WWE: A Year After Fans Said She Was ‘Ruined’, Bayley Is Quietly Shining Again

Bayley has been one of WWE’s most beloved characters ever since emerging on the scene in NXT as everyone’s favorite underdog. Last year, some fans worried that Bayley was “ruined” after a botched feud with Alexa Bliss, but nothing could be further from the truth right now.

While Bayley hasn’t earned a singles match for the WWE Raw Women’s Championship following that fateful Extreme Rules match with Alexa Bliss, she did participate in three title matches since then. Bayley was arguably the standout of the excellent Women’s Elimination Chamber match, and she could have easily won if it weren’t for Scar’s (uh, I mean, Sasha Banks’s…) selfish actions at the top of the chamber pod.

Since the Elimination Chamber, Bayley and Sasha have reunited to form the “Boss and Hug Connection”, which has quickly become one of WWE’s most exciting tag teams in the ring. If they were able to feud with more opponents than just the Riott Squad every week, more fans would get a chance to appreciate how good these two are together.

The road to reuniting Sasha and Bayley, however, was tumultuous, with fans getting multiple bait-and-switches. Fans thought the Elimination Chamber antics from Sasha could lead to a match at WrestleMania, but that didn’t materialize. Then, fans thought the two could face off at SummerSlam, in the same building where they had the greatest women’s match in WWE history at NXT TakeOver: Brooklyn I, but, instead, they formed a tag team.

The formation of their tag team began with an emotional moment, in which Sasha Banks pulled out our heartstrings by proclaiming that she “loves” Bayley and will “always” love “The Huggable One”.

More from Daily DDT

• It’s time for Adam Cole and MJF to drop the ROH tag team titles
• Tom Lawlor talks MLW return, AEW opportunity, CM Punk’s WWE return and more
• Eddie Kingston stands to gain the most from the AEW Continental Classic
• Trish Stratus on WWE NXT would help elevate that women’s division
• Randy Orton signs with SmackDown to go after The Bloodline

But let’s not forget that the catalyst for this was Bayley showing Sasha some tough love. When Bayley finally snapped on the woman who had manipulated her for months and simply treated her like a small child, Bayley showed the WWE Universe that she is back to being the tough, nuanced babyface character she was in NXT.

Because while Bayley was undoubtedly lovable and the wide-eyed fan that lives in all of us watching, she was also fully capable of kicking ass in the squared circle. She beat Sasha Banks twice at TakeOvers, she held her own against Asuka, and she was arguably the face of NXT at her peak.

So when she beat the hell out of Sasha and told “The Boss” (of all people) that she ain’t s**t, we saw a more confident, grown-up, and realistic portrayal of the Bayley character on WWE television. To date, that video has garnered two million views on YouTube.

In June 2017 when Bayley lost to Bliss at Extreme Rules in embarrassing fashion, too afraid to even make usage of the kendo stick, a moment like that seemed impossible. When Bayley was busy taking pins in meaningless tag team matches, a few fans bought into the idea that WWE had simply given up on a talented woman who was once one of their most popular athletes in NXT.

It may seem like Banks and Bayley aren’t doing much on the WWE main roster right now as a tag team, but WWE seems to trust them quite a bit. They get on television in matches every week, which is, sadly, more than can be said for many of the women on both Raw and SmackDown. Furthermore, they get a healthy dose of matches in the third hour, and the third hours of Raw seem to have less of a drop-off when they are involved.

The fans still care about Bayley, and WWE has slowly given them reasons to care about her again. She’s no longer one-dimensional, because for the first time on the main roster, she stood up to someone who treated her unfairly.

On top of that, Bayley has been booked strongly in actual matches. The last time she lost a televised singles match was in early February, when she faced off against the then-undefeated Asuka. In their losses to the Riott Squad on Aug. 6 and Aug. 20, it was Banks who was pinned by the heels – not Bayley. Heck, back at WrestleMania, she would have won the first WrestleMania Women’s Battle Royal, if it weren’t for a surprise at the end from Naomi.

It’s amazing how WWE responded to Bayley’s awful booking last summer, because, one year later, Bayley is shining again. She’s consistently put on solid work in tag matches on Raw, to the point where her weekly stability as an in-ring talent has become quite undervalued. Her promo work and acting during the brief Banks/Bayley stand-offs were significantly better than anything she produced in 2017, simply because she had a chance to be stronger and act like a truer version of her character instead of being a pushover.

I don’t know when Bayley will re-enter the Raw Women’s Championship picture or when the rumored Women’s Tag Team Championships are coming. But I do know that Bayley has come roaring back in 2018, and she remains a fan favorite.

It’s easy to overlook somebody when the main event scene is clogged up with the same wrestlers, so don’t sleep on the fact that Bayley is in a much better place right now despite not being in Ronda Rousey’s or Alexa Bliss’s position. Judging by the way they’ve been booking her in matches, she might not be far off from doing something special in the coming months.