Did WWE Ruin Bayley’s Would-Be WrestleMania Moment?

Bayley’s Raw Women’s Championship victory may have been better saved for WrestleMania 33 next month in Orlando, Florida.

Way back in July, when the WWE roster was being split up into teams of red and blue as the brand extension got underway, it very much appeared as though Monday Night Raw’s female division had a distinct edge over that of SmackDown Live. Boasting Charlotte, Sasha Banks, Nia Jax, Alicia Fox, Emma and Paige, not to mention prospective talents like Summer Rae and Dana Brooke, the flagship show seemed set to take women’s wrestling by storm. It then helped a great deal to have Bayley get brought up from NXT to boost the standards even more after SummerSlam.

Unfortunately, with Summer Rae and Paige both away with injury, Alicia Fox being used predominantly in the cruiserweight division, and the company’s sheer lack of regard for Emma’s potential, it soon became clear that the Raw Women’s Championship had no more than four — at a push — potential challengers.

The fact that Charlotte is a four-time champion when the title is less than a year old just goes to show how unimportant the strap has become, since being thrown from shoulder to shoulder during the long-running Sasha/Charlotte feud.

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As a direct result of its thin roster, as well as WWE’s efforts to uphold Charlotte’s undefeated streak in pay-per-view title matches, the Raw women’s division has seen countless big moments gone to waste because they took place on the weekly show.

The most recent victim of untimely success on Raw seems to be Bayley.

The new Raw Women’s Champion was crowned as such on the February 13 edition of Monday Night Raw, and since her first championship victory came so close to WrestleMania next month, a lot of fans couldn’t help but feel cheated out of a hugely gratifying moment for the woman on the grandest stage of them all.

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If that wasn’t enough, Bayley’s first reign — and subsequent defense, in which she ended Charlotte’s record-setting PPV streak — has a rather prevalent cloud casting a shadow over it due to Sasha Banks’ constant interference.

The biggest question following this development is rather simple; why?

Why did WWE feel the need to rush Bayley’s triumphant emergence as Raw Women’s Champion, and have her bring Charlotte’s record to an end with less than two months remaining before the single biggest event of the calendar year?

We already know that Bayley will be defending the title in Orlando against both Charlotte and Sasha Banks in a triple threat match on April 2, but it’s not like they can protect Charlotte by having her win to keep her streak intact anymore.

At this point, the winner at WrestleMania is far less important because there’s not nearly as much on the line. As it stands, everyone involved in the match has held the title, and nobody is waltzing in with an undefeated streak so the real potential to build this match as big as it possibly can be is essentially gone right now

The only outcome that could take us forward from WrestleMania with some added buzz is if Sasha Banks makes a heel turn, potentially even taking the strap.

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That will be difficult to justify, however, considering it’s going to be every woman for herself at WrestleMania in a triple threat match. She’d need to do something particularly dastardly for it to result in a full-blown shift in character in Orlando.

Something that comes to mind is how Neville prevented Sami Zayn from winning the NXT Championship at NXT TakeOver: Fatal Four-Way back in 2014, by pulling the referee out of the ring as Zayn went for the winning cover.

This didn’t directly turn him heel that night, but it definitely foreshadowed a heel Neville in a championship rivalry with Zayn later down the line.

Something like that could work, but we may just be clutching at straws. If this is the route we go down, there’s still no reason Bayley needed to win the title first.

Looking down the line to WrestleMania, Bayley’s early reign definitely seems to have sullied the impact her first ‘Mania could have made not only on her career.

Seeing her overcome the odds would have allowed for a WrestleMania XXX Daniel Bryan-esque energy to fill the arena, but now the fans in Orlando are bound to be much less enthralled by the proceedings when these three ladies lace up.

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Given the right circumstances, Sasha Banks vs. Bayley vs. Charlotte could’ve easily matched the triple threat match from last year’s show of shows, but right now there’s no way this year’s affair is going to come close to that classic.