She's The Man

There’s a traditional path to glory in WWE lore. A popular star on the rise wins--nay, survives—the thirty-person gauntlet Royal Rumble match, thus earning the right to challenge the world champion at the biggest show of the year, WrestleMania. It’s a route traveled by no lesser stars than Shawn Michaels, Stone Cold Steve Austin, and Batista.

There are some inconvenient truths that complicate this narrative. Like that the first four years of the Rumble saw the match treated as more of a novelty gimmick than an important historical marker, and didn’t carry any world title or WrestleMania ramifications. Like that the first man to travel this heralded Road to WrestleMania was not an underdog hero, but rather super heavyweight heel Yokozuna who made less of an inspirational run through the Rumble than he made a dominant ten minute appearance, wrecking guys half his size or twice as tired from having entered the match much earlier.

The most inconvenient truth of all? The traditional narrative hasn’t really played out in its purest sense for fourteen years. That’s when Batista rose from relative obscurity to win the match, capitalize on his popularity by officially turning into a good guy, and then topple his evil veteran mentor, Triple H, to win the World Heavyweight Championship at WrestleMania 21.

In the interim, some other heroes--faces, in the parlance of wrestling--have won the Rumble and gone on to win world titles at ‘Mania, but they’ve all been padding their legacies rather than making them. Randy Orton had already won multiple world titles and main evented a WrestleMania when he followed this path in 2016 and the same goes for The Undertaker in 2007. Sheamus may not have been as well established in 2012, but he had already been a world champion, and his journey was severely hampered by fans vocally rejecting it, and the fact that his crowning moment at ‘Mania went down not in the main event, but the first match of the show.

The last chance WWE had to fully realize this story was in Daniel Bryan in 2014 or 2015 based on the groundswell of fan support behind him. Neither time did WWE pull the trigger on at least the Rumble piece of the puzzle. Instead, the company tried to foist this push on Roman Reigns, whom the fans rejected vocally enough to alter those plans mid-course.

But now something different is happening.

Becky Lynch was a wrestler in her native Ireland who worked indie shows to make ends meet before retiring from wrestling. Then WWE came calling, looking to recruit female talent for its budding women’s division and, at the encouragement of real life friend and mentor Finn Balor, gave this wrestling thing one more shot. She has since been an integral part of the so-called Women’s Revolution, for which WWE has eschewed trying to market pretty faces as fighters despite their lack of skill or athleticism to back the narrative. This new generation of female talent has trained hard and been afforded opportunities to flourish on a comparable scale as the men.

Lynch has never been the face of this movement. Indeed, she’s on the short list for best female wrestlers not to have won the developmental NXT Women’s Championship despite challenging for it multiple times. And while she has been among the top five or so female stars on the main roster, she’s never been treated as the top star, always behind at least Ric Flair’s daughter Charlotte and Snoop Dogg’s cousin Sasha Banks; often as not behind monster heel Nia Jax and unlikely featured heel Alexa Bliss. All of them and Ronda Rousey.

Rousey came to WWE with the credibility of her remarkable real life UFC run behind her. And though the losses she took at the end of her MMA career tarnished her legacy some--for exposing her limitations and suggesting that she may never been so dominant in the first place had she run into certain Achilles’ heel opponents sooner--she remained the most famous and most credible fighter to ever sign with WWE.

Rousey received the warm reception you’d expect for a guest appearance alongside The Rock at WrestleMania 31 and for her more official entrance into the company last year, culminating in a WrestleMania 34 match in which she far outperformed expectations.

That’s where things get wonky.

In a way that makes little sense outside the context of hardcore wrestling fandom, the crowd turned on Rousey, observing her least appealing traits as a corporate favorite who leapfrogged women who had been working their way up the ranks for years longer. And just as fans soured on Rousey, Lynch made her move.

Fresh off of injury, and filming a movie, she got the advice from co-star (and WWE legend) Shawn Michaels to return to WWE carrying herself like she was the biggest star in the world. Take this fresh attitude and combine it with some of the best in ring and on mic performances of Lynch’s career, plus a heel turn that fans loved and the so-called Irish Lass Kicker exploded into one of the most popular stars in the company. Particularly in the female ranks, suddenly only Rousey could claim to have a bigger name, and that came with the aforementioned baggage.

And so we arrive at WrestleMania, and a Triple Threat proposition. In one corner stands Rousey, all but browbeaten by fans into a full-on heel turn. In another corner stands Charlotte Flair, whom WWE has only played up as the corporate choice to represent the company. And then there’s Becky Lynch.

Lynch took to using the nickname “The Man.” It’s in part a riff on Ric Flair’s old mantra that, To be the man, you’ve got to beat the man, in part a play off of the more casual vernacular around the best in any field being called the man. Lynch herself has suggested that there’s an underlying narrative of equality—that if “the man” is the best, why couldn’t a woman take on that moniker?

It’s an awkward nickname when WWE’s undergoing its first full-blown feminist movement. In a time when the company is celebrating women, why would top female star call herself The Man?

That we’re asking the question embodies the answer. Lynch gets people talking. She’s different. She’s provocative. She’s owned most of her peers in the ring, on the mic, and even on the new frontier of social media. That she’d have the most controversial and most talked about nickname a female talent has ever brandished in WWE? That’s a heap of Irish potatoes on the side of the steak she’s serving up.

Most pundits expect the women to close the show for the first time ever at WrestleMania, proper main eventers making good on all of that Women’s Revolution buzz and prophecy. If that comes to fruition, which woman will stand tall as the first WrestleMania main event winner (and incidentally, Women’s Champion)?

We won’t know until April 7. But the smart money is on The Man.