In the summer of 2015, three women made their debut on WWE’s flagship program, “Raw.” The trio— Sasha Banks, Charlotte Flair and a fire-haired Irish native named Becky Lynch— had been making a reputation for themselves in WWE’s developmental group, NXT. It was said that their arrival would herald a new beginning for female wrestlers, whose contributions had seemingly been marginalized on WWE programming.
A year and a half later, and it’s clear progress has been made. Segments with women as the focal point are becoming more commonplace on WWE shows. A match between Banks and Flair headlined a WWE pay-per-view last fall, a first. And Becky Lynch has become one of the central figures on WWE’s other staple program, SmackDown Live, which airs every Tuesday on the USA Network. But, Lynch said in an interview, it has taken a long road to get here.
“It was like, okay, these are the people that made waves down in NXT, and these are the people that you want here, so here you go,” Lynch said of her early days on the main WWE roster. “But it took time for us to develop the characters. So NXT is a different crowd than the crowd at Raw and SmackDown. So why do people care about Sasha? Why do people care about Charlotte? Why do people care about Becky Lynch? And now we’re getting to see it, we’re understanding everybody’s character.”
Which, she said, has also helped the cause of female performers by expanding the amount of available airtime.
“All the girls on SmackDown are being featured, and everybody has a storyline. And the crowd is really able to get behind every single girl we have on the roster,” Lynch said.
Wildest dreams
Growing up in Ireland, Lynch said she literally cannot remember a time where wrestling was not a part of her life. It was part of her regular routine, watching shows on the weekends with her brother when they were kids. But the idea that she would someday pursue it as a career seemed impossible to her.
“It was never something that I thought I would [do]— I was from Ireland, and that was in America, you know what I mean? It was beyond my wildest dreams that I could be a wrestler,” said Lynch. “But at 15, my brother was going to give it a shot, and when I found out they were in Ireland, I went right down and I fell in love with doing it.”
Training under current WWE star Finn Balor, Lynch said she had a drive to excel right from the start. “I was the only girl down there, and I wanted to be as good as anybody else there. And what was so great about Finn is that he never treated me any differently. Nobody was allowed to go lighter on me because I was a girl, you know what I mean? So it was really that I had to just step up and hold my own.”
What I’m meant to do
Unfortunately, fate would throw a few curveballs Lynch’s way— an injury in 2006 derailed her budding career, and she came to the conclusion that she would have to give up wrestling. For seven years, she pursued other avenues— holding a job as a flight attendant, going to college to study acting— but still, a nagging feeling in her gut told her there was something missing in her life. Finally, after booking a job as a stuntwoman on the History Channel show “Vikings,” she returned to her wrestling school and fate was waiting to steer her back on track.
“When I was down at the wrestling school, the instructor had just been signed to NXT. And he was like, ‘Could you ever go for a tryout?’ And I was like, ‘No, you know, that ship has sailed. I’m onto this acting thing, I’m doing this stunt work, I’m going to New York, I have my flight paid for, I got my visa booked, everything.’ And he was like, ‘Look. Think about it for a second. I think you’d get it.’ As soon as he said it, I was like, ‘You know what? Yes. Of course I’d get it. Of course, that’s what I’m meant to do. Yes, I’m doing it.’
“And with that, I’m like…it was like I’ve spent these seven years trying to dig for a passion, and trying to force things, and suddenly, it was like everything pulled me in the right direction.”
A matter of time
Soon after she signed a contract with WWE to perform in NXT, Lynch met up with the three other women who have helped shape the performer she has become — Banks, Flair and recent WWE call-up Bayley. Together, the quartet would become known as the Four Horsewomen, and the group’s work in NXT would spark a change in how women’s wrestling is received.
“If I hadn’t given up when I had, then I wouldn’t be at the time that I am at, with the girls that I was with. With the Four Horsewomen. And I think that’s a real blessing, you know what I mean? Because I don’t think we could have done the things that we’ve done with just one of us being there at the time. It has to be all four of us, and it was just lightning in a bottle.”
Now, as Lynch main-events SmackDown shows and her fellow Horsewomen become focal points of Raw, it seems like there are few mountains left for this new generation of women wrestlers to climb. Well, maybe one. And it’s a big one. Could a women’s match ever headline WWE’s biggest show of the year, WrestleMania? Lynch thinks so.
“I think we’re so very close. And I wouldn’t be surprised if it was next year. Like, I really wouldn’t. That would not shock me. And I think it really is just a matter of time.”
“SmackDown Live” will be broadcast from the Huntington Center on Tuesday, January 24. The show begins at 7:45 pm. For tickets or more information, visit huntingtoncentertoledo.com/events.
