Can Charlotte Flair make stars out of the NXT women?

Will WWE’s strategy to use Charlotte Flair and her second NXT Women’s Title reign as a cudgel to get the other NXT women over work?

When WWE put the NXT Women’s Championship on Charlotte Flair at WrestleMania 36, it did so with the mindset that moving one of their highest-profile female wrestlers over to NXT would attract more of the audience that watches RAW and/or SmackDown every week while also giving the rest of the black and gold brand’s women’s division a credibility lift via working with her.

The early returns on this strategy haven’t produced the results the company hoped for. Even when accounting for the extenuating circumstances caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, Flair’s appearances haven’t drawn many new eyes on the show and her first two matches against NXT talent, while entertaining, weren’t exactly star-making outings.

Take her battle with Mia Yim on this past Wednesday’s NXT, for example. Yes, the two wrestled a solid 10-minute match — Flair won via submission — but while watching it, did you believe for a single second that Yim would pick up the upset victory? When the match ended, did you view Yim any differently than you did before it started (keep in mind, Yim was already positioned as an upper midcard star in the women’s division, Flair’s “good hand” comments notwithstanding)?

Now, that’s not to say that Yim or Kayden Karter — who faced Flair on the April 20 episode of RAW in what was a glorified enhancement match — should’ve beaten Flair in non-title matches, but these somewhat humdrum matches illustrate how faulty WWE’s process for creating top draws is.

If WWE truly wanted to propel the NXT Women’s division, Flair would’ve lost to Rhea Ripley at WrestleMania instead of forcing her to tap out to the Figure Eight Leglock. But since Vince McMahon and his creative team chose to further cement Flair’s inadvertent status as WWE’s resident Jason Witten-esque compiler, they have to be smarter about how they use her in this role.

It goes without saying that having Flair decisively beat every woman on the NXT roster does no one any favors — Flair gains nothing from the wins and the women she beat will look like the minor leaguers Flair said they were. At the same time, booking most of them to “take Flair to the limit” will lose its luster after a while, especially if those efforts aren’t followed up on with a winning streak or a marquee win over someone else. And the idea that all of these women will be elevated to stardom by Flair’s mere presence speeds past wishful thinking on the way to downright illogical.

To get the most out of this, the NXT and WWE creative teams must identify which wrestlers from the NXT distaff ranks they want to elevate and formulate a plan to do so while Flair is around. Ripley will probably win the title back from Flair at some point, but aside from her, they can find unique ways to improve the other women’s standing on the brand.

It shouldn’t look the same for everyone. An 8-10 minute match may not help Yim in the macro, but it could do wonders for, say, Kacy Catanzaro or Xia Li, who are still looking for their first signature outing. They could also fill weeks building up a challenger like Tegan Nox with wins and promos where she discusses how important winning the title from Flair would be, setting the stage for an anticipated match for the strap.

And if they book a dream match (like Flair vs. Io Shirai, which is set for the next episode of NXT), they have to push it as though it’s one of the biggest and most important matches in the history of the show; don’t just mention that the match will take place in a week’s time with little to get fans excited other than a couple of short videos.

Even if the company undertakes these measures, it will take time for them to pay off. Fortunately for WWE, time is a luxury it has right now. It better use it wisely.