5 Ups & 5 Downs From WWE Raw (1 May - Review)

DOWNS…

5. More Title-Trading Ahead

Rhea Ripley Raw draft
WWE

Once Raw Women’s Champion Bianca Belair was drafted to SmackDown on Friday, it was only a matter of time before Rhea Ripley was sent to the red brand, which came almost immediately Monday night.

And this likely means we’re going to have to endure another trading of the top two women’s titles, a move that was ridiculed when it happened the last time in October 2021, with Becky Lynch and Charlotte Flair swapping belts.

In the grand scheme of things, maybe most fans just don’t care, it’s just a color swap from red to blue for Belair and blue to red for Rhea. But if you care about title lineage at all, this screws that all up. It also means the titles are interchangeable: It isn’t the specific title that’s valuable, it’s just having one of a certain tier that matters.

One solution: Rename the titles to do away with brand-specific naming, so they can move between shows, like the Intercontinental and United States Championships are doing this year.

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Contributor
Contributor

Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.