SHIMMER Vol. 27 and 28 DVD Taping Results (SPOILERS)

Credit: Gregory Davis and Credit: Pwinsider.com

All right, here’s my full report for the SHIMMER Volumes 27 and 28 DVD tapings from last night. The show was sold out less than a week ago; although the official ticket stub count was around 205. Nonetheless it was a packed house.

The show started very late. A full 75 minutes late. Doors opened around 2:23, way past the expected 1:00 time. Basically, they had a lot of problems with the lights. First, their regular lighting guy wasn’t there, so when everything was wired and the switch was turned on, only one of the five sections worked. So in the process of rewiring, they inadvertently destroyed one of the Florissant tubes, shattering glass in the ring, so that had to be cleaned. And to top it off, the wiring for two of the light sections had to go down to the floor, and under the crowd. This lead to situations of wrestlers knocking out the lights at times. Now to kill time, several wrestlers came out, including Nikki Roxx, Kimberly Kash, Allison Danger, Cheerleader Melissa, Daizee Haze, and Joey Eastman. They signed autographs, and basically goofed around for our entertainment. Joey kept claiming that Kong and Hamada got into a fight and they were cleaning up their mess.

In a SPARKLE match, AAW regular Knight Wagner defeated two wrestlers who’d I’d prefer to not even remember.

In another SPARKLE match, Nicole Matthews defeated “Skill Death Artist #2.”. The artist was dressed as a Ninja. Before an opponent came out, Matthews came out, complaining about there being another ninja. Matthews easily defeated her.

In the last SPARKLE match, Sassy Stephie and Kacey Diamond (w/ Mademoiselle Rachelle) defeated Kimbery Kash and another wrestler whose name I’m forgetting. I wasn’t a fan of Kash and her partner. Sassy was decent. Kacey is a French character, and French was all she said, so that lead to the crowd chanting WHAT all match. Her skills were OK. Rachelle was like a secretary, although she didn’t really do anything.

Volume 27

We began with a backstage promo from Nikki Roxx. She noted how she was in the opening match on the first show. After being back for a year and a half, it was time for a title match, so later tonight it’ll be MsChif vs. Nikki Roxx for the title.

1. Malia Hosaka (w/ Lexie Fyfe on a stick) defeated Tenille. Lexie has been injured for a while, so Malia brought out a cardboard anime drawing of her on a stick (there’s a fan at ringside who makes these cutouts for everyone at every show, and he even designed a recent DVD cover). Malia was her usual great self, but I feel that Tenille still needs a lot of work.

Portia Perez promo from her home. Promoted Dave Prazak noted a couple days ago that she was legitimately sick with the Swine Flu. However, the segment made it seem like she was faking it, as she had a fake note from “The Doctor”, brought out a bunch of candy as “Doctor’s Orders”, and added a couple of weak coughs here and there for effect.

Allison Danger came out to complain about how Perez is scared of her, especially after just winning the tag titles. Nicole Matthews came out to defend her, and that lead to Kellie Skater attacking Danger. As Matthews left, so noted “I don’t even know who that is!”

2. Allison Danger defeated Kellie Skater. Danger’s first good match since having her child. Skater has a great personality, and hit some good moves as well. Skater is one to look out for down the line.

Daizee Haze came out. She apologized for being injured again, and noted her students were injured as well. So, wanting to be involved somehow, she became a ref for the taping. This involved a hilarious scene where head referee Bryce Remsberg gave her a ref’s shirt as if was an engagement ring.

3. The International Home Wrecking Crew of Rain and Jetta (w/ Lacey) defeated Daffney and Rachel Summerlyn. Oh Jetta. For this match, she decide to wrestle in a more, shall we say, revealing top. The story of the match was that Rachel was in there on her own. A couple times when she goes for the tag, Daffney wasn’t there due to things like warming up the crowd. Near the end, when Rachel is ready for another tag, she walked out on her. After the match, the crew had a dance to a pop song. Laughs all throughout the match.

4. Cat Power defeated Ariel. Daizee Haze was the referee. My goodness, Cat Power gets hotter by the taping. There was nothing really memorable about the match.

5. Wesna Busic and Melanie Cruise defeated Ashley Lane and Nevaeh. Busic and Cruise’s manager Annie Social was absent due to a health issue. Lane and Nevaeh started off strong, but after Busic came in, this was almost a squash of the former tag team champions.

Backstage bit with LuFisto and Amazing Kong. Both wanted title shots. Daizee came between then, and made a #1 Contenders match for tonight.

6. Cheerleader Melissa defeated Nicole Matthews. Great match. Nicole was able to injure Melissa’s knee early on, and worked on it like crazy. After a stiff Curb Stomp, and some back and forth counters, Melissa hit to Kudo Driver for the win.

7. Sara Del Rey defeated Jessie McKay. At first glance, Jessie looks just like one of the Bella Twins. But she can go. The match was primarily a squash, but she still got in great moves and kicks. However, she fell to an arm bar.

8. Amazing Kong vs. LuFisto ended in a couple count out. Daizee was the ref again. Physical and stiff is how you can describe this one. At one point, LuFisto actually hit a German suplex on Kong. Eventually, the fight spilled outside, they brawled outside, and were counted out.

After Hamada came out for her match, Kong and LuFisto came back out, still fighting, and continued through the entry way.

9. Ayoko Hamada defeated Mercedes Martinez. Great match. Kicks and crops galore. Hamada comes as advertised, and delivers.

10. MsChif defeated Nikki Roxx to retain the SHIMMER Championship. Not bad, but nothing sticking out as notable.

Right before intermission, Daizee came back out to clarify that the #1 Contenders match was a double count out, but that she still had to declare a top contender. So she made it a three-way match. MsChif vs. Amazing Kong vs. LuFisto.

Intermission was shortened to 15 minutes, due to the earlier delays.

Volume 28:

1. Ariel defeated Malia Hosaka (with Lexie Fyfe on a stick). This one ended up being more for comedy. Malia kept wanting to tag out to her “partner”. At one point, the cardboard was in the ring, so Ariel, after repeatedly being told that Lexie was “legal”, pinned her for a broken up two count. And later, the referee ejected her from ringside, complete with an official “the referee has announced that Lexie Fyfe on a Stick has been ejected” statement from ring announcer Joey Eastman. I believe a Dariel ended it.

2. Melanie Cruise defeated Kimberly Kash. I believe this was Kash’s main roster debut. Total squash, and not a good one at that, as the finish count was messed up.

3. Ashley Lane and Nevaeh defeated Kacey Diamond and Sassy Stephie (w/ Mademoiselle Rachelle). Decent match. Perhaps my favorite Ohio Girls match thus far.

4. Nikki Roxx defeated Wesna Busic. Evenly matched from both sides. Roxx won with a surprise rollup.

Rachel Summerlyn came out to a more serious theme when compared to her old one. She wanted answers from Daffney. She noted that Daffney helped her out as her career progressed. Daffney came out to her TNA theme and wrestling gear. Daffney basically said what she taught her didn’t work, and sucker punched her.

5. Rachel Summerlyn defeated Daffney by DQ. This “match” was not even two minutes, and Daffney was quickly disqualified for not breaking the five count on the ropes. Daffney continued to attach her several times afterward, despite being held back by the officials. So we basically learned that Daffney was unable to have a full blown match tonight, so got her advancing storylines instead.

I forgot exactly when this happened, but Amber Gertner interviewed Cheerleader Melissa, when Kellie Skater came in, acting like she was a jobber nobody, which lead to a match later.

6. The International Home Wrecking Crew of Rain and Jetta (w/ Lacey) defeated Jessie McKay and Tenille. Jetta was back to her old ring gear (boo). Close to another squash, with McKay in there most of the time. Again, Tenille needs some more work. The crew won with a combo cross body and Rain Drop (or Acid Rain) finisher. We were treated to the same victory dance.

7. Cheerleader Melissa defeated Kellie Skater. I also want to point out that Melissa’s attire is setup that it could be used as both her Cheerleader and Alissa Flash characters. In fact, this attire is on her new TNA promo photo. Kellie noted before the match that she’s the greatest, virtually indestructible, and was going to destroy this cheerleader. However, during the match she did a lot of running away. A decent match, which was intensified at the end when Melissa slammed Kellie’s head against the guardrail something like 15 times. It was so hard she even knocked the lights out.

8. Mercedes Martinez defeated Cat Power. Another decent match, although nothing is standing out at the moment.

9. Nicole Matthews defeated Allison Danger. Nicole was pretty good, although I wasn’t thrilled with Allison’s work this time. Nicole is quickly becoming a top player in the company. I say she main events a taping next year. During the match, referee Laura Mattano was knocked out, and Daizee Haze came in to continue. She stopped Nicole from using one title belt, but as she put it away, she used the other title belt to knock Allison out (Nicole came out with both titles every time tonight). Another referee came out to say what happened, but her decision stood.

10. Sara Del Rey defeated Ayoko Hamada in a no disqualification match. I may exaggerate at times, and admittedly I haven’t seen every match in SHIMMER yet, but this may go down as the greatest match in the company’s history. It started off decently, but was thrown out after Del Rey used a chair to get disqualification. Hamada wanted to keep fighting, so the match was quickly made no DQ. And just like that they were out in the crowd. Lots of chairs used, slamming into the wall, hard kicks and chops and slaps. And when they were back in the ring, a folding chair was used viscously. Numerous kick outs of signature moves and finishers. It took a pile driver to end it. This match is worth the money when it’s available on DVD or Clickwrestle.com.

11. MsChif defeated Amazing Kong and LuFisto to retain the SHIMMER Championship. This was an elimination match. LuFisto was eliminated pretty early with an Amazing Bomb. MsChif hit all her signature moves, and even kicked out of another Amazing Bomb. In the end Kong fell to the Desecrator. I believe it was Kong’s first pin fall loss in SHIMMER. Afterward, the two actually shook hands, as the show came to an end.

The new after party location was at the 39ten lounge in Lyons, which in my opinion was a big improvement over the old location. We all had a blast.

Colt Cabana was also at the show and party.

No return date announced, but as always there won’t be a show in the winter due to travel concerns. Based on the past, the series should resume in April.

Volume 27 started out very slowly, but it picked up and turned into a good show. I’d say slightly above average. Melissa/Matthews is match of the card. Volume 28 will be highly recommend based on Del Rey/Hamada alone, but the main event and Melissa/Skater were great as well.

Check out the SHIMMER Forum at www.shimmerwrestling.com in the coming days for photos of the show from the three ringside photographers, the various fans, and backstage.