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Leave it to WWE to get Becky Lynch back so good – and so bad at the same time.
After more than a year away from WWE, “The Man” made his long-awaited return on Saturday night at the SummerSlam pay-per-view at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas.
At first, there was a “glass break” moment after Sasha Banks was deemed unable to make it to her SmackDown Women’s Championship game against Belair.
The old booker’s rule is to deliver something equal or greater than the wrestler or match that was lost on the card.
WWE certainly did that by bringing Lynch back.
The setup was great. WWE waited until Belair had stepped into the ring to announce Banks’ absence, then said they would face Carmella instead. It left the Vegas devotees very, very unhappy for a few moments, but then Lynch’s music hit and the crowd – and every wrestling fan watching – lost their minds.
Lynch had been away from WWE since May 2020 because she and her husband Seth Rollins had a baby girl.
Lynch, 34, knocked out Carmella and then embarked on a match with Belair that lasted a few seconds. She shook the champion’s hand, pulled her for a punch and threw a Manhandle Slam to retrieve the stunning 1-2-3 pin and SmackDown Women’s Championship around her waist. Lynch beating Belair wasn’t the problem – it was almost expected. But how it happened was wrong on so many levels. It sounded like Brock Lesnar, who also returned on Saturday, crushing Kofi Kingston in the first episode of “Friday Night SmackDown”.
What WWE gave its fans on Saturday turned a moment that was supposed to be filled with pure joy into something less than.
So where has it all gone?
Firstly, Belair and Banks might have had the best game at WrestleMania 37, so fans were expecting something special again. Then Lynch asked Belair to “blow up the roof” with her, raising fan expectations even higher. But they haven’t met them. So now WWE has over-delivered and under-delivered at the same time. Fifty-fifty booking at its best WWE.
Fans want to see Lynch win, but only using less-than-above-the-board tactics against the bigger heels. So while being smooth and catching Belair off guard might fit his character, it should never have been used against an artist that WWE built like a pure babyface.
Of course, it can be said that WWE is protecting Belair from taking a clean pin, so to preserve another match between the two, WWE has more time to announce it. But if it had been done right on Saturday, Belair could have left a bigger star if she had shown she was at Lynch’s level in a five-minute tie game. Then she could still have played the “you caught me off guard” card for a rematch that she now has anyway. This is how you build and prop up your stars. Plus, Lynch didn’t need a squash victory. His credentials speak for themselves. If WWE needed time for their match at SummerSlam, they should have cut off the Shinsuke Nakamura jam session or the Xavier Woods pointless water fight against The Miz and John Morrison.
WWE could have had Carmella crushed by Belair and then had Lynch’s music. Pure joy hits the crowd. The two could have just looked down or Lynch could have possibly shaken hands with her and then combed her hair. This would have been better and then you had a real match for the first time between Belair and Lynch.
WWE has put a lot of time and effort into making Belair a major player in the women’s division. It was succeeding in a way they had never allowed Rhea Ripley to do on Raw. Bayley and Banks have also helped as opponents to Belair over the past year. WWE itself had a brand new athletic, intelligent and charismatic female star. What does he have now? Belair spent months proving she was equal to Bayley and Banks. Should she start over with Lynch now?
The WWE Women’s Division continues to be The Four Horsemen and everyone. Charlotte Flair is the Raw Women’s Champion again, potentially setting up a Raw match against SmackDown against Lynch at the Survivor Series. These two don’t need the belts or this scene for this match to make sense
Maybe Banks is coming back to provide the heel in that SmackDown title triangle? Maybe WWE has found itself in a corner and Belair needs to turn around to provide a suitable opponent for Lynch, who likely won’t become the villain anytime soon. Will Belair fall back into the intermediate or tag pitcher with Lynch having a long reign. Neither option sounds good compared to what Belair was before Saturday.
Maybe, just maybe. Belair’s shipments of talent allow him to overcome WWE’s questionable reservation. Her facial expressions throughout the ordeal were all we have seen at home: disappointment when Carmella was announced, shock and excitement when Lynch arrived, and stunned disbelief when she lost. the title. Belair is talented enough to pull through if given the chance.
It didn’t have to be that way. But only WWE can find a way to soften the return of one of its biggest stars and potentially damage another in the process.
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