During a recent interview with Sports Illustrated, Bayley commented on which WWE and NXT talents have stood out to her this year, and more. You can check out some highlights from the interview below:
On the cancellation of GLOW: “I loved that show. I binge-watched, and I honestly never expected it to be as intriguing as it was. I fell into the story lines, and you couldn’t help but fall in love with the characters. Awesome Kong being in there was so cool. I was just obsessed with it. I’m so disappointed that we can’t see how it all turns out. They showed that, in wrestling, we’re a little bit of everything.”
On her proudest accomplishment over the past year: “I don’t know if I could pick out just one thing. This whole pandemic era, Performance Center era, doing shows in front of no one, wrestling in front of no one, we did promos in front of no one. I think that showed a lot. That showed how well we come together as a team at WWE. For me, it was a blessing in disguise. I started realizing I could use this to my benefit by focusing on myself. That’s the first time in my career I was able to really grow and find out a lot about myself for the better. I’d held myself back too long trying to be a people-pleaser and a fan-pleaser, so I’m grateful for the chance to show the world, this company, the fans, and Sasha Banks that I was capable of this all along. Now it’s finally showing through, where I’m about to come up on a 365-day championship reign. I’m putting in the work every single week. I’m very proud of this.”
On what fans don’t know about being a champion: “It’s the work that goes into it. Right now, I’m doing this interview while eating a Caesar salad on my layover. Fulfilling obligations is a big part of it. Being champion during a pandemic has taken a while to get used to because, for a long time, I wasn’t reading comments on social media. The fan base there can be very different from the fans watching at home or the fans in the crowd. But that’s the only interaction we have now, so I’ve been on my phone figuring out what the fans are into and what they’re enjoying, just so I can go forward. Whatever they want to see, that’s what I’m not going to do. That’s been working for me.”
On which talents from WWE or NXT that has stood out to her in the past six months: “Shotzi [Blackheart] has really stood out to me. She’s someone I knew from the Bay Area. She trained in the same area as I did, but I never really wrestled her until that NXT match. Her performance in that gauntlet match, and now she’s hosting “Halloween Havoc,” and she has her own tank. NXT as a whole has stepped up. And as much as it pains me to say this, the person that’s really stepped up is Asuka. I already had a lot of respect for her, but it’s only grown over the past few months. There is a reason why she is where she is and why she’s been doing it for so long. So besides Sasha and I for carrying the shows, I’d say it’s been Asuka.”
