2018: The Rise of the WWE Women’s Division

In a year full of surprises, what has really stood out this year in WWE is it’s women’s division. They had their first Royal Rumble, their first TLC match, and their first all women’s PPV in Evolution.

Ronda Rousey kicked in the door and shocked the world as she showed how well she caught on to the sport in such a short period of time. She even makes her entrance donning the legend Rowdy Roddy Piper’s coveted leather jacket. In just a few months, she climbed her way to the top and won the RAW women’s championship.

Just this week on Monday Night Raw, new women’s tag titles were announced to be joining the list of WWE titles on the roster. Last night, the women were the main event of both the annual December 26th post-Christmas house show at Madison Square Garden, and a house show in Chicago.

Just yesterday, CBS Sports posted their end of the year awards for wrestling. To nobody’s surprise, they named “The Man,” Becky Lynch as their wrestler of the year.

Once she decided that she wasn’t letting anybody walk over her anymore at this past Summer Slam, she has undoubtedly been the most popular superstar currently on weekly TV. Nothing she did was able to get her anything but universally cheered. She would talk shit about superstars that we were supposed to like, say that we fans didn’t support her, but to no avail.

She’s on her way to becoming a modern Stone Cold Steve Austin in terms of attitude and popularity. Preceding Survivor Series, she led an attack on the RAW women’s roster, leaving looking like a true warrior. If you asked me for one picture that would sum up WWE in 2018, it would be this:

The best part of all this is that it isn’t shocking or presented as this forced “history-making” propaganda. It just simply exists. WWE isn’t perfect, far from it. The women are now on the same level as the men, and while stumbling a little *cough* Asuka *cough* they’ve nailed the booking of their women, and fully legitimized the division.

-Braden Jackson (@Dembrae)