Coming off of an extremely disappointing Queen’s Crown tournament, it is now more apparent than ever that the women’s division needs desperate help.
In the tournament, two stars who seemed to be getting a push, and needed one, got eliminated in the first round: Toni Storm and Liv Morgan. The two people who beat them, Carmella and Zelina Vega, had previously been the ‘jobbers’ within the division. I have no problem with pushing new women at all! I just wish that WWE didn’t have to disregard the other people they were pushing to do this.
The combined time for the whole Queen’s Crown tournament was 19 minutes and 24 seconds. The final match in the tournament, also the longest match, only clocked in at 5:51. The Becky Lynch, Bianca Belair, and Sasha Banks match for the Smackdown Women’s Championship was only one second longer than the full tournament, coming in at 19:25. This feud was built at the exact same time the tournament was happening. This proves what we have long known, WWE only knows how to book the women at the top of their division. I would like to imagine if WWE had put bigger stars in this tournament, the matches would have been longer. I would have also appreciated it more if there were more people in this bracket, along with the King of The Ring bracket. I would have enjoyed seeing some NXT stars battle with some of the main roster stars for the crown. I was extremely excited for this tournament because tournaments are meant to make stars. This tournament just killed any steam that these women had going into it: Toni Storm, Liv Morgan, and Shayna Bazler.
There are no tag teams in the WWE Women’s division besides the current Women’s Tag Team Champions, Rhea Ripley and Nikki A.S.H. WWE’s style of booking this division has been to throw together random wrestlers and make it a tag team. Ever since splitting up and releasing The IIconics without giving them a long, meaningful reign, it has been apparent there is no motivation to book these titles well. After introducing the NXT Women’s Tag Team Championships, it has been even more apparent. The original purpose of the main roster belts was to allow them to travel to all brands, including NXT, to allow for there to be more tag teams to defend those belts against. In this year’s WWE Draft, WWE split up their only two other tag teams, besides the champions: Shotzi & Tegan and Natayla & Tamina. Shotzi & Tegan beat the previous champions, Natayla & Tamina, three times in ‘Title Contender’ matches without ever getting a title match. They have now thrown together Zelina Vega and Carmella who recently faced each other in the Queen’s Crown tournament, which was avoidable.
Smackdown currently is filled with heel Superstars in the Women’s Division. With the champion, Charlotte Flair, being a heel as well, this makes the booking possibilities for that belt minute. We have the following women as faces: Naomi, Toni Storm, Sasha Banks, and Aliyah. It is unknown if they will push Toni Storm and Aliyah to the point where they can face Charlotte for the strap. Sasha will first need to go through newly-turned heel Shotzi before getting to Charlotte. Shotzi, who was a ready-made face, received great crowd reactions during her match with Charlotte. Naomi is currently stuck in a feud with Sonya Deville and Shayna Bazler, which has already begun to feel like it is dragging. I believe that Naomi is the one that is able to dethrone Charlotte.
I have yet to touch on the booking of the Raw and Smackdown Women’s Champions. We all remember that unforgettable title swap. These two will now likely face each other at Survivor Series. The relationship between the two may have fallen apart, but we are able to assume the reason that the debacle happened is because everyone within the segment disagreed with how the segment would go down. WWE has struggled to book Becky Lynch since returning at Summerslam. Her heel character is not connecting. We are still wanting to cheer for her. The heel in the feud between Bianca and Becky is WWE creative. Bianca has now lost in four matches to Becky, including Summerslam, and is now no longer in the title picture. They threw away a historic title reign in order to bring Becky back as someone who isn’t connecting with the fans. Liv Morgan is now in the Raw Women’s title picture. I am hopeful she will get the treatment she deserves in this feud, but judging by her past booking and the booking of Bianca, this seems unlikely.
Many have compared the booking of the AEW Women’s division to the WWE Women’s division. AEW has been giving their women more time in their TBS tournament matches, and is also allowing for their matches within the tournament to build. With the introduction of the TBS title belt, I am very hopeful we will get more than one women’s match on an episode of AEW television. WWE has also been inconsistent with making sure there is more than one women’s match per episode. For example, the November 5th episode of Smackdown only had one women’s match, Shayna Bazler vs Naomi.
It seems by the length of the matches we are trending towards the Divas era. WWE has lost a lot of my goodwill in the past few years. I would like to say I’m hopeful they can turn this around. However, judging by the oversexualization and misogyny involved in Toxic Attraction on NXT, the future of this division looks bleak.