Naomi & Jade Cargill Are the Most Exciting Thing About WrestleMania.
My thoughts on the women's wrestling landscape heading into WrestleMania.
Four years ago, Bianca Belair and Mercedes Moné (nee Sasha Banks) made history as the first Black wrestlers to main event WrestleMania.
I was hoping Belair would etch her name in the annals of time when she took on her former Big 3 teammates Naomi and Jade Cargill in the first ever all-Black triple threat at this weekend’s WrestleMania 41, but Naomi and Cargill will write a different kind of history: the first women’s singles non-title match in 19 years. The last one was in 2006 at WrestleMania 22 when Torrie Wilson took on Candice Michelle in a Playboy Pillow Fight. We’ve come a long way baby…
As WWE is wont to do, the road to WrestleMania has been a rough one, with the Big 3 triple threat being the obvious and, to my mind, rightful storyline between the three. Instead Bianca Cena seems shoehorned into the Women’s World Championship triple threat match against Iyo Sky and Rhea Ripley (even though technically it’s Ripley who is shoehorned in as Belair won the right to challenge the champion at Elimination Chamber).
There has been backstage heat on Cargill for allegedly being hard to work with, while public opinion is that she can’t wrestle. Despite her glow gimmick and being a fixture of the women’s division for the past decade-plus, Naomi has never really gotten a chance to shine. But she’s been doing some great character work since turning heel after it was revealed that she was the one who attacked Cargill, keeping her out of action for months while Naomi took her place as Bianca’s tag team partner. Her caution tape gear and razor blade accessories are legitimately exciting. I hope they get a chance to showcase their feud and that women’s wrestling can stand on the strength of storyline on the grandest stage of them all.
Charlotte Flair VS. Tiffany Stratton—the blueprint VS. the update—was supposed to be the women’s match everyone was interested in. And it is now, after an apparent behind the scenes feud between the two has spewed into kayfabe, but it started out messy, with the crowd turning on Flair (in other news: the sky is blue) and forcing natural heel Stratton into the babyface role. We’re seeing Stratton adapt to a difficult opponent going off script in real time; whether she can hold her own against the woman who paved the way for her and in whose image she was made will be the ultimate test.
Meanwhile the Women’s Tag Team Champions, Liv Morgan and Raquel Rodriguez, have been in Naomi, Bianca and Cargill’s business since they were wrongfully fingered for attacking Cargill months ago, but they’ll be facing the randomly thrown together tag team of Bayley and Women’s Intercontinental Champion Lyra Valkyria when Triple H looked at the WrestleMania card and was like, shit, I forgot about all the other women’s champions.
The most egregious oversight is that of Chelsea Green, arguably the MVP of WWE for the past year or more, who is not scheduled to defend her Women’s United States Championship which is undoubtedly the biggest travesty involving the U.S. right now. We haven’t come a long way baby…
