Rain/Roxx match, it’s not actively bad, but it needed something more to be taken to the next level. Most of their work involves showing off MsChif’s agility and flexibility, shown in the form of Fyfe’s ability to stretch her out with the camel clutch and the pendulum stretch, as well as MsChif’s hanging armbar and bridging back on her O’Connor roll. But the match itself isn’t much more than a way to kill some time before Cheerleader Melissa appears to distract MsChif and prevent her from hitting the Desecrator and allowing Fyfe to hit the Attitude Adjuster for the win. There’s certainly nothing wrong with continuing the MsChif/Melissa rivalry, especially after they had such a boss match, but the wrestling itself should be more than just a stall tactic before the angle.

CHEERLEADER MELISSA vs. SHANTELLE TAYLOR

It’s easy to see that this is the best match of the taping so far, but, it’s not without its issues. This winds up being a bit like the MsChif/Fyfe match, it never really feels like the match is explicitly going somewhere. What makes this better is that Melissa and Taylor both add some smart moments and nice touches so that the match doesn’t feel like they’re just killing time before the finish. The best stuff is the early portion involving Melissa working over Taylor’s arm. Taylor outsmarts Melissa early on by goading her into attempting to lock up and then rolling away from her. Taylor continues staying head by successfully grounding her with headlocks and foiling Melissa’s attempts to escape. When Melissa finally gets control she focuses on Taylor’s arm, which is smart considering what preceded it, but as soon as Taylor surprises Melissa with the wheelbarrow armdrag the arm is forgotten about by them both. They play off the wheelbarrow spot a bit later when Taylor tries it again and gets dumped on her head.

There’s also some nice stuff involving Melissa’s ongoing inability to hit the Kudo driver in SHIMMER, which continues here with two attempts, neither of which are successful for her. But, like the arm work, they’re self contained in the context of the match. The first one has a little setup to it in the form of Melissa forcing Taylor to chase her around ringside and ambushing her with boots when Taylor rolls into the ring, but that’s really the extent of it. The other issue that creeps up is that it never genuinely feels like Taylor can pull out the win, the best she’s able to muster is to not get planted with Melissa’s big move. The finish comes when Melissa catches Taylor on the top and plants her with an ugly Air Raid Crash, all Taylor managed to do before going to the top was win a forearm exchange, so it looks more like Taylor screwed herself by getting into a position she couldn’t get out of, rather than Melissa really winning by outsmarting or outwrestling her. ***

REBECCA KNOX vs. ALLISON DANGER

As a match, this is best known for Knox’s fakeout with her ankle injury and turning from Dr. Jekyll into Mr. Hyde (or, more accurately, from Knox into K-Nox). That’s actually probably for the best anyway, the first ten minutes or so before the injury spot was mostly matwork. The work was fine for the most part, but, it was another case where it seemed to be done just to do it. It was nice to see Danger able to keep up and actually outdo Knox on the mat, but it never seemed like the match was being taken anywhere.

The fakeout itself is rather well done. There’s no camera shot at the wrong time to expose that Knox is faking, she doesn’t overdo things with her selling, and even the fans are in a bit of a stunned silence. Then, Knox boots Danger off the apron and the place comes apart. But, the match itself doesn’t really get much better afterwards, it’s just worked more aggressively with Knox actively taking the fight to Danger and using a few dirty tricks when the situation arose. Knox cuts off Danger’s attempts to mount a comeback before she can get anything going, and their work isn’t always smooth, such as Danger’s STO. Knox avoids the Shimmering Warlock and finishes Danger with the Hard Knox (Falcon Arrow). As a finish, it’s perfectly fine, but it just feels tacked on because they don’t really seem to be building to anything. Knox could have worked over Danger’s leg to lead to the missed Warlock, or Knox could have won by using the ropes or pulling tights to play off her earlier cheating to get over the fact that she needed to resort to those just to beat Danger. But, as it is, it’s fine, there’s nothing wrong with giving someone with the reputation as Knox the first win over Danger, and, if anything, this gives the rub to Danger by Knox needed to fake an injury just to get a solid upper hand.

SARA DEL REY vs. DAIZEE HAZE

Although this is the best match of the taping, it’s a step down from both of their matches from Volume 1. The first five minutes, before Sara takes a break, seem like filler, but they’re really not. Sara figures she can wrestle circles around Haze on the mat, and finds out really quickly that Haze can hold her own. Although Sara is clearly the better of the two of them when it comes to the mat, Haze winds up winning a mat exchange when Sara is unable to kip up to her feet.

After their brief intermission so that Sara can demonstrate that she is, in fact, able to do a kip up, as well as the referee showing that he can do so as well, they resume the action. It’s actually a bit similar to Knox/Danger, only without the cheating. Sara, knowing that she’s not going to be able to beat Daizee straight up on the mat, gets a bit aggressive. There’s a really nice segment where Sara is unable to lock in a crossface all the way, so she wears down Daizee with headbutts before locking in the hold. The fans, who had been very supportive of both women, now get 100% behind the Haze. As the match wears on, it turns into a very nice back and fourth match, with some very believable near falls for Daizee, the best of which is the sunset flip counter to Sara’s powerbomb attempt, but there’s also a nice near fall from the Yakuza kick as well as Haze’s counter to Sara’s electric chair. What winds up making the difference is the ability to think ahead, which is what ultimately gives Del Rey the victory and continuing her undefeated streak. It starts with Del Rey stumbling out of position for the Yakuza kick after the Heart Punch. She gets a second to recover and when she gets back into position, she’s able to dodge the kick and lift Haze up for an electric chair. Haze doesn’t learn her lesson about trying too much too soon, and she attempts the Mind Trip after only hitting a single chop and Sara blocks that, and then plants her with a big German suplex for the pin, to continue her undefeated streak. It’d have been nice to see Sara get a bit more ruthless at times, but this is a pretty good effort on its own merits. ***1/4

Conclusion: This is sort of a mixed bag, as far as overall match quality, it’s nothing special. Where this scores major points is in the groundwork that it lays, continuing the Melissa/MsChif rivalry, the Hosaka/Fyfe alliance, and establishing the Danger/Knox feud. If you’re just looking for snowflakes, then you’ll wanna pass this up, otherwise this is another recommended show from SHIMMER.