Will Credible Jobbers Be Returning?

Let me start with a little review of terminology. The centerpiece is that woman the WWE wants to be the main focus of the women's division and to dominate title matters on a long-term basis. Women with wrestling credibility will be used to put her over and be used as filler. Those are credible jobbers. Stars developed and featured on the periphery of the centerpiece and her title matters are periphery divas.

With the brand split coming, many fans are excited for the WWE bringing back certain talent from the past to help fill out the rosters. If the WWE was not doing a brand split, they would have more than enough talent between the main roster and NXT to handle things efficiently. The WWE would just need to improve how they use that talent to truly produce results. With the roster split, however, the WWE does need more bodies. And it would help to bring in people viewers are familiar with, not just talent from the minor leagues only wrestling fans will care about.

There are a whole bunch of reports of people the WWE is interested in bringing back. It is mostly men I see popping up in these reports. That is understandable. More men get pushed than women. Besides that, the WWE is able to generate hype with wrestling fans just with women from NXT. These women don't have any real star power, but this is an era where vocal wrestling fans are hyped up about women's wrestling and will react to a lot of these women more than the general audience will care to do. The WWE does not really need to bring any women back.

Nevertheless, the WWE has shown that they are willing to bring women back in this era. Some say the new era started after they dumped the old butterfly title and debuted the new Women's Championship at Wrestlemania. The first woman to return on the full-time roster after that magical night? Maryse. A diva. She is involved in a periphery angle with her husband, Miz. An eye-candy periphery diva is the first woman to return in a new era that is supposedly more about women's wrestling.

What about credible jobbers? What about those women there mainly for their wrestling talent? Wrestling fans would probably be even more excited to see some of these women back right now than in previous years. And yet, no real reports about these women being contacted to come back for the main roster. I have seen none.

Look back at the diva era when it came to credible jobbers coming back. It has happened on occasion. What has never happened, however, is that a woman given this type of career returned to the company to be treated better.

Gail Kim is the classic example. She was in the WWE. She won the Women's Championship. Her matches were not that great. The WWE didn't get rid of here right there, but they eventually did. She went to TNA. She made a big name for herself. The WWE roped her back in. And they still treated her like a credible jobber. She never got any title reigns. She got jobber pushes. She got the weak periphery angles credible jobbers tend to get. She became an afterthought. And she walked out on the company and went back to TNA.

A lot of wrestling fans would love to see Mickie James back in the WWE. She connected better with the fans during the diva era than any of the other credible jobbers. And she still has a few good years left in her. They brought her back in 2013 to be a guest trainer in NXT. They will eventually put her into the Hall of Fame years from now. But she has not yet retired and wants to come back to the WWE as a performer. What are her chances? She would be the best choice of active female wrestlers that were pushed as credible jobbers in the WWE already. Problem is, the WWE did not view her as a star when they had her and it doesn't seem like anything has really changed since then. If she did come back, she would probably end up like The Dudleyz. She already won 6 women's titles in the WWE. The WWE will not book a credible jobber to tie Trish's record and they probably will not acknowledge that Mickie already beat the record when you count her TNA title reigns.

Overall, I am not expecting the WWE to bring back any credible jobbers in the coming weeks. They don't need them. They can generate hype in the women's division just with what is coming out of NXT. They can sign women that have no real star power, run them through NXT for at least a year, and debut them much to the excitement of wrestling fans. It is more likely that a new debut from NXT happens in the coming weeks. Even if you do have a return of one of these female wrestlers that were not actually pushed as stars in the diva era, how will they end up being treated in this era?