Former WWE SmackDown Women’s Champion Carmella has given her thoughts about the booking of the women’s division in WWE.
Carmella has been a mainstay of SmackDown’s women’s division since she debuted on the blue brand in 2016. During that time she has held the brand’s women’s title as well as being the first female winner of Money In The Bank.
Appearing on The Bellas Podcast with WWE Hall Of Famers Nikki and Brie Bella, Carmella discussed the state of booking in the women’s division.
Carmella stated:
“Even, myself, I would sit at home and watch Raw and it would be 10 p.m. before I would see a woman on the show. It’s like, ‘this is a three-hour show. What the hell?’ Even if I’m just a fan, which I am. Like if I didn’t work at WWE and I was just sitting at home watching, I want to see the women. That’s why I tune in. If I’m waiting until 10 p.m. to see a girl, it’s like, ‘what the hell?’ That’s not okay for little girls at home or whoever is watching waiting for the women.”
“It just feels like oh, now, there’s only a focus on maybe two women or one women’s storyline. Like you were saying back when [The Bellas] were there, we had 3 women’s storylines on a 2-hour show and that was when I was still with James [Ellsworth], so we know it’s a possibility. We know that they’re capable of doing that.”
Carmella then noted that the change from having a live audience to not may have changed the way it’s decided who is featured each week:
“I think sometimes there’s this weird shift and people kind of forget. We need to remind them. No, we are a big part of the show. We don’t have to have matches every week, we can do promo segments or backstage segments, even a 30-second insert into the show, just to show hey, here she is. She’s represented on the show. Then, if people are talking about it, OK maybe next week we give her a little bit of a longer segment because people want to see that. Whether it’s me, or whoever it may be I think now because we don’t have a live audience, we are going with who is trending that week.”
It was recently noted on social media that the total length of women’s wrestling on SmackDown for the month of April so far was less than the length of the AEW Women’s Championship match between Hikaru Shida and Tay Conti.
Carmella also discussed her feelings about the release of her WrestleMania tag team partner Billie Kay. Kay was part of a raft of releases made in April that included former US Champions Samoa Joe and Kalisto.