We’ve got a month-and-a-half before WWE’s first all-women’s pay-per-view (PPV) event, Evolution, happens Sun., Oct. 28 on Long Island. So while the early buzz has worn off - thanks in part to the card thus far consisting solely of seemingly out-of-continuity matches featuring Hall of Famers and the optics of the show happening days before one at which women can not even appear - there’s still time to regenerate excitement.
The company’s promised all of its women’s championships will be on the line, and compelling match-ups for those could be key to getting the fans fired up about Evolution. We didn’t have bookings for any of those four belts - until NXT taped at Full Sail last night (Sept. 20 - full results here).
We can read the rumors and extrapolate out from current storylines to predict the Raw and SmackDown Women’s title matches. You’ll need spoiler reports to know or guess at the NXT UK Women’s championship bout and Mae Young Classic (MYC) finals. But now we know the black-and-yellow will offer up the latest battle in a rivalry which began in the last match of the first ever MYC... Shayna Baszler vs. Kairi Sane for the NXT Women’s title.
Even as call-up rumors swirled after losing the belt to Sane at TakeOver: Brooklyn 4, Baszler announced she wanted her contractual rematch. The Pirate Princess also defeated Shayna in Las Vegas to claim the Mae Young trophy in 2017, and since New York the Queen of Spades has been more ruthless than ever in her quest to take down her nemesis in a big match.
Will a showdown of long-standing rivals add enough spice to the “dream matches” already announced and get people excited for Evolution again?
We’ll see. Here’s the spoiler-riffic, subject to change card as it currently stands:
- Alexa Bliss vs. Trish Stratus
- Lita vs. Mickie James
- Kairi Sane (c) vs. Shayna Baszler for the NXT Women’s championship
- Toni Storm vs. Io Shirai in the Mae Young Classic final
- Ronda Rousey (c) vs. ??? for the Raw Women’s title
- Becky Lynch (c) vs. ??? for the SmackDown Women’s championship
- Rhea Ripley (c) vs. ??? for the NXT UK Women’s title