In any other year, this would have been a brilliant plan: Ellsworth and Carmella were heels, and having Carmella not care that she had the help of a man to win the briefcase is the kind of thing that would turn both fans and her fellow performers (in storyline) against her even more. In the first women’s Money in the Bank ladder match, WWE decided to have James Ellsworth, a man, pull the briefcase down and give it to Carmella, the wrestler he was buddy buddy with. In Money in the Bank matches, a briefcase holding a contract for a championship match is suspended above the ring. WWE's problems with women's wrestling won't be fixed by a show dedicated to them The wrestlers we want to win the Royal Rumbles This is the first women’s Royal Rumble match, and unlike, say, the first women’s Money in the Bank ladder match from this summer, WWE needs to keep that context in mind while plotting out both the match and its result. The women’s Rumble will be the same in those ways, but there is something that needs to be kept in mind that the men’s match, which has been an annual event since 1987, does not need to consider. It will be just like the men’s Rumble: 30 performers, the winner getting a chance to choose between either a RAW or SmackDown Women’s Championship match at WrestleMania 34, and, presumably, actual time to put on a quality match given how the Rumble is setup with wrestlers making their way to the ring on a timer. They’ve often settled for moments of shock value over substance, and while they’ve spent the last few years trying to correct that course - eliminating the Divas Belt and replacing it with Women’s Championships, getting rid of the concept of “Divas” altogether by naming their women performers “Superstars” like the men, and introducing more screen time and more talented performers from around the globe - there remains work to be done.Ī bit of that work comes this Sunday, when WWE hosts the first-ever women’s Royal Rumble match at the 2018 Royal Rumble. That might sound cynical, but that’s about the only way to approach WWE’s history with its women. It’s a rarity, and the appearances themselves usually aren’t much to write home about: the whole idea is that someone like Chyna pops into the Rumble to the surprise of everyone, eliminates another wrestler, and then is eliminated themselves right after the pivotal moment that will later appear on DVDs and documentaries and be pointed to as proof of progress being recorded. Women have entered WWE’s Royal Rumble match in the past.