Against Madison Eagles, Cheerleader Melissa Bides Her Time
Against Madison Eagles, Cheerleader Melissa Bides Her Time
You know what should happen when a heel champion forces a babyface challenger to climb a ladder of opponents before a title match? The heel should get SMASHED.
There are two ways to look at the build to this title change. The first is that it’s a skillfully executed build over the course of 14 shows, from Madison Eagles cheating to beat Cheerleader Melissa to become number one contender to the SHIMMER Championship, which she won, to this moment. The second is to consider said moment in its broader context, which is Cheerleader Melissa’s importance to SHIMMER — this is the promotion’s 44th Volume, and it is Melissa’s 44th time on the card. The only other woman to do that being Sara Del Ray, we’re talking about a wrestler who has been a definitional SHIMMER talent since day one trying to seize her dream in a match against a woman who has defined the promotion in her own fashion.
That 14 Volume build. I have praised SHIMMER’s tendency to book long term angles plenty over the course of this month, but man does it cook here. You have Eagles cheating to win their first encounter, winning their second encounter clean with a surprise Hellbound, and eating the pin in a tag match. When Melissa tries to use this as leverage to gain a second title shot, Eagles uses the fact that she was double teamed to force her to the back of the line. Eagles defends the title 10 times over this stretch. Melissa racks up win after win, eventually becoming the number one contender after defeating Kana.
This is a trope. You are, of course familiar with it — Maxwell Jacob Friedman makes his major rivals jump through a series of hoops for the thin gruel of a match against him so often that Max makes light of in promos. Heel champions do this as a means of attrition — they want their rival to lose, of course, but if they don’t, they figure the sheer amount of work they’ve put the challenger through will put them at a distinct advantage, especially if, like Max, they don’t wrestle much over the same span of time.
Madison Eagles wrestled. A lot. And while she kept her title, a champion doesn’t build momentum so much as they contain it. They have reached the ceiling. In forcing Melissa to climb the ladder, she was less trying to wear her out than put her in her place. 44 Volumes into SHIMMER Women Athletes — hell, one volume in — and it was pretty clear: her place was at the top of the promotion. She was already confident about this going in, but Eagles gave her room to run, which turned out to be a fatal mistake.
For one, it allows Cheerleader Melissa to dictate the pace of the match, which is much faster than Madison Eagles’ more classically-minded game of ground control traditionally works at. It’s a big tactical error, and while it seems like she holds her own in the (somewhat overlong) crowd brawling half of the match, Eagles is wrestling in response to her challenger, fighting from underneath as chairs are thrown, bars are brawled atop of, and guardrails are brought into play. Does she land big shots? Yes, but again, they’re always in response to something bigger on Melissa’s part — she’s trying to outrun a storm. Less than being a bad plan, it’s a broken one, something completely out of her control.
And that’s basically how this kind of angle should work. There’s an argument, I suppose, for undercutting the babyface’s triumph, for prolonging the agony, but again, I defer to MJF: Wardlow crushing him with a trillion powerbombs was much more satisfying (to me) than causing Bryan Danielson to lose faith in himself. A chase can only go so long, and this is the end of Cheerleader Melissa’s — in perfect time, too.
Of course, there are teases that Eagles might pull this out. She does regain control once the match gets into the ring, but she tries to spam Hellbound too many times and Melissa, having tasted it before, is too savvy, too driven to eat it here. There’s a nice callback to the finish of Melissa’s first challenge, where she slips out of a Hellbound attempt, takes a roundhouse kick, and goes up for the move again. She lost to that combination the first time, but has the wherewithal to slip it for a second.
That Melissa wins a la Bret Hart, countering a move into a pinning combination instead of winning the title with a conclusive finishing manuver, may not pack the same punch as the Kudo Driver, but it makes sense: not only would Eagles have that move as well scouted as Melissa does Hellbound, but the sudden pinfall spot, this deep in a match, is as much about the heel’s hubris as anything, their belief in whatever killer blow they have planned against the fates that’ve conspired against them all along.
I have my quibbles here: I don’t like that this is a de facto no disqualification match. Yes, I get that The Fans and the Referee Don’t Wand to See This End on a Disqualification, but you know what? If Cheerleader Melissa felt that strongly about it, she wouldn’t throw chairs or stay out on the floor for as long as she does. Portia Perez makes note of this on commentary, and while it’s her job to do so as the heel commentator, totally in keeping with Bobby Heenan and Jesse Ventura’s “the rules matter when the babyface is cheating” ideology, starting the match that way and bifurcating it into two radically different acts with no real bridge between them is unfortunate.
Luckily, Cheerleader Melissa and Madison Eagles really throw themselves into both acts, and the moment that is Melissa winning the championship is a triumph, for her and for SHIMMER. It is a testament to the power of simmering tension and babyface determination, an instance where it’s the right champion meeting the right challenger with the right outcome. It’s hard to ask for much more than that.