Diva Dirt presents its sixth annual Writers’ Choice Awards, as decided by the Diva Dirt team. As we come to the end of 2016, we have picked the best of the best to be awarded our Writers’ Choice trophies.
Wrestler of the Year: Becky Lynch
Amongst enticing gimmicks, flashy entrances, good mic work and undying fan support, the art of wrestling itself tends to be forgotten when deciding which woman stood the tallest at the end of each year. However, though many women in the industry hold high levels of wrestling talent, there’s one woman that had some of the best matches throughout: and that is the Lass Kicker, Becky Lynch.
Lynch started off the year with a bang as she took on former bestie Charlotte Flair for the WWE Divas championship at Royal Rumble. Though she would go on to lose the match, she put on a stellar performance, hinting at the year that was to come.
The next WWE pay-per-view that Lynch would shine in would be Fastlane. Here she would comfort former enemy Sasha Banks in her fight against the evil Naomi and Tamina, aka Team B.A.D.! All four women would put on an incredible fight, but with the Bank Statement and Dis-Arm-Her locked in, Lynch and Banks took home the win.
And if by that point you weren’t already seeing the star that Becky had become, Wrestlemania 32 would change your mind. In a historic triple threat – and arguably the biggest women’s match in the pay-per-view’s history – Becky would compete in the very first WWE Women’s championship match, where she would go on to steal the show. She did end up tapping to the Figure Eight, but Lynch carried the match to new heights. All three women put on what has been crowned the best women’s match of 2016, and this took them all to a new level of superiority. But it was Lynch that needed to benefit from this the most. Though she had proven herself time and time again, she’d always be overshadowed by her fellow “Horsewomen”. And despite being booked to lose this one, Lynch made sure that crowds would be chanting her name.
Becky’s momentum from Wrestlemania would carry her through top notch matches during her storyline with Natalya. She would pull out her big guns in a losing effort at Money In The Bank, and would then have a very underrated feud with the Queen of Black Harts. From the fantastic bout at Battleground to the very first women’s match on SmackDown Live, these two ladies would knock it out of the park each time they squared off.
These incredible matches would then lead Becky to take on five other competitors, and be crowned the very first SmackDown Women’s champion at Backlash. This match allowed each woman to shine individually, and though it’s probably on the lower end of her top matches of the year, Lynch stood tall. And it was at this moment than the Lass Kicker would cement her legacy in the WWE by pushing the SmackDown women’s locker room to new heights.
From this moment on she would have her first feud as a champion, allowing her to tell a fantastic story with Alexa Bliss. And, with stories aside, the two women had a brilliant set of matches. Their SmackDown main event was intense and proved that both women had great chemistry with each other. And their TLC match, though full of criticism from fans, cemented either lady as incredible wrestlers.
This Straight Fire Lass had some incredible matches that unfortunately go unnoticed at times. Lynch was able to tear herself away from the Horsewomen label and help turn Team Blue into a viable team of wrestlers. Her incredible wrestling skills allowed her to prove that she is more than just the extra wheel of the NXT revolutionaries. She turned heads every time she showed up and even if we ignore the stories, gimmicks and flashy promos, the fierce competitor made 2016 the year of the Lass Kicker.
So that wraps up this year’s Writers’ Choice Awards reveal! Here’s to an incredible 2017 for women’s wrestling!
