What’s the story?
Dave Meltzer and Bryan Alvarez of Wrestling Observer Radio are speculating that Bayley could face another stiff challenge to her WWE Raw Women’s Championship at Payback. With Alexa Bliss and Mickie James making the move to Raw as part of the Superstar shake-up, the Observer is reporting that a fatal 5-way could be on the cards for WWE Payback. Things aren’t getting any easier for Bayley.
In case you didn’t know...
Bayley successfully defended the Raw Women’s Championship in a fatal 4-way at WrestleMania 33 against Charlotte Flair, Sasha Banks and Nia Jax. With Flair expected to move to SmackDown LIVE, many assumed that Bayley would slide into a singles feud with her on-screen ‘best friend’, Sasha Banks, with Jax lurking menacingly in the background.
Alexa Bliss and Mickie James arrived on Raw and immediately made their presence felt. Bliss, in particular, received a big reaction from the live crowd, and many have high hopes for The Wicked Witch of the WWE going forward.
The heart of the matter
Meltzer and Alvarez are speculating that Bayley could find herself defending the Raw Women’s Championship against four challengers. The match is expected to be a fatal 5-way featuring Bayley, Sasha Banks, Nia Jax, Mickie James and Alexa Bliss.
Also read: Nia Jax nearly kills Charlotte twice in the same match
With just under three weeks and two episodes of Raw to go until Payback, there is plenty of time for plans to change, but the appearance of Bliss and James last night combined with Jax’s victory over Charlotte suggests that the Raw women’s title picture will continue to be crowded.
What’s next?
Those hoping for a hard reset of the Raw women’s division following WrestleMania 33 may be setting themselves up for disappointment. Bliss and James will be looking to continue their momentum on Raw going forward and will surely make their in-ring debuts sooner rather than later. Jax was the dominant figure on last night’s show, however, and it’ll be interesting to see how Bayley and Sasha Banks respond to the violence wrought by the physically imposing Jax.
Author’s take
While it would have been nice to see a straight one-on-one feud between Bayley and Sasha, Alexa and Mickie are simply too talented not to be used in a major way on Raw. The women’s division on the flagship show continues to have an immense amount of talent that is thrown into one big story, and while that is frustrating there is every chance that the 5-way could outshine the 4-way that took place at WrestleMania 33. Time will tell.
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