Has WWE Ruined Asuka?
Just a year ago, Asuka was the most talked about Superstar in the world of wrestling. She had the longest undefeated streak in WWE's history and was the undisputed NXT Women's champion. She was also the winner of the inaugural Women's Royal Rumble match.
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After the debut match at NXT Takeover: Respect against Dana Brooke in 2015, the Japanese was undefeated for a staggering 914 days, in which she picked up more than 240 wins before finally losing to Charlotte Flair at WrestleMania 34.
Below is a clip chronicling the sheer numbers Asuka generated during her undefeated run :
In 2017, Asuka became the first Japanese wrestler to top Pro Wrestling Illustrated's annual PWI Female 50 list. But ever since losing to Charlotte at WrestleMania, the Empress has been a shadow of her former self.
After being drafted to Smackdown during the Superstar Shakeup, Asuka faced defeat in her very first match on Tuesday Nights and things have only been getting worse. She has lost two consecutive pay per view matches and her chances of making it to SummerSlam are very slim unless WWE books her in an intergender match against the Chinless Wonder, James Ellsworth at the event.
The downfall of Asuka has been on expected lines but the terrible booking that she has been made to put through is truly sad. In addition to that, she has also been entrusted with the herculean task of getting a good match out of an inferior performer like Carmella, whose botches are the only talking point of her matches.
Another sore point has been the way the company has diminished the value of Asuka's streak like it was of no value. On the contrary, Undertaker's WrestleMania streak is something which is talked till now. After the Streak broke at WrestleMania 30, Paul Heyman made it a point to mention that his client was the one in 21-1 and announcers hyped it enormously and this made the streak feel more special and made Brock Lesnar the mega draw that he is today.
But the same can't be said about Asuka's streak which was only mentioned a few times on times on TV and WWE now pretends like it never happened in the first place. The aura that Asuka once had diminished greatly since the streak broke which has turned into the Express of Yesterday.
Asia's run will act as a major deterrent for WWE's future Japanese signings. We want to see Japanese like stars like Kazuchika Okada and Tetsuya Naito in the company but after seeing the terrible booking that Asuka and her fellow countryman Shinsuke Nakamura have been subjected to on the main roster, will they even think of risking everything just to get to the WWE where they would be an afterthought rather than staying in their home country and scaling new heights.
While all is not lost and WWE still has time to do good by the Empress, the fanatical pace of her downfall indicates a major push isn't in the works at least for the foreseeable future. This is sad considering the fact that Asuka is one of the best female performers in the company and has time and again proven her worth in the ring. We just hope that WWE realizes the mess they made with Asuka and try to at least try to build her up in the coming weeks.