When I started writing this article, I was not aware of the different scenarios involved and the ripple effect it would cause in the Women’s Division. This has forced the article to be longer than I expected. With that in mind, I have a limited this article to just two sectors in which the brand split might affect the Women’s Division. I intend to follow it up with more views on the matter.
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One of the highly anticipated announcements in the wrestling community was made this week. The Brand Split is coming and it is no a figment of imagination in the minds of hardcore wrestling fans anymore. WWE had been teasing this for weeks and it couldn’t have come at a more opportune time than this.
This is a beginning of New Era in the eyes of WWE. After the Attitude Era and the Ruthless Aggression Era, the PG era has been a highly disappointing one in the eyes of many wrestling fans including me. Don’t get this twisted, I am glad for the restrictions of chair shots to the head and highly dangerous moves, but as a hardcore wrestling fan I find the product too tailored to PG standards to my taste.
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Gone were those electrifying promos that took feuds to the next level, gone were those bloody moments that just signals us that things just got more vigorous and most of all, gone were those believable wrestling characters. PG era took away the heart of wrestling and replaced it with some synthetic equipment that just pumps and beats. The soul of the WWE was gone.
But with the dawn of this new era, we can except some changes. Though it is highly unlikely that WWE would steer away from PG, we can atleast expect some changes that will help WWE sail smoothly and appease our tastes. Great wrestling for one, can be that change. The fans of WWE has always cheered for great wrestling matches and Superstars in it. And Daniel Bryan is one such Superstar who was embraced for his wrestling rather than his good looks.
Now that a new era is beginning and new opportunities are arising, this brand split may have a heavier role to play than any one might think. A brand split basically means two separate rosters for two separate shows. This creates a whole different set of opportunities which has never existed before for Superstars, especially the female performers.
Much like the main roster, the women’s division has had a shot in the arm in the recent times. With the introduction of the Divas Revolution, everyone expected great things for the female wrestlers in the company. But, it never took off as one might have hoped. After the initial boom, the revolution reached a point where it seemed it would never progress further.
But, the match at WrestleMania changed everything. We had the birth of a legitimate championship which was raised to the level of the ultimate prize in WWE. We also had a Women’s Division classic. Sasha Banks, Charlotte and Becky Lynch put on a brilliant performance that could be easily termed as the best match of the night. If not for Shane’s spot in his match with the Undertaker, the trio would have been the one who stole the show.
It is ironic to think that Shane took the spotlight away from the women’s division in an effort to start a new era. Will this be the state of the female performers in the new era? Will the women’s division be overshadowed time and time again?
I feel sad to break this, but the truth is many fans thought so in their hearts event though they wouldn’t voice it out loud. How many times have we seen talented female performers be an eye candy and love doll? How many times have we witnessed the start-stop of women’s revolution? How many times have we seen talented performers get lost in backstage politics?
Is there an end to all this? Is there someway out of this vicious circle the befalls Women’s Division from time to time?
If there is one such thing, then it must be this brand split.
With the brand split comes a plethora of options to whole of WWE and this article intends to look into how that might affect the Women’s Division.
The first and foremost effect of a brand split will be the division of roster. The Women’s Division has always been overshadowed by the male roster in WWE. Even with full strength, the Women’s Division has never been much talked about as much as the Men’s Division. The reason is simple. WWE never invests proper amount of time in developing a female Superstar as it does with a male Superstar.
Though it might be changing nowadays, we have too look at the effect of the brand split with this in mind. The main drawback withe splitting the roster for the Women’s Division is that WWE doesn’t have any noteworthy characters to effectively split. WWE has always spent building characters with short term perspective when it comes to female performers.
Apart from the champion and the challenger, no other characters are built. This creates a problem. If in case, WWE chooses to split the Women’s division, Charlotte will be in Raw most probably as it is the flagship show. Hence, SmackDown will be at a loss. WWE has not built other legitimate top star level characters. Sasha Banks is off-TV and Becky Lynch is losing to upcoming talents. Natalya hasn't been booked strongly either. Paige, on the other hand, has become completely irrelevant.
I hope the problem is visible now. WWE hasn’t built another Superstar apart from Charlotte to have an effective split of roster. So, we can safely say that the roster won’t be split and there will be only one title to go after. Hence, this makes the female superstars who are in SmackDown roster as effective as jobbers. There is literally no importance for them.
The only option for WWE here is to book another Superstar apart from Charlotte as strong as it can be booked in the upcoming weeks. WWE should use the limited time effectively to create another believable character and build it powerful enough to lead the other set of female superstars in SmackDown without even a title. And the only person it could be accomplished against is Charlotte – whom they have built up for months.
And the likelihood of it happening is not that big.
WWE could call up Bayley from NXT and make this work. But, that will throw a wrench in their long term plans and it will hurt Sasha Banks’ credibility in untold ways. If Bayley becomes the top star in the other roster, WWE has to again book Sasha from scratch to make her look like a threat to Charlotte or Bayley. The main problem here is that WWE has never put in much effort towards the female division as it should have.
The next effect of brand split is that there will be more television time. Instead of the few favored Superstars hogging the spotlight, more superstars will be given the air-time for one. And that is a much needed commodity for the Women’s division in general where not more than one feud is built at a time.
It is very rarely that WWE uses their female performers in an intelligent way. It is a long standing tradition in WWE for a female Superstar to work her way through various eye candy gimmicks and love doll spots to make it to the top level. Even then the storylines look silly most of the times. But, there looks to be a change in that tradition nowadays. And this brand split might just help the female superstars in that way.
With two separate shows and rosters, WWE has an opportunity to build more than one feud at a time. Let’s say a maximum of four, two top feuds and two supporting feuds for each brand and supporting matches to build around it. (Let’s not get greedy people, I am not even sure WWE will have four feuds featuring women, because that is how WWE works.) Though there aren’t many female performers in the main roster, we can expect that it will be remedied with the injection of new talent from NXT.
But, that leaves a huge void in NXT. And whether you accept it or not, NXT runs on female performers as much as on male performers. Can you imagine an NXT without Bayley, Asuka, Nia Jax, Alexa Bliss, Eva Marie and Carmella? These are the likely Superstars to be called up to the main roster if in case there is a call up. I think, you begin to see the scope of the problem.
WWE has effectively booked themselves into a corner. Either they have to sacrifice the strength of NXT or they have to build a top star out of nowhere. And that is not something that could be done as easily as said. So, when looking from these perspectives the brand split looks to be more damaging to the female roster than anyone might expect it to be.
There are still few things to discuss regarding the impact of the brand split on Women’s Division. And I will be discussing it in the follow-up article.
If you have any more thoughts that you want me to discuss about about this topic, let me know @VKKirupa
