DEVIL'S ADVOCATE: You can't have Women's Tag Divisions




There are countless examples in history of good, sometimes even great ideas, failing to take off because the timing was off. Something about the landscape in front of them wasn’t in prime position to allow that idea to take off like it should have, and thus, it failed.

Prior to Stephanie McMahon making her “monumental and historic announcement” on July 23rd’s edition of Monday Night RAW, there was plenty of speculation on social media as to what the contents of Ms. McMahon’s statement were going to include. Many believed it was in regards to the state of the WWE’s still-burgeoning women’s division, and they were correct. Fans will be treated to the first ever all-women’s pay-per-view event in October appropriately titled Evolution.

However, both before and after the announcement, there was a particular subject of speculation that I saw time and time again: the genesis of Women’s Tag Team Championships.


At face value, it makes sense. There are plenty of talented women toiling away on the main roster without significant feuds, plus there’s deserving performers in NXT that can get the call-up to further fill out two brands’ new tag divisions if necessary. Plus, the women of WWE have proven over and over again that they have earned the right to every opportunity as the men. It truly is a new era.

The fact of the matter is, while the women of WWE likely deserve a tag team division, it’s in no one’s best interest to actually start one right now. Why? Because while the WWE certainly does not lack in-ring talent in the current work-rate era, it is very short on one extremely valuable commodity: Time.

There just isn’t nearly enough time on WWE programming to facilitate Women’s Tag Team Championships on RAW and SmackDown Live (at least, not if you want them to be successful). Talent is already scratching and clawing for TV time on a weekly basis, and too often, good workers get left off your screens because there isn’t enough time to showcase all of the company’s performers.

Furthermore, even the men’s tag team division is struggling to earn TV time at the moment. Last week, SmackDown Live had one of its most critically acclaimed episodes since moving to Tuesday nights, and yet its Tag Team Champions, The Bludgeon Brothers, were nowhere to be seen. They may have been mentioned on mic once during the broadcast, too. And think of a team like Sheamus and Cesaro, too. One the crème de la crème of the RAW tag division because of their in-ring reliability as well as their emphasis on logic when putting together their matches, The Bar has hardly been heard or seen from on SmackDown Live TV in a month. On RAW, the Authors of Pain need valuable airtime to establish themselves as the world-beaters we saw in NXT. Have they gotten it? Maybe more so recently, but it’s been a hard battle to get them on the call sheet.

If they were somehow able to allocate proper TV time on a weekly basis to a women’s tag division, it’s likely going to come at the expense at the WWE’s already ailing midcard scene on both the men’s and women’s side of the roster. The company could be generously described as inconsistent at best when it comes to building meaningful non-title feuds in its men’s midcard, and I can’t think of one major non-title feud in the women’s division since the brand split. It would be a classic case of fix one problem by creating another.

Creating Women’s Tag Team Championships now in the current landscape is almost setting it up to fail. The all-women’s PPV is a slam dunk idea (especially after the PR points fumbled with the Greatest Royal Rumble), but tag divisions for the ladies is too much too soon. Right now, WWE needs to focus its energy on putting its current talent – champions, headliners, midcarders and tag teams – in positions to succeed, not creating even more titles that can’t make it onto weekly TV frequently enough.

Any wrestler who’s stepped through gorilla position in the McMahons’ company will tell you that time is so very valuable. For the fan, patience should be regarded as a valuable virtue, too. The women of WWE deserve a tag team division, but that means they also deserve the opportunity to ensure that it doesn’t immediately flounder. At this time, that opportunity does not exist. Someday it will, but right now, it does not. The timing just isn’t right.

Comments

Post a Comment