8 WWE WrestleMania 37 - Night 2 Impulse Reactions
3. Asuka (c) Vs. Rhea Ripley
Rhea Ripley badly executed Monday Night Raw heel run will one day prove itself conclusively to be the right call, even if not all of it was on display for her anticlimactic Raw Women's Championship clash with Asuka.
'The Nightmare' was a more fitting description of Ripley's 2020 than it was a nickname for the former NXT Champion. Another year like that stood to devastate her fledging career, but the result of this match and a strong Rumble showing seems to have assuaged those fears for now.
It's a shame WWE didn't see fit to give these two a strong story on the way in, because they were the ones left to pay for it on the company's 'Grandest Stage'. Minus crowd investment and a third act, Ripley's actual victory was about the only thing that shook the audience into life. The rest felt like a collection of physically intense but emotionally distant best bits that belonged elsewhere.
The booking was correct and committed, at least. Asuka worked wonders at points during the peak of the pandemic, but Raw's booking has been too woeful even for her to overcome. The time was right for Ripley's minuscule slice of redemption heading into the new normal.