Raw women's champion Charlotte poses with her father, WWE Hall of Famer Ric Flair, and NBA legend Shaquille O' Neal at the 2016 ESPY Awards. (Photo : Getty Images/Kevin Winter)
The WWE has expended much effort on shedding the "Divas" moniker and placing female wrestlers in the spotlight. So far, these endeavors have been paying off, after it was revealed that WWE events that had female wrestlers in the main event received substantially higher ratings. Now, they are even trying to incorporate many members of the female roster in the road to WrestleMania 33.
The WWE will begin doing so by hosting a women's single elimination tournament that will feature either 16 or 32 competitors. This is a big step in the right direction, as it will allow many female wrestlers in the promotion's developmental territories to break through into the main roster and prove themselves against some more established names.
Charlotte Flair, Sasha Banks, and Becky Lynch previously participated in a triple threat match for the now defunct Divas championship at last year's WrestleMania. This year, Flair is expected to come into "grandest stage of them all" as the defending Raw Women's champion, according to What Culture. She is expected to defend her title against Bayley, with the possibility of Banks and Nia Jax also being thrown into the mix.
Lynch may also once again participate on the main card at WrestleMania, attempting to reclaim her SmackDown women's championship against Alexa Bliss. The match in which Bliss won the championship from Lynch was a tables match at the TLC: Tables, Ladders, and Chairs pay-per-view, which shows just how much faith the WWE has now placed, and will continue to place, into their female competitors.
WWE vice president Triple H recently said in an interview with the Gorilla Position podcast that "[McMahon] had seen time and time again in NXT all the things [Flair and Banks] had gone through." He added that because of this, the WWE CEO did not have to be talked much into the pair participating in the main event matchup at Hell in a Cell.
It is worth noting that Flair and Banks duked it out in the main event despite the fact that Kevin Owens and Seth Rollins fought for the Universal championship on the same night.
Watch Flair and Banks take each other on in a Hell in a Cell match for the Raw women's championship here:
