Carmella became the first ever Women’s Money in the Bank briefcase holder, and even though she had to win a ladder match all on her own, her first victory came thanks to some extra help from James Ellsworth. Even though Ellsworth is no longer employed by WWE, he hasn’t forgotten the moment that earned him massive amounts of heat.
When James Ellsworth climbed up that ladder to grab the Money in the Bank briefcase in WWE’s first ever Women’s MITB match, I was absolutely incensed. How could WWE allow a man to grab the briefcase and effectively hand it over to Carmella in a match that was supposed to be ground-breaking for women? I wasn’t the only one who was upset, and both Ellsworth and Carmella took full advantage on the following episodes of SmackDown Live and Talking Smack (please come back one day).
Ellsworth was released on Nov. 15 seemingly out of the blue, and he’s been busy working dates outside WWE. He’s apparently been successful, and a lot of that success stems from working intergender matches. He even made a list of women he would like to face, emulating something Cody Rhodes did with “dream matches” when he first left WWE.
And you know what? Ellsworth’s Twitter game is still on point, and the same can be said for his ability to gain heat.
March is Women’s History Month, and instead of taking the time to honor some of Ellsworth’s opponents or friends (like Becky Lynch and Carmella), he decided to draw some more heat on himself by trolling with this Money in the Bank screengrab. We all remember this quite well, and it’s a brilliant stroke from Ellsworth to make reference to this event.
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Thanks to things like this, Ellsworth is someone we love to see get beat, even if he is, by all accounts, a great dude in real life.
So what’s next for Ellsworth? How about a match against Nick Aldis for the NWA World Heavyweight Championship?