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#1 Handling of AEW's women's division
Hikaru Shida is the best female performer in AEW and should be holding the title. She's already the longest-reigning Women's Champion in AEW's young history. Her booking and title reign have been perfectly fine. Where things fall apart, however, is looking at the rest of the division.
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Due to the pandemic, a portion of AEW's women's division was stuck overseas (Riho, Emi Sakura) or hurt (Kris Statlander, Shanna, Britt Baker). And on top of all that, they released both Bea Priestley and Sadie Gibbs. Gibbs only appeared on Dynamite in backstage segments.
Depending on how it is perceived, AEW had to feature another promotion's Champion on its programming. While it is good to have promotions working with each other, the cupboard was rather barren for AEW, and they relied on featuring the NWA Women's Champion Thunder Rosa prominently for times in 2020.
The cross-promotion is good for pro wrestling, but it also highlighted an ongoing problem regarding the depth in the division. One way things could have been remedied was to give Allie a singles push. She's a well-known name outside of AEW and was one of the biggest signings for the women's division.
Instead, she was placed into a tag team with Brandi Rhodes, and they competed in a tournament. They lost in the finals to Diamante and Ivelisse. Her record was 6-2 as a tag team and 2-0 in singles action. With things so barren in the division, why wasn't she challenging Shida or at least receiving her own push?
When she wasn't tagging with Brandi, she was only used as a valet for the Butcher and the Blade. Unless she is injured or something else is up, there is little reason why she shouldn't have been used as a singles star in 2020. She revealed she has battled with depression before, so perhaps that could be a reason.
That tournament also featured some familiar names that could have been added. One was Tay Conti, who was signed after the tournament, while Nicole Savoy tagged with Big Swole. She might have had other commitments or didn't want to sign a full-time deal, but Savoy would have been a great addition to the division.
Also having brief moments with AEW in 2020 were both Priscilla Kelly (on Jericho's Cruise) and Mercedes Martinez (in the ladies Casino Battle Royale). Martinez would have one more match with AEW in 2020 on AEW Dark before signing with WWE in January.
Adding one or even two of the names like Kelly, Savoy, or Martinez would have done wonders for AEW's women's division. Instead, it remained one of the few areas where AEW missed some huge opportunities this year.
