Alabama's race was "Democrat or pedophile" and going into the race, _everybody thought Moore was going to win because a Democrat was considered more unelectable than a pedophile in Alamabama_. It's easy to say "Well the republican candidate was uniquely terrible, and that's why the Democrat won". But if Moore had won, nobody would have been surprised. Plenty of people would have been disappointed, sure, but nobody would have said "Well, I for sure thought Alabama would go for the D over the R in this case".

Yes, there's definitely some unusual factors that went into this race, and the Republican party made a lot of unforced errors that let the race be competitive. But the fact that it was even possible for it to be competitive seems like evidence of a wave to me, especially when you pair it with the recent Democratic wave in Virginia.

> Sessions won the seat in 2014 with 97.3% of the vote

Which sounds impressive, except that he was running unopposed (not just no Democratic opponent but no other candidates filed for the election at all) in both the primary and general election.

The fact that a Republican can run unopposed in a state-wide election of national importance is probably the best evidence it'll turn back to red at the earliest opportunity.

That a Republican incumbent could run opposed for a Senate seat that Democrats had written off based on decades of losses, in a midterm election (which is generally bad for the President's party) under a Democratic president is not a strong sign of how a Democratic incumbent will fare six years later in a Presidential election year.

Actually it's going 2018.

Session's former Alabama senate seat is up in 2020.

Doug Jones's seat is not up for re-election until the 2020 elections.