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Carmella becomes the next challenger for the SmackDown Women’s Title

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Update: Although it still hasn’t officially been announced on TV or on social media, Bayley vs. Carmella is set for Super ShowDown in Saudi Arabia. This news comes from a mass e-mail sent out to WWE fans advertising SmackDown. In it, it states the winner of the Fatal 4-Way will face Bayley at Super ShowDown. … Read more

Winners & Losers: SmackDown 01/31/20

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Friday Night SmackDown was dubbed “Super” this week, but it had its moment where it wasn’t so super. This is mainly in reference to the only match of the night. Alexa Bliss and Nikki Cross took on Fire & Desire for what feels like the hundredth time. What makes matters even worse is I don’t think we know why they are wrestling each other, to begin with.

These two teams have had their fair share of feuds in the past, but this one has literally zero storyline. They have been having matches against each other for weeks now and no one knows why. The main story is actually between Mandy Rose and Otis. After all, she did get a date with Otis set for Valentine’s Day.

https://twitter.com/WWE_MandyRose/status/1223450464680923136?s=20

Fire & Desire suffer another loss after a short match between the two teams. Michael Cole repeatedly said that whoever wins may have a chance at the Women’s Tag Team Titles against The Kabuki Warriors. A match hasn’t been made official, but at least we are starting to talk about the tag titles again. Rose would take the pin after a neckbreaker by Cross sets up Bliss to deliver the Twisted Bliss.

Despite the one win Rose picked up on Bliss a couple weeks ago, this is the same result week after week.

Now on to a better moment of the night. Naomi has returned! That’s right, Naomi, who returned at the Royal Rumble, is now back on the blue brand. The SmackDown Women’s Champion Bayley was out in the ring first. She was gloating about her win against Lacey Evans at the Royal Rumble.

She goes on and on about how much of a role model she is and how she has beaten everyone there is to beat. Expecting Charlotte Flair to pick her to face at WrestleMania, she calls out the Queen but gets the Glow instead.

Naomi’s music hits and her entrance had a new fresh element to it. She heads to the ring with an EDM Fishbowl placed upon her head. Once she enters the ring, she states that she could stand in the back with Bayley spilling lies. She reminded Bayley that she hasn’t beaten her when she so boldly stated she has defeated everyone.

Bayley would attack Naomi, but the Glow Queen would get the last laugh as she lays out the champion who winds up on the floor at ringside.

It looks like Naomi is going to be the next challenger for Bayley. This could very well just be a one-off at Elimination Chamber, or perhaps they will continue this through WrestleMania.

WINNER: Naomi

Naomi is the clear winner this week. She has made her long-awaited return and seemingly has claimed her spot in the title picture. The former two-time SmackDown Women’s Champion can use this title match/feud and so do the fans. Both SmackDown and RAW have been rather stagnant with the same talent being used and recycled storylines. This seems fresh between Naomi and Bayley and I am ready for it.

LOSERS: Fire & Desire

Unfortunately for Mandy Rose and Sonya Deville, they continue to end up on the losers list. The only thing that would make either one a winner would be Rose securing a date with Otis. As much as I love these two together, the best thing may be to try them out as singles competitors. I do hope they can win the tag titles before they are broken up though.

Final Thoughts:

It is good to hear the tag team titles being talked about again, but we need more teams. Having Bliss and Cross go right back at the titles when they are the ones who lost them to the Kabuki Warriors is just recycling again.

Overall SmackDown has a similar problem that RAW has. The same few women used every week. For several weeks at least SmackDown was using every member of their roster, but now we are back to the same few (minus the inclusion of Naomi). Bring back, Dana Brooke. Where is Carmella? Let’s fix this.

Also can we start having more matches? If NXT can have two to three matches a week consistently then so can SmackDown and RAW.

I really think they may be ready to move a few NXT talent over. Hopefully this happens around WrestleMania time. Top picks to move over are Shayna Baszler, Bianca Belair, Io Shirai, and Candice LeRae. It would be nice to see those who haven’t won the NXT Championship to do so, but I don’t see Rhea Ripley dropping the title anytime soon.

What were your thoughts on this week’s SmackDown? Who were your Winners & Losers? Use the comment section below to let us know what you think.

Discussion Post: SmackDown 01/31/20

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SmackDown

Tonight is the first Friday Night SmackDown since a lot took place at the Royal Rumble. At this time there hasn’t been anything advertised for the women of the blue brand, but that may be a good thing. The first show coming off of a big Royal Rumble event could have some possibilities. The first … Read more

Fantasy Booking: Sasha Banks vs. Bayley at WrestleMania 36

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Since the days of NXT, Sasha Banks and Bayley have been side-by-side sharing legendary moments. Moments that will live on forever in WWE history. With WrestleMania only two months away, the time is now for “The Boss & Hug Connection” to finally meet one-on-one in Tampa, Fla. This year the SmackDown Women’s Championship should be … Read more

Rumble Stats

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Hello, readers! As many of you know, I love looking up records and statistics. With the Royal Rumble passing, it looked like a ripe time to look at the numbers of the Women’s Rumble. Now that there are three in the books, it’s now easier to compare and contrast. Let’s take a look see at … Read more

Royal Rumble Review – YouTube Edition

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The Royal Rumble took place last night and proved to be a really enjoyable and fun show. As promised in my preview and predictions video here is my review of last night’s action. In the video, I talk about the surprises, the returns and everything else that took place during the show. I really appreciate … Read more

Discussion Post: Royal Rumble

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Tonight’s the night. The start to the road to WrestleMania is here. Tonight’s Royal Rumble event will be hosting three matches. RAW Women’s Championship Becky Lynch (c) vs. Asuka SmackDown Women’s Championship Bayley (c) vs. Lacey Evans 30-Woman Royal Rumble Match So far the participants announced are: Charlotte Flair, Natalya, Sarah Logan, Dana Brooke, Carmella, … Read more

Royal Rumble Preview and Predictions – YouTube Edition

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The Royal Rumble is here tonight (or morning in my case) so I have dipped my toe into DivaDirtTV over on YouTube and put together a little video for your viewing pleasure. In the video, I talk about the build-up to the rumble, address rumours, and pick my winners. Please take a look, have a … Read more

Bayley set to defend her title at the Royal Rumble against Lacey Evans

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After their non-title match tonight, Lacey Evans has received her SmackDown Women’s Championship match against Bayley at Royal Rumble. The Royal Rumble is just one week from Sunday and Evans will be looking to win her first gold in her career. Ever since the Friday Night SmackDown after Survivor Series, Bayley and Evans have been … Read more

Women With The Most Matches

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Following wrestling for as long I have, I’ve always wondered just how many matches do these women compete in during the course of their career? Well, thanks to our friends at profightdb, we have an answer. This will show the 10 women who have wrestled the most matches of all time. Who made the list? … Read more

Winners & Losers: SmackDown 01/03/20

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The first Friday Night SmackDown of the new year kicked off with the women as it very well should have. The scheduled Triple Threat tag team match was first with Alexa Bliss & Nikki Cross vs. Lacey Evans & Dana Brooke vs. Sasha Banks & SmackDown Women’s Champion Bayley. The match starts with Evans and Banks, but Banks wasn’t having it as she tagged in Cross.

The match was a great way to start off the year and was quite lengthy. All six-women were able to showcase their skills and it was overall enjoying to watch. The crowd was really into the match as well which was good to see. The match would culminate with Brooke isolated by both Banks and Bayley. In this type of match-up she could tag either Evans or a member of Cross & Bliss.

Bayley would take out the team of Cross & Bliss off the ring apron to the ringside floor to eliminate them from the equation. Brooke would eventually get the tag to Evans. Evans would focus on Bayley and miss with her moonsault as Banks pulled her best friend out of the ring.

After a Bayley to Belly (it is hard to believe she is still using this move) a near fall is broken up by Brooke, Cross, and Bliss. Once the match regroups, Banks is tagged in and after a double team from her and Bayley is countered by Evans, The Boss is hit with the Woman’s Right. Brooke would tag in and hit a huge senton on Banks to pick up the pin and the win.

This was the main focus of the women for the night. Fire & Desire did appear but it was only to further the storyline of Mandy Rose and Otis. Carmella after collecting a couple wins against both Sonya Deville and Rose was not present.

The Usos returned at the end of the show, so this could and mostly like means that Naomi will be on SmackDown upon her return. Naomi was out of action when the WWE Draft took place in October so her placement could be either brand. Hopefully, her return will be held off until maybe the Royal Rumble match so that she receives the best response possible.

WINNER: Dana Brooke

Dana Brooke is perhaps the biggest winner of the night. She not only excelled in the ring but she would pick up the win for her team. Many people may not like that out of anyone in the match she pinned Sasha Banks, but her recently booking recently is what she has needed for years.

She could very well have pinned Nikki Cross or Alexa Bliss and still made an impact without Banks taking another loss. However, the story is between Brooke & Lacey Evans against Banks and Bayley so the pin makes sense.

WINNER: Lacey Evans

Lacey Evans’ babyface turn is better than anyone expected. A gimmick that fits so well with being a heel has actually translated quite well as a babyface role. Her clip art graphics on her titantron seem to have left also. She now has patriotic red, white, and blue graphics which makes more sense for her character and just overall looks better. The crowd was eating it up as well.

Her in-ring skills continue to show improvement. Personally, I have always been a fan of hers but her improvement is still incredibly noticeable to where she was at 6 months ago.

Credit: WWE

LOSER: Sasha Banks

In the same ways that Dana Brooke is a winner is why Sasha Banks is on the losing end this week. Banks more or less just continues to take losses. It is a tough position for Banks to currently be in as she is still by the side of Bayley. If Bayley loses a match instead then her title may be in jeopardy.

Banks losing just continues to put people over without progressing herself. There is nothing wrong with putting people over, but at some point Banks needs her moment. Could she potentially get her moment by winning the Royal Rumble? As long as they stay together or as long as Bayley is still champion I feel it is always going to be a lose-lose situation.

LOSER: Carmella

Carmella putting together two weeks worth of wins against Fire & Desire to just be missing in action is a little head-scratching. Of course, this is just one week where she is not present, but where are her wins going to push her to? It seems like she needs a good one-on-one feud and not against a tag team.

With the pairing of Brooke and Evans as of late, the landscape of SmackDown is becoming just tag teams. Having more tag teams isn’t a bad thing as that division is badly needing to grow, but then that means there may be a need for a few more singles competitors. Perhaps moving a few over from NXT wouldn’t be the worst thing to happen.

For next week it has already been announced that Lacey Evans will go one-on-one with Sasha Banks.

What are your thoughts of this week’s SmackDown? Who were your Winners & Losers? Leave your thoughts in the comment section below!!

10 Game Changers of the Decade

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Once upon a time, not long ago, the 2010s just started, NXT had its first all women’s season, Laycool dominated the WWE, TNA had their infamous Lockbox 8 woman elimination tag. We saw old faces return to wrestling; Trish, Lita, Chyna, Traci Brooks. We lost Chyna and Mae Young, had Snooki Mania, witnessed the first … Read more

Bayley becomes longest reigning SmackDown Women’s Champion

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On paper, Bayley has had an incredible year in 2019. In fact, between her reign as one-half of the inaugural Women’s Tag Team Champions and being a two-time SmackDown Women’s Champion she hasn’t spent much of the year without a title. As of today, she has a total combined reign as SmackDown Women’s Champion of … Read more

Discussion Post: SmackDown 12/27/19

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SmackDown

There is one more Friday Night SmackDown left for the year 2019 and it takes place tonight. Alexa Bliss is hoping to end the year strong as she gets her voice back on the microphone during a return segment of “A Moment of Bliss.” This segment could shed some light on what comes next for … Read more

Dana Brooke requests to face Bayley on SmackDown

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On tonight’s episode of Friday Night SmackDown, Dana Brooke will go one-on-one in a non-title match against the SmackDown Women’s Champion Bayley. Last week after Brooke was caught laughing with Elias as they humiliated Bayley in song, the champion challenged Brooke to a match. Brooke quickly jumped at the opportunity and the two took it … Read more

Asuka needs the Raw Women’s Championship

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A few years ago the catchphrase “No one is ready for Asuka” sent a powerful message throughout the women’s revolution as “The Empress of Tomorrow” left her path of destruction through NXT and WWE’s main roster. She went undefeated for 914 days before suffering her first loss at the hands of Charlotte Flair at WrestleMania … Read more

Winners & Losers: SmackDown 11/29/19

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This week’s Friday Night SmackDown certainly had its moments for the women’s division. Coming off a Survivor Series loss, SmackDown Women’s Champion Bayley and Sasha Banks addressed their fellow colleagues in disgust. The one to answer their tirade was Lacey Evans.

The only match of this week’s show was between Sonya Deville and Nikki Cross. The match itself was short but with Cross pulling off a victory it led to the return of Alexa Bliss.

https://twitter.com/tde_wrestling/status/1200599757669851136?s=20

For the full rundown of the show, you can head over to the live coverage that you can view here.

Here are the Winners & Losers from this week’s SmackDown:

WINNER: Alexa Bliss

Alexa Bliss made her return and although it wasn’t entirely a surprise it puts her as a big win. Bliss is scheduled to be in a Fatal 4-way this weekend at Starrcade on Sunday, so her reemergence was expected. She was last seen almost two months ago at Hell in a Cell and has been nursing a shoulder injury since.

WINNER: Lacey Evans

Lacey Evans received the biggest win of the week. Although it hasn’t been confirmed that she is Bayley’s next challenger for the title it can be assumed. The face turn for her still remains to be seen on how good it will work, but it is a start. She received a decent reaction from the crowd as well.

Although personally, Evans wouldn’t be my first choice for the next opponent for Bayley, at least it isn’t the same Nikki Cross/Alexa Bliss feud that has been done way too much. More than likely it is only going to be a temporary feud as I don’t see Bayley losing the title until at least WrestleMania.

LOSER: Bayley

Bayley’s heel persona fell big this week. Generally, I feel like her heel turn has been working even if it is a little lackluster. This week however was not a good way to build the champion up especially after a loss at Survivor Series.

After Lacey took down Sasha Banks her bestie simply stood there. It is not a good look for the SmackDown women’s division to have a champion who doesn’t have that fire. She should have won at Survivor Series in order to further her character development.

Final Thoughts:

Sasha Banks could use her own feud and break away some from Bayley. It looks like this could be Carmella. And if nothing comes from this, it should.

https://twitter.com/tde_wrestling/status/1200596925210214400?s=20

I am not opposed to Lacey being Bayley’s next opponent, especially as it may just be a one-off to get to the Royal Rumble. However, this was the perfect time to give Dana Brooke her moment. With her Twitter romance with Batista, Brooke is the talk of wrestling social media right now.

They could have built off of this and had Brooke as the one to come out to confront Bayley and Sasha instead of Lacey. Instead, she was just provided with a backstage segment with Drake Maverick trying to give her a little smoochy smooch. Missed opportunity and we all know Dana loves her opportunities.

What were your thoughts on this week’s SmackDown? Who were your Winners & Losers? Discuss this week’s show and developments in the comment section below.

The matches that made “The Man” Becky Lynch

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This week Becky Lynch celebrated becoming the longest-reigning WWE Raw Women’s Champion, so to commemorate I have devised a list of her top matches from early career to main-eventer. The matches span through her time at NXT where she established herself as the “Irish Lass-Kicker” with her gutsy break-through performances. To the matches en route … Read more

Starrcade match changed to a Fatal 4-Way

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WWE has changed the landscape of their women’s match at Starrcade. It was previously said that we would see The Kabuki Warriors defending their Women’s Tag Team Championship against RAW Women’s Champion Becky Lynch and Charlotte Flair, It was being booked as a Texas Tornado Match. The pressure has now been applied even more for … Read more

The Women of NXT Ruled This Weekend

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Off of the heels of a, if I can be partial, fantastic WarGames and a pretty solid Survivor Series match, the women of WWE are sitting pretty high. While the men also killed it, history was made on the women’s side of things with their first ever “WarGames” match, and they delivered. Team Ripley showed … Read more

Winners & Losers: NXT 11/13/19

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The road to WarGames and Survivor Series is getting shorter and shorter as we are less than two weeks away from both. NXT this week was full of the women’s roster which is something that RAW and SmackDown seem to have troubles in doing.

Throughout the night, members of Team Ripley for WarGames was attacked. First, we saw team captain Rhea Ripley and Tegan Nox who were laid out by an unknown attacker. Later on, in the night their fellow team member Candice LeRae suffers the same attack. *Cue Scarlett Bordeaux who made an appearance by helping LeRae after the attack*

https://twitter.com/TeganNoxWWE_/status/1194831533540085766?s=20

What was interesting though is Marina Shafir and Jessamyn Duke was also attacked at the same time LeRae was. These two ladies are not part of the WarGames match but this could mean they will be on the NXT women’s team for the traditional Survivor Series match. There have been no names announced for the Survivor Series match just yet.

There were two matches this week. The first was Xia Li who took on Aliyah in a short match. The second was the highly advertised Women’s Ladder Match which had Io Shirai vs. Mia Yim in the main event. This match being the main event was the exact right choice. The match definitely was slow to start, but by the end it had me invested. As a result of Io Shirai winning this slugfest of a match, we now know that Kay Lee Ray is the fourth and final member of Team Baszler for WarGames.

https://twitter.com/tde_wrestling/status/1194832271955701760?s=20

Let’s get right into the Winners & Losers of this week’s NXT:

WINNERS: Mia Yim & Io Shirai

Say what you want of Mia Yim but she delivered and beyond by the end of this main event. Between the hit to the face with the ladder and the ending of going through the ladder on the outside shows that she isn’t afraid to take bumps and get hurt. She may not have won the match, but she certainly made an impact.

Shirai did a great job throughout this main event ladder match at selling especially with her hand after it was targeted by Yim with the ladder. She won the advantage for her team for WarGames which is a huge positive heading into this type of match.

WINNER: Kay Lee Ray

An obvious winner of the night is NXT UK Champion Kay Lee Ray. With having WWE just recently in Manchester it was odd that she wasn’t involved in any sort of way. Now it makes more sense as to why she wasn’t used like her male UK roster counterparts were.

This is a good way to get exposure to not only the NXT UK brand but for Ray herself. This definitely isn’t a brand everyone watches, but seeing her in a high profile match such as the first-ever women’s WarGames match is a big win for her.

WINNER: Bayley

Bayley continues to be present during this feud and build up for Survivor Series for her match against Becky Lynch and Shayna Baszler. Many people wrote Bayley off from day one for many reasons, but they are still giving her moments to show she is a force. Her taking out Shayna and possibly being the one that took out Team Baszler along with Shafir and Duke was good to see and what was needed.

LOSER: Aliyah

Sigh. Unfortunately, Aliyah has wound up on the loser end this week. Not only was the match super short, but she was the victim of a busted nose.

Aliyah deserves better, but unfortunately due to the nature of what went down on this week’s show, there isn’t much hope of her to be pushed in any sort of fashion. In fact, if they allowed her and Vanessa to actually be the tag team they are then maybe it would paint Aliyah in a different light.

LOSERS: Rhea Ripley’s Team for WarGames

Ripley and her team were taken out this week besides Mia Yim. Not only was she taken out, but so was Tegan Nox and Candice LeRae. By the end of the show, it was not 100% clear of who took them out, but according to a tweet by Bayley, it is assumed to be her. If it was just Bayley she took out five women plus Shayna and well there ya go.

What were your thoughts on this week’s NXT? Are you enjoying what is being delivered on the black and gold brand? Are you looking forward to WarGames and Survivor Series in less than two weeks? Who were your Winners & Losers this week?

Leave your thoughts in the comment section below. Check back in with Diva Dirt for Live Coverage of Friday Night SmackDown this Friday at 8 p.m. ET.

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