{"id":109396,"date":"2022-02-02T10:00:59","date_gmt":"2022-02-02T15:00:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/?p=109396"},"modified":"2022-02-01T20:47:22","modified_gmt":"2022-02-02T01:47:22","slug":"ronda-rousey-wrestlemania-38-opponents","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2022\/02\/02\/ronda-rousey-wrestlemania-38-opponents\/","title":{"rendered":"Who Should Face Ronda Rousey at WrestleMania 38?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A staple of <strong>World Wrestling Entertainment\u2019s<\/strong> pay-per-view\u00a0series <strong><em>Royal Rumble <\/em><\/strong>is its surprise returns. Heading into January 29\u2019s installment, <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2021\/01\/31\/bianca-belair-2021-womens-royal-rumble\/\" target=\"_self\">2021\u2019s winner<\/a>, <strong>Bianca Belair, <\/strong>was the popular favorite to win this year&#8217;s women\u2019s <em>Royal Rumble<\/em> match. Hopes were high that Belair would capture the <strong><em>WrestleMania 38<\/em><\/strong> opportunity and parlay it into a rematch against <strong>Becky Lynch, <\/strong>with the Raw Women&#8217;s Championship at stake. However, the odds turned against this outcome when <strong>Ronda Rousey <\/strong>entered at number 28, making her return to WWE after two years away, her own sights set on <em>WrestleMania 38<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Ronda Rousey makes a rowdy return: Royal Rumble 2022 (WWE Network Exclusive)\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/fXURqrHAQlA?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h2><strong>Who Faces Ronda Rousey at WrestleMania?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<h3><strong>What We Know So Far<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>Rousey eliminated former rival <strong>Charlotte Flair <\/strong>to win the 30-woman match and secure a shot at either Flair\u2019s SmackDown Women&#8217;s Championship, or Lynch\u2019s Raw title. While WWE revisited Flair\u2019s and Lynch\u2019s longstanding rivalry at 2021\u2019s <em><strong>Survivor Series<\/strong>, <\/em>the return of Rousey places all three on a collision course that hearkens back to their 2019 <strong><em>WrestleMania 35 <\/em><\/strong>winner-takes-all triple threat which made sports entertainment history. The bout, the first women\u2019s match to be featured as <em>WrestleMania\u2019s <\/em>main event, ended with Lynch claiming both the Raw and SmackDown women&#8217;s titles, capping off her rapid rise in popularity.<\/p>\n<p>On January 31\u2019s broadcast of <strong><em>Monday Night Raw<\/em><\/strong>, from the Heritage Bank Center in Cincinnati, Ohio, a steely Rousey cut a scathing in-ring promo on Lynch, dismissively referring to \u201cBig Time Becks\u201d as \u201cRebecca.\u201d Lynch interrupted and ended up on the end of an armbar from Rousey. Before departing, Ronda Rousey informed Becky Lynch that she would choose between her and Charlotte Flair for her <em>WrestleMania <\/em>opponent on <strong><em>Friday Night SmackDown<\/em><\/strong>. After two years, Flair, Lynch, and Rousey are back in each other\u2019s orbit, and new grudges and old wounds are propelling their road to<em> WrestleMania<\/em>, with Rousey\u2019s choice to be known on Friday. Here are the odds for both of her possible picks.<\/p>\n<p><a id=\"i8PiCtghTcliyhv_wl2rCw\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/1025399726\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'i8PiCtghTcliyhv_wl2rCw',sig:'QrrlHPdlFHW6bqK6VlYXTTNkQG7jF6YkQ4RXQNOxJWo=',w:'594px',h:'395px',items:'1025399726',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n<h3><strong>Charlotte Flair<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>Flair falling to Rousey, the penultimate woman standing in the women\u2019s <em>Rumble<\/em>, and Rousey\u2019s inevitable <em>SmackDown<\/em> appearance, seem to indicate that her sights are set on Flair and the SmackDown women\u2019s title. This would upset the trajectory that Flair and <strong>Sasha Banks<\/strong> have been on since Flair\u2019s late autumn 2021 drafting to <em>SmackDown<\/em>, poised for a rivalry. Flair and Banks\u2019s ire built through Flair\u2019s bullying of Banks\u2019s prot\u00e9g\u00e9 <strong>Toni Storm, <\/strong>but with <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2021\/12\/29\/report-toni-storm-gone-from-wwe\/\" target=\"_self\">Storm\u2019s departure from WWE<\/a>, that storyline is now a moot point. With Rousey\u2019s elimination of Flair in the women\u2019s <em>Royal Rumble<\/em> match, they now have a fresh score to settle. Though both lost to Lynch at <em>WrestleMania 35<\/em>, they were opponents at 2018\u2019s <em>Survivor Series <\/em>and rivals throughout 2019. Though that past is overshadowed by the ascendance of Lynch, Flair, and Rousey have their own history that looks set to be reignited, perhaps with Banks also in the mix.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"600\" height=\"338\" class=\"size-full wp-image-88782 alignnone\" src=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/15\/2021\/04\/Becky-Lynch-Ronda-Rousey-e1617821501520.jpg\" alt=\"Becky Lynch Ronda Rousey\" \/><\/p>\n<h3><strong>Becky Lynch<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>Rousey scathingly called Lynch\u2019s title reign \u201cstagnating\u201d, and there is some truth to that. Despite several successful title defenses against Belair, <strong>Liv Morgan<\/strong>, and <strong>Doudrop, <\/strong>Lynch\u2019s \u201cBig Time Becks\u201d heel character,\u00a0 a grandiose and arrogant celebrity, has failed to find the sort of organic momentum she enjoyed as \u201cThe Man\u201d. However, Rousey seemed adamant on dismissing Lynch, saying that Lynch\u2019s reign was Lynch\u2019s problem, and teasing the possibility of picking Flair just to spite Lynch.<\/p>\n<p>Before the <em>WrestleMania 35<\/em> triple threat and Lynch\u2019s victory, Rousey enjoyed an impressive 231-day reign with the Raw women&#8217;s title. Her title defenses helped WWE solidify the athletically credible tone it was then trying to establish for its women\u2019s division. However, putting Rousey in the running for the belt would place Bianca Belair another step further from the rematch with Lynch that many anticipated would begin to take shape in the wake of 2022\u2019s Rumble.<\/p>\n<p>WWE\u2019s women\u2019s division, and emerging talent like Belair, suffered throughout 2021 from poor and uneven booking. Whatever Rousey\u2019s choice, with her, Flair, and Lynch once again the division\u2019s centerpieces, WWE has a chance to remind viewers of the inception and glory days of its \u201cwomen\u2019s revolution\u201d, a time of ambitiously staged storylines and matches for its women\u2019s division.<\/p>\n<p>[pickup_prop id=&#8221;18865&#8243;]<\/p>\n<p><em>Stay tuned to the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/\" target=\"_self\">Last Word on Pro Wrestling<\/a> for more on this and other stories from around the world of wrestling, as they develop. You can always count on LWOPW to be on top of the major news in the wrestling world. As well as to provide you with analysis, previews, videos, interviews, and editorials on the wrestling world. You can check out an almost unlimited array of WWE content on the <a href=\"https:\/\/watch.wwe.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">WWE Network<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.peacocktv.com\/watch\/home\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Peacock<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A staple of World Wrestling Entertainment\u2019s pay-per-view\u00a0series Royal Rumble is its surprise returns. Heading into January 29\u2019s installment, 2021\u2019s winner, Bianca Belair, was the popular favorite to win this year&#8217;s women\u2019s Royal Rumble match. Hopes were high that Belair would capture the WrestleMania 38 opportunity and parlay it into a rematch against Becky Lynch, with [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3715,"featured_media":109400,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2192,25,26,317,4,3,320],"tags":[8233,163,403,7821,217,1284,159,598],"class_list":["post-109396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wrestling","category-raw","category-smackdown","category-women","category-wwe","category-wwe-universe","category-wwe-women","tag-2022-royal-rumble","tag-becky-lynch","tag-charlotte-flair","tag-doudrop","tag-liv-morgan","tag-ronda-rousey","tag-sasha-banks","tag-toni-storm"],"modified_by":"Robbie Sutter","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3715"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109396"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109396\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=109396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=109396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}