Check This Out...

7.06.2009

"Tag Me In!"

In advance I would like to thank fellow writer Christopher Casur for this idea. Tag team wrestling is something that I’ve been a fan of my entire life. I grew up watching teams like The Legion of Doom, Demolition, The Rockers, The Rock & Roll Express, The Fabulous Freebirds, The Hart Foundation, and The Brain Busters. Powerful teams that ran through many a enhancement talent. There were also teams that were good but rarely get talked about. Power & Glory, The Warlord and Barbarian, The Bushwhackers, The Killer Bees, and The Natural Disasters.

Now I’m sure that I have left tons of teams out. I half did this on purpose so you all can fill in any blanks. I don’t want this to be an article about how bad tag team wrestling is in the WWE. That would be like shooting fish in a barrel. I also cant talk about how good the tag teams in TNA are (since I don’t watch it). When I was covering ROH I saw that they had some very strong tag teams (American Wolves, Steen & Generico, King & Titus, The Briscoes) that made me miss tag teams even more. So what the hell happened? When did “tag team” become a dirty word?

Some people*cough HHH cough* once said that if you aren’t wrestling to become the world champion then you shouldn’t be in the business. Crap, I say! What is wrong with having someone that you can run with and win tag team gold? Nothing at all. Unless it’s a team that is slapped together. One of the biggest slapped together teams were the Mega Powers consisting of Macho Man and Hulk Hogan. Another was The Two Man Power Trip with HHH and Austin. Rated RKO with Edge and Randy Orton. These were cool. These were entertaining. And then you got some teams that stunk to high heaven. Cena and HBK. Matt Hardy and MVP. Edge and Jericho. Yeah.

I know that some of you like the team of Edge and Jericho. I don’t. This team is what is wrong with the treatment tag teams get in the WWE. You know what? Fuck it. I am gonna blame WWE for killing tag teams. They are what everyone follows in terms of style and once they started disrespecting the belts everyone followed suit. Edge and Jericho beat two of the only three teams in WWE. Read that again. Two of the three in the entire company! Legacy, The Colons, and Cryme Tyme. The last being a team that has never even won the belts in the years they have been with the company. Other teams that have been disbanded were The Hooligans, Miz & Morrison, and Jesse and Festus.

When these teams are broken up we all go with “The Rocker’s Rule.” Someone will be the HBK. Someone will be the Janetty. This means that someone will succeed and someone will fail. When Edge and Christian split we all assumed that Edge would be the most popular. While true, Christian had his own success as a solo competitor. With The Hardy’s we thought Matt had ‘future endeavour” written all over himself, but he ended up being very entertaining while Jeff floundered before finally hitting his stride. With Miz and Morrison I expected that once the team broke up that Morrison would blow up and Miz would vanish into obscurity. Not only did Miz participate at the last PPV in the semi-main, but Morrison, after beating the heavyweight champion CM Punk, he was left off the card altogether! What the hell is going on?!

Tag team wrestling isn’t dying because there are no more teams. Its dying because we are being trained to not give a damn about team work. Its dying because real teams that make attempts to be a real tag team are getting beating by a team that hadn’t tagged at any point until winning the belts. Damn it, what is going on? I never mentioned The Dudley’s in this entire article. It’s because while they are an okay team, I will never consider them great. They are good for putting younger teams over.

Who do you think is the best tag team in wrestling? Why are they the best? Me. I gotta go with Legion of Doom. In my tryout article I mentioned how they shoot scared me as a child. Plus, their finisher, The Doomsday Device, was deadly. Just ask a Godwinn.


10 comments: on ""Tag Me In!""

Steve said...

Fantastic article, Dante. Tag team wrestling is truly becoming a lost art form. It's a different beast from singles wrestling and, sadly, one that is on the endangered species list.

My favorite tag team ever? Blanchard and Anderson. Hands down.

Steve from Chicago, passing out drunk for the night...

Zyrone said...

The Steiner Brothers and Harlem Heat come to mind for me. I think the E killed off tag team wrestling for the same reason that Cena running around; crossover potential. Correct me if I'm wrong but a tag team has never been that popular before and I know the LOD was big but that was before the boom. I would love to see tag team wrestling come back but I would also like to see more comedy acts, legit cruiser weight action, and talented stars get brought up too. But right now those are all pipe dreams to most companies that is until the E gets some competition. Thank you for posting man.

richie said...

i would have to say The new age outlaws..i really enjoyed the chemistry they had in the ring, and they both are good workers. they are number 1 of my favorite tag teams

Dante said...

Thanks, Steve ("Sosayitnow!"). While I was never a HUGE fan of Blanchard, when he was with Arn he was good. Damn, Arn Anderson could team with a stick of gum and win the tag belts. He was that good. Get your drink on.

Zyrone has good taste in teams. The Steiner Brothers were one of the first set of guys that I saw that were suplexing people all over the ring. Their Summer Slam match against the Beverly Brothers had the most killer Frankensteiner I have ever seen. I wish Harlem Heat had stayed together longer. I liked the team but hated Booker T. Not because of his wrestling skills but because he was such a chickenshit heel.

Richie, The NAO were a team that on paper sounds like shit but for whatever reason they clicked hardcore. I still make create-a-wrestlers of them.

Anonymous said...

great article, i agree with zyrone, tag team wrestling, cruiser weight action and new stars are what are needed soo much at the minute, now were just seeing the likes of the colons get broken up after a shiity few months with no mic time and no one evens gives a fuck if they split or not. same old for most tags these days. shame

Unknown said...

There was a time in the E that tag-team wrestling wasn't considered a bad thing.
This was during the Attitude Era when you had E&C,Too Cool,Dudley Boys,Hardy Boyz,Radicalz,Holly's,Outlaws/DX,A.P.A. and maybe more.
Maybe the E did split some of these teams up because of lack of young/fresh superstars.
With these guys you could present them in such a way that they feel fresh again and with they aging/exodus of some of the older stars this was a step that they felt they needed to take.
The cruisers were better in the WCW even when they brought in the cruiserweight title.
I agree with Zyrone that it's time for TNA to step up and really challenge WWE.

Anonymous said...

well unlike back then where the teams can be established and get themselves over tag teams now are seen differently. when you see new tag teams everyone thinks which one is gonna be the breakout star, every where you look on the internet thats all that is talked about when new tag teams are made. damn you hbk

D.J.B. said...

Holy shit, great article, and you cited a source for the inspiration, that my friend is a foreign concept around here.

My favorite tag team...H.A.T.E Inc most likely, but other than them (I list them because they frighten me) I'd honestly have to say AMW. They just made it work, and made you believe it worked. Even with Harris' singles "push" back in the PPV days they just had it. Maybe not the best or my absolute favorite but of the tag teams since tag team's died they are definitely up there.

Best of all time though, damn you Dante, I'm on medication and you're making me think. Being the token southern guy though I'd be a bastard for not going with the FREEBIRDS.

Dante said...

I would've mentioned HATE Inc. but I didn't want to confuse everyone. They are the tag champs, though. Christian, I totally forgot about the APA. They were a dominant ass team. Yeah, about ten years ago there were so many tag teams to enjoy. I miss the shit out of that.

Anonymous said...

Tag Team wrestling will never recover, but thanks to TNA it's not going to die just quite yet. TNA has several decent team on the roster, but none of them will ever capture the magic of teams like the Road Warriors, Midnight Express, Harlem Heat, the Steiners, Killer Bees, or the Hart Foundation just to name a few.

Chris