Why the WWE Women’s Division Needs Its Own Show
It’s time for WWE to have a true Women’s Revolution!
When WWE announced the Mae Young Classic women’s tournament earlier this year, many wrestling fans wondered where this would lead the women’s division. Would they get their own show like the cruiserweights did after the Cruiserweight Classic tournament, or was this something that was done simply to get more eyes on the WWE product and help scout future talent?
While the real reasoning is still unknown, this tournament made it more clear than ever that the women of WWE absolutely need their own show. They easily have the deepest and most talented women’s roster in WWE history already without even counting the multiple women from NXT who are ready to get called up, and the hungry veterans that were signed from the Mae Young Classic.
As it is, the main roster has more women than they know what to do with. Despite the massive amount of talent, the women are generally given no more than one to two matches per show. This is why they end up with these storylines that try to involve every woman on the roster, which leads to cluster matches like we saw at No Mercy. With Asuka likely to be a big part of Raw when she makes her debut later this month, this will only further complicate the problem.
How Did We Get Here?
In order to better understand why the women need their own show, I think that it’s important to give a brief history of how we got to this point.
Anyone who has ever watched WWE knows that women’s wrestling has always been underutilized and underappreciated in the company. Until recently, the women’s division has been nothing more than an afterthought, and even ceased to exist during certain periods of time. Even during the massive success of the Attitude Era, lingerie matches and bikini contests were more prevalent than actual women’s wrestling matches.
In the early 2000s, led by wrestlers like Trish Stratus and Lita, things finally started turning around. Fans began to gain more respect for what women could do in the ring, and WWE seemed to make a better effort to push women’s wrestling and have it involved on shows.
Even with the talent in the women’s division growing for more than a decade though, the women’s storylines and matches were generally considered throwaway.
That all changed in the summer of 2015 when Charlotte, Sasha Banks, and Becky Lynch made their way to the main WWE roster from NXT. These three women plus Bayley, who would get called up the following year, helped to revolutionize women’s wrestling in WWE’s developmental brand. Expectations were high that they could do the same for the main roster.
The change really started taking shape in late 2013 and early 2014 when wrestlers like Paige, Emma, and Natalya were having critically praised matches in NXT. As the popularity of NXT grew throughout 2014, the Four Horsewomen took it to another level though. The women consistently became the “must-see” matches at each show. It all culminated with Bayley and Sasha Banks main eventing NXT TakeOver: Respect in an Iron Woman match.
The Time is Now
Fast forward a couple years, and the “Women’s Revolution”, as it’s been dubbed, has been met with mixed responses. There’s definitely been progress, with the “divas” branding finally being dropped and the women getting an opportunity to main event various shows.
Still, at the six plus hour spectacle of WrestleMania 33, the women were only allotted two matches totaling less than twenty minutes in match time. In addition to that, the SmackDown Women’s Championship match was arguably only added to the main show after outcry from fans on social media.
If you look at WWE’s current roster (counting NXT), and add in the women who were signed from the Mae Young Classic, there are more than 50 female superstars employed by WWE. Even if you take out people like Renee Young and Cathy Kelley, who don’t ever wrestle, that still adds up to over 40. That’s a much bigger roster than the cruiserweights have, and certainly more than enough for an hour long weekly show.
Would It Work?
So, would having a show that’s exclusive to the women’s division actually work? It’s a question that we’ve asked before, and one that I’m sure WWE executives have spent long nights pondering. After all, WWE is a business, so they wouldn’t invest in something that they didn’t feel had the potential to make some money.
It’s impossible to say with any certain whether something like this would actually be successful, but if handled correctly, we’ve seen that the women could be just as big of a draw as the men. The women’s matches at NXT TakeOver: Rival, Unstoppable, and Brooklyn arguably stole the show each time. It was the critical acclaim and positive responses that led to Bayley and Sasha Banks main eventing a TakeOver special.
Next: Who Is The Greatest Superstar To Never Be World Champion?
At this point, I think that the women of WWE have earned the chance to have their own show. If WWE pushes this show like it’s a big deal and gives them storylines that people will actually care about, it would definitely get a positive reaction from fans.
It’s a shame that their massive roster of talent is being totally wasted right now. The sooner WWE could launch a women’s division exclusive show, the better.