Do You Like WWE’s 30 Day Title Defense Rule? | Question Of The Day

Welcome to another eWrestlingNews Question of the Day!

Last night on WWE SmackDown, General Manager Nick Aldis made the decision to keep the interim WWE Women’s Championship on Chelsea Green for the next 30 days, hoping she can be cleared to compete by then so that she won’t have to relinquish the title.

This is a rule WWE has played loose with over the years. Sometimes, they’ll invoke it for this very purpose of an injury or for a storyline to force a heel into defending their championship. Other times, WWE will go MONTHS without acknowledging it, hoping fans don’t remember it was even a thing, as they stall because they don’t want to do anything with their champion who is otherwise not in a spot to compete the way they want to. It isn’t even always an injury, as it could be that they just don’t want to show up like Brock Lesnar, or that there aren’t other storylines they want to pursue.

My question for you today is “Are you a fan of the 30 day rule?”

Remember to answer with your response in the comments below.

As far as my answer…

My thought process in wrestling creative is always that there should be rules that are followed, and there should be rules that are just there but are malleable. This is one of those malleable ones, but only to a certain extent.

I don’t think there should literally be someone with a counter saying it’s been 31 days since the last title defense, which means the champion is by default stripped of their title. That’s like trying to keep the win-loss records to mean anything when house shows sometimes count and sometimes don’t, or trying to write yourself out of the instant replay idea. You have to suspend your disbelief sometimes.

However, it’s absurd when they do things like what they did with Liv Morgan this year. That was far, far past the time where she could’ve done SOMETHING.

It’s not even difficult to do most of the time. Obviously, with Chelsea, she’s injured. That’s something you can’t really write around with a title defense. But they HAVE had people defend the title on someone else’s behalf. I don’t love the idea, but it’s at least something.

When it isn’t an injury, there’s no excuse. Have someone like Morgan defend the belt on one episode of Monday Night Raw prior to the Queen of the Ring tournament, for example, and you’re good. It doesn’t have to be a big program or a complicated story. Adam Pearce says “You haven’t defended your title in weeks. Guess what. You’ve got a title defense tonight against ____.” Liv gets mad, storms out of the room, comes out later and beats the challenger. The end.

I’m not huge on interim titles, so if something is well past the 30 day mark and there’s no end in sight, that’s when I think vacating the title is the best case scenario. Not every title run is 6-12 months, and if that person is going to be the champion again, they can just add another reign to their list of accolades.

Green is a case where I hope she’s able to come back in time and that she is officially recognized as a true champion instead of an interim title-holder. In the meantime, spotlight the Women’s United States Championship and the tag team titles, or create some feuds that don’t require a belt. There are plenty options to explore.

What do you think? Drop your thoughts below!