WWE WrestleMania 36: Comparing Becky Lynch’s past foes to Shayna Baszler

Becky Lynch’s current Raw Title reign is arguably one of the most dominant championship reigns in WWE history.

She won the title Apr. 8, 2019 after defeating Ronda Rousey and Charlotte Flair in the main event of WWE Wrestlemania 35. Almost a year later, Lynch still holds the RAW Women’s Championship and has proven multiple times why she deserves to still be holding the title.

With Wrestlemania 36 around the corner, Becky Lynch is booked to defend he Raw women’s title against ex-MMA cage fighter and longest reigning NXT Women’s Champion Shayna Baszler.

There are a lot of different theories and cases being made by wrestling fans in the WWE Universe as to why either Shayna should win or Becky should retain. In my opinion I am looking at the interactions between the challenger and the champion, which has a drastic change from prior feuds.

Something more jarring about this match up, it seems that Shayna has been hard to scout for Becky. If you take a look at her opponents over the last year, Becky has been able to find a way or a weakness in her nemesis to get the upper hand:

Charlotte Flair, someone considered to be her lifelong rival, because Becky knows her ex best friend so well Becky knows pretty much her every move. On the other hand, because Charlotte treated Becky like a sidekick, she never caught on to the fact that Becky was always watching.

Lacey Evans, it’s safe to say that going into this feud Becky had all the confidence in the world. She was fresh off a win over Ronda Rousey and she knew a green Lacey was barely a threat. She realized early on, Lacey was talk and a lot of flash.

Natalya, Becky’s long history with Natalya was a huge factor. She knew Nattie’s moveset. She always knew Nattie was the real deal, but she didn’t just go after Nattie, she went after Nattie’s reputation in her own country. Unfortunately, for Nattie this raised her ire and threw her focus off when it came to the Raw women’s champion.

Ronda Rousey, while Ronda was different then any of Becky’s other opponents, once Becky found her weakness, she barraged her and broke her down mentally with her mind games. This resulted in the Baddest Woman on the Planet turning on the WWE Universe and talking down on pro wrestling as a whole, in a karma like turn of events she ended up losing to Becky Lynch with a wrestling move.

What about Shayna? What is her weakness? Before the Elimination Chamber match, Becky Lynch – in classic Becky fashion- was was using social media and backstage promos to poke fun at Shayna, trolling her and acting overly cocky to get under Shayna’s skin.

Becky’s tactics aside, the Queen of Spades did not take the bait. Baszler had a dominant showing in the Elimination chamber match, decimating each opponent without hardly breaking a sweat as Lynch watched from backstage.

Ever since Baszler’s massacre in the chamber, Becky’s games and trolling have stopped, a much more serious Lynch has emerged. Her promos are serious and direct, her tweets purposeful and meaningful.

After Elimination Chamber something in Becky’s thought process has changed. She is starting to realize that the mind games, Twitter antics and trolling will not & have not worked with Shayna. As someone who was an MMA fighter and has much longer in-ring experience then Ronda ever had, some believe Becky is underestimating her. In fact, some argue Shayna Baszler has been scouting The Man all along.

Either way, the result of this match has become harder to predict for many fans and without a clear exposed “weakness” which Becky is usually very good at finding early on, this match could go either way and has the potential to shock the WWE Universe.