FanPost

Unbridled joy: Happiness is Bayley's debut

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Happiness (hapɪnəs) - noun: the state of being happy.

Happiness is seeing perhaps your favourite wrestler finally get her deserved due and the stage she finally deserved to be on in a moment long overdue.

Happiness is the second the music hits, you immediately go from 0-999mph marking out and do so like you've never done so before - moreso than any of the three moments that you've marked out for before.

Happiness is when you see said wrestler continue to bicker with her partner over who has a certain 'King of Strong Style' as their friend whilst make plans to go for tag team gold in what is akin to a relationship between sisters (as fantastically pointed out by andrewmswift's fantastic series on You-Know-Who).

Happiness is when you rewind back to watch the entrance properly because you were too busy marking out the first time and then have a big wide grin on your face when you hear the Attitude Era-like pop that was given.

Happiness is when you watch back the entrance again and again, over and over to the point you miss an entire match of the pay-per-view.

Happiness is when the day after the pay-per-view, one tweet which loosely references said debut to an acquaintance who mentions she's been out of wrestling for a dozen or so years opens the floodgates to a whole conversation on it with a whole bunch of people and mutual acquaintances and possibly new friends over it as you give said out-of-loop acquaintance a crash course on some of the best female wrestling matches these past few years.

Happiness is when you finally see your favourite wrestler debut to the best reaction ever and it fills you with so much joy after a week or two of feeling insanely rubbish and even times questioning your self-worth in numerous aspects.

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I'm a 25 year-old man from Northern Ireland who should be way, way outside of Bayley's target demographic. I mean, the target demo is that of young children: you just have to look at these two reactions from last night, including superfan Izzy as case in point. But I am unashamed to say that I was more or less learing out at my TV, hoping and hoping beyond hope this was finally it. That our beloved Hugster was going to be Sasha Banks' partner against Charlotte and Dana Brooke at Battleground.

As the pause between music hit, the tension wracked up for me. I was so out of it, I hadn't even copped on Sasha's outfit was a nod to Bayley nor was I noticing her facial reactions that had I caught those, I perhaps would have gotten more excited that moment.

But when that music hit, when Turn It Up hit the tron - total and utter markdown commenced as I full on lost my shit. I'm not ashamed to say last night was the most I've ever marked out. I'd consider the three biggest mark out moments I've had was Sami Zayn's MR debut, Daniel Bryan's WM30 wins (I may have previously said Sami Zayn's RR entry from earlier this year on here elsewhere, but - awesome as it was and much as I marked for it to the point of waking someone up from it - I'd actually forgotten about DB, oops) and Shane McMahon's return earlier this year. This easily beat all three of them combined.

This brought so much joy, I've watched the clip WWE put out on Twitter and Facebook a dozen times today already and rewound it a hundred times at least on the Network last night to the point I missed the Wyatts-New Day because of said rewinding.

To say Bayley has had this coming for a long time feels like understatement of the century. As I've said before, I firmly believe she is the heart and soul - not Finn, not Sami, Bayley - of NXT. To me, she is the face of the brand, she is the one who has helped carry it to incredible heights since that night in Brooklyn. Maybe even just before it too with her fellow horsewomen. She has been long deserving of this spot and as happy as I was to see my favourite wrestler on the main roster, even if just for one night as reported, I was just as happy to see Pamela Martinez get the recognition she was long overdue for the incredible she has put in. There's a reason why fans call her the female John Cena and for good reason. If you need a reminder, all you need to do is look at the two reactions above.

But the Verizon Center gave her an Attitude Era pop for a reason. Grown adults who are far out of the Hugster's demographic gave such a roar. Becky Lynch summed it up best in the promo package for Bayley's match against Asuka at NXT Takeover Dallas.

"She's a perfect role model for little girls, little boys, grown women, grown men. She eptimises the NXT women's division."

(Sidenote: in the context of last night, watching that promo to get that quote has made me well up - again, to use a term I'll overuse here, I'm not ashamed to admit that)

Maybe I - and most of this site - am not out of reach from Bayley's supposed demographic after all.

But last night means so much more than that, at least to me.

Last night was the first time in a week or two I had felt 'happy' so to speak. I've not been myself for a while and I've at times questioned my self-worth in regards to my work and what I do and whether it's all been worth it. It's not been a good time for me, to say the least. So for last night to give me that was much appreciated, even if it was unintentional.

It's worth noting too these emotional aspects of wrestling and how healthy they can be, at least most of the time. For example: Daniel Bryan's retirement speech. Needless to say, we were wrecks during that 15-20 minute speech. But there's a memory I have from the day after that speech. We all saw the crying woman in that crowd who was openly weeping during that speech.

The day after on Twitter, when I linked to the video of the full speech, an acquiescence spotted this and essentially subtweeted about how stupid it was for her to cry over something as (paraphrasing) 'fake as wrestling' soon after I tweeted the video out, me noting in said tweet you didn't have to be a wrestling fan to watch Bryan's speech.

Yes, we know this is a worked form of entertainment (what, you didn't know?). But, to quote Wrestling Isn't Wrestling, when wrestling is good, it's fucking great. That includes when it gives us those emotional beats to it too, whether it be Daniel Bryan's retirement and the sad, emotional but cathartic nature of it or finally seeing Bayley debut on the main roster in the most happiest and gleeful way possible.

Those moments are why, even if we end up frustrated at how a certain angle pans out for the worst or our favourite superstar isn't getting the push they deserve, we somehow stick around. Because the payoff will be incredible, as evidenced last night at Battleground.

So what next for the Boss and Hug Connection? As noted, this is a one-off for now in the interim with Bayley heading out to try and become a two-time NXT Women's Champion with a Takeover Brooklyn rematch against Asuka looking almost certain whilst Sasha looks set to become the number one contender to Charlotte's WWE Women's Championship at SummerSlam.

This is a one-off I am okay with in the interim. Patience was wearing a little thin to see her come up and this'll go some way in helping to relieve some of the pressure on it until Takeover and SummerSlam is done. Hopefully by then, we may end up seeing the Hugster make a full main roster debut on Raw the night after SummerSlam (on what would also be the one-year anniversary since Bayley and Sasha tore down the house at the Barclays Center).

But even as a one-off appearance, its already doing its part. As of writing this, out of any video posted on the WWE's YouTube channel last night from Battleground, the clip it chose for the channel from the tag match was third overall (behind the Shield Triple Threat and Randy Orton's RKO to Chris Jericho) and the second highest Fallout video, behind Dean Ambrose.

On a personal level, it's working too. A conversation had with a friend who hasn't watched wrestling since the early 2000s (this person's words to the point she thought Stone Cold Steve Austin was still going) earlier this afternoon that didn't start out about wrestling suddenly became about it and in turn loosely mentioning Bayley's debut to the point that 15-20 minutes later, my Twitter mentions feed ballooned to around 33 notifications. All about Battleground, Bayley and wrestling in general.

That's how much pulling power last night has had. And that's how invaluable Bayley can and will be to the main roster if the 'E book her right. Now, there is all the right reasons in the world to doubt such a thing - this is the WWE after all - but last night couldn't have gone more perfect for them. Speculation was rampant all week on who it could be. Chatter was on who we wanted to be all week. And such is the WWE that we wouldn't believe who we wanted it to be until Turn It Up was finally blaring out.

So, whether as a tag team or just being frenemies for life who bicker about whether they're best friends with Danilo or Shinsuke Nakamura, may Bayley and Sasha Banks bicker forever. May they fight forever. Because this is a win-win for WWE in terms of the potential they will bring and for the fans because of the joy they bring.

Because happiness is bliss right now. And we all got that sense of bliss last night.

Happiness is a hug away.

Johnny Cullen writes about games for a living and has written for the likes of Eurogamer, VG247 and Official PlayStation Magazine UK and also podcasts about games for My Favourite Game. You can follow him on Twitter - for mostly games hijinks but also WWE tweets (and be a bit obsessive over Bayley, The Last of Us, Metal Gear Solid 3 and Jonsi & Alex) - @JohnnyCullen.

The FanPosts are solely the subjective opinions of Cageside Seats readers and do not necessarily reflect the views of Cageside Seats editors or staff.