Rhea Ripley kicked off Monday Night Raw confirming the dreaded rumor was true. Ripley has suffered an injury that will keep her out “quite a few months” and she relinquished her Women’s World Championship after 380 days as champion.

This is a significant blow to WWE programming, in more ways than one.

Ripley won her first championship on the main roster at last year’s WrestleMania 39 in Hollywood against Charlotte Flair. Dominating the Monday Night Raw scene alongside Judgment Day, many thought Ripley might lose the title after a year as champion. Rather, Rhea Ripley retained her Women’s World Championship against Becky Lynch at WrestleMania 40 just last weekend.

You never want to see a championship run like Rhea Ripley’s end due to injury. You hope she would remain healthy for her reign and drop the championship to someone who would benefit from beating her, particularly with a run as long as what Rhea Ripley had. But that’s not the case, and there’s cause to be upset with WWE for the way they handled matters.

With Ripley dropping the championship on Monday night, she ties Bayley at 380 days as the longest-reigning Women’s World Champion, a title formerly known as the SmackDown Women’s Championship. Could they not let Ripley hold it one more week? A couple more months to gather additional information? Instead, she falls short of having the longest reign, which is what she would have if the injury occurred a week or two later.

We had a similar situation with Seth Rollins and the World Heavyweight Championship earlier this year. Rollins tore his MCL and meniscus, putting a WrestleMania title defense in jeopardy. Rather than jumping the gun and stripping Rollins of the title, they kept Rollins on television and allowed the process to play out. This enabled Rollins to get healthier, compete in two memorable matches at WrestleMania 40, and pass the torch to Drew McIntyre (and then Damian Priest) after a lengthy run of 316 days.

The opportunity was there for Rhea Ripley to stay on television. She’s a vital part of the group Judgment Day, which has proclaimed to run Monday Night Raw the last year, and they have. Over the last year, Judgment Day is usually seen kicking off Raw or in the main event. Ripley could have managed from the sidelines “Dirty” Dominik Mysterio, Finn Balor and JD McDonagh, or the new World Heavyweight Champion Damian Priest.

Where does Judgment Day go from here? But where does the women’s division go from here?

We mentioned Becky Lynch lost to Rhea Ripley at WrestleMania last weekend. Lynch has now taken time off to recover with Seth Rollins. So all of a sudden, Monday Night Raw has lost two of its biggest stars in the women’s division.

In the story, Rhea Ripley is blaming Liv Morgan for the injury. Ironically, Ripley injured Liv Morgan in a match and now it appears Morgan got her revenge with her backstage attack last week. Could Liv Morgan go to the title scene while Ripley is gone? As of now, Raw has nobody in their women’s division on the level of anyone like Ripley or Lynch. There’s a reason they opened WrestleMania weekend. They’re two of the best in the game and specifically Rhea Ripley was at the top of her game.

The WWE Draft occurs at the end of the month and this injury, along with the absence of Becky Lynch and Charlotte Flair from television, could alter the results of the Draft. The likes of Bianca Belair, Naomi, Jade Cargill, or anyone from Damage CTRL could come to Monday Night Raw and give WWE a chance to even the women’s division out. But for now, “Mami” will be missed.