Opinion: Why Unifying The RAW and Smackdown Live Titles Makes Sense After WrestleMania
With WrestleMania this Sunday, fans are getting ready, for the first time ever, to see the event headlined by a women's title match. The match has shifted within the last couple months with Charlotte Flair being added to the Becky Lynch vs. Ronda Rousey bout, and now, Flair becoming an eight-time title holder by beating Asuka for the Smackdown women's championship making the match a dual title match.
This can mean one thing, the winner will not hold two titles but instead receive a dual brand championship in the upcoming weeks. This is a good move on WWE and makes sense and here is how.
Unifying the belts not only brings together two belts but both of the women's divisions as well. The division from both brands is small meaning we're seeing the same matches over and over, most commonly against the Riott Squad on RAW and Mandy and Sonya Deville on Smackdown.
Unifying the belts means we get a bit of versatility within the division and makes better storylines with heartfelt outcomes like Dana Brooke, who has been asking for a chance, to one day call herself a women's champion.
The brand split was originally designed to give wrestlers who never had received a shot that chance to be featured in matches and possibly earn set opportunities. But in the end, it was the same result with the same guys receiving those chances.
It makes even more sense to have one women's championship belt seeing the fact there is only one set of women's tag team belts that are defended between both brands. Having one belt and one tag team title gives these champions the ability to hop between brands meaning we can get new matchups in the upcoming weeks. IIconics vs. The Riott Squad, Lynch vs. a never settled face breaker match against Nia Jax, the list goes on.
But before we can think ahead, we have to first get through mania this Sunday to see who will become the new, dual brand, women's champion.