What on earth has happened to tag wrestling?

[tiger_rick]

Nearly started this before but thinking about potential dream matches just reminded me what an absolute shit-show tag wrestling is these days.

AEW had a great tag division for a long while but absolutely shit the bed with introducing the trios titles (two sets of the bleeding things too) and cooling off 90% of their tag teams and the whole division is currently completely ice cold. Any teams who are fun to watch are generally very low-card teams who exist on C shows. The main acts - Bucks, FTR, Acclaimed, Lucha Brothers, GYV, etc are all as cooled off as they've ever been. They actually put over that Private Party were on a PPV for the first time in 5 years. If that wasn't a massive neon sign that they're deep in the reeds, I dunno what is. 

I was in favour of the trios belts, in all honesty. AEW had plenty of natural 3-man factions or alliances and it should have been something they could have done easily without getting a single  other established tag team involved with, apart from the Bucks, who were clearly the choice for inaugural champs. The idea was far better than the execution though and it's just really watered down their traditional tag division and matches.

That tag division needs quite a few new teams who run through the old teams and they disappear. Luchas should have been the first one given they're off. Turn The Acclaimed and try something grittier with them. Get the Bucks out of the way for a bit with some faction war. Stick FTR in the singles again to distract them. Write of GYV already. Get some new teams, book them consistently and patiently and don't let them get out of their lane. 

It doesn't seem any better over in the E. According to Wiki, since Sami & KO won the belts at mania, almost every champ has been two of a faction or a makeshift duo. The only "real" tag teams I noticed on the lists were DIY, two guys who have never been close to over in mainstream WWE, and "Awesome Truth", a concept from 13 years ago. Off the top of my head, the Street Profits are the only other current tag team I could name in WWE. Is the division really that shallow?

I'd have thought Triple H was the sort of guy who'd want to build a proper tag division. NXT had a few good teams at one point and presented the belts pretty well. I'd have bet good money on him making that a bit of a mission - especially when TK was busy ruining his.

There's still enjoyable tag matches on telly but it's almost always 6/8/10 man tags that fill TV time. It's hard to recall the last tag match between two proper teams that sounded remotely appealing. 

What on earth is happening?

Edited 12 hours ago by tiger_rick

[BomberPat]

I don't think you can blame the Trios belts for watering down the Tag belts, because the Trios titles are even more of an afterthought. There have been a run of three or four man groups in AEW who haven't had a sniff of either set of titles - if they're going to insist on keeping Chris Jericho on TV, I'd have put the Trios belts on The Learning Tree back when they were feuding with Hook, Samoa Joe and Katsuyori Shibata, and that could have neatly transitioned them into their most recent programme against The Conglomeration. As it stands, none of those teams have even suggested any interest in the Trios title. Undisputed Kingdom have never challenged for them, no configuration of the Don Callis Family have challenged for them.

If it were up to me, I'd put the Trios belts on three luchadores, and formally change it to a Lucha rules belt, where leaving the ring counts as a tag, so it's just constant fast-paced free-flowing chaos. It makes those belts distinct from the tag belts, gives purpose to the kind of multi-man feel-good matches AEW are already running anyway, and it's something no other major American promotion has done.


I think the tag titles in AEW have dropped off for the same reason a lot of stuff in AEW has dropped off, just a lack of focus. They have the talent, but they're far from the early days of talking up how a Tag Title match could main event a PPV just as readily as a singles match. I also think they've focused too much on teams who the Young Bucks can work well with, or are Young Bucks-lite. FTR's "old school" gimmick is largely just decoration, they wrestle the same kind of tag match as the Bucks, just with a different kind of spot. If the Trios division was better centred on the kind of constant movement that the Bucks bring to the table, that would create an opening for a big Road Warriors-style team to just plow through and dominate the tag division for a few months, and I think they would really benefit from that kind of stylistic change.

In WWE, I think Triple H largely still has the Vince mindset that tag teams are best served as a prop to get one guy over, or to further singles programmes, and that a tag team is just hiring two guys for one spot when you could be paying one guy half as much. 

More broadly, very few people start out in wrestling wanting to be a tag team wrestler, not enough schools teach tag team wrestling well, and there aren't enough wrestlers that are content to work as a tag team for the bulk of their career (and that's a self-fulfilling prophecy - tag teams don't make the big money, so wrestlers don't want to be in tag teams, so tag teams never get good enough to warrant the big money). 

[SaitoRyo]

Put the straps on The Outrunners. 

[The King of Old School]

Think part of the problem in WWE was splitting the belts up again, don't think that was at all necessary.

One set of tag champs floating between brands was perfect and you ended up with big matches because of it, even got defended on PPV a few times in the "5 match era", and they also headlined a Wrestlemania, who would have thought a tag team title match would ever do that? 

There just isn't enough depth to have two lots of tag champs in WWE.

[d-d-d-dAz]

Great thread.

I think for me a big issue over time has been that major companies stopped putting effort into booking pure 'tag teams'. There were individuals who had tag teams as marriages of convenience, or there were factions of which two people made up a tag team. But over time, less and less effort has been put into establishing why a certain team is a team, why they know each other so well, why they're a solid unit and why they're more dangerous as a pair.

So you end up with tag teams that often feel thrown together, and in the WWE especially they're subordinated to the singles stars - at times, losing handicap matches to singles wrestlers or having to hand over the titles as if they're a prop in the main event feud - and it all just feels pointless investing time in.

It's a real shame as I adore tag team wrestling, but it doesn't feel like it's been done well for a prolonged period of time in the US for ages.

[Your Fight Site]

21 minutes ago, The King of Old School said:

Think part of the problem in WWE was splitting the belts up again, don't think that was at all necessary.

One set of tag champs floating between brands was perfect and you ended up with big matches because of it, even got defended on PPV a few times in the "5 match era", and they also headlined a Wrestlemania, who would have thought a tag team title match would ever do that? 

There just isn't enough depth to have two lots of tag champs in WWE.

On that note, can someone explain to me what the deal is with WWE’s top tier titles? It seems there’s three of them?

• WWE Championship
• World Heavyweight Championship
• Universal Championship

Is the modern-day “Undisputed Championship” just a combination of the WWE and Universal Championships? Even though Gunther holds a world title? Why on earth does a single company need three world champions?

[JNLister]

6 minutes ago, Your Fight Site said:

On that note, can someone explain to me what the deal is with WWE’s top tier titles? It seems there’s three of them?

• WWE Championship
• World Heavyweight Championship
• Universal Championship

Is the modern-day “Undisputed Championship” just a combination of the WWE and Universal Championships? Even though Gunther holds a world title? Why on earth does a single company need three world champions?

It's just a cycle of "let's unify the belts to make Roman strong"/"we need a new belt for Seth".

Officially right now, the WWE Championship and the Universal Championship are separate titles defended and held together as the Undisputed Championship with a single belt.

[JNLister]

1 hour ago, tiger_rick said:

Nearly started this before but thinking about potential dream matches just reminded me what an absolute shit-show tag wrestling is these days.

...

There's still enjoyable tag matches on telly but it's almost always 6/8/10 man tags that fill TV time. It's hard to recall the last tag match between two proper teams that sounded remotely appealing. 

What on earth is happening?

I refer the honourable gentleman to my previous answer:

 

[Carbomb]

I remember discussing this with @HarmonicGenerator back when he was doing his "Summerslam Match A Day" thread.

For a long time, I felt that the best and most essential form of wrestling match was the classic one-on-one, no gimmicks. I'm still not far off that, but I was brought very close to Cornette's point of view, that actually it's the classic tag match, because it turns up all the best elements of wrestling storytelling to their highest notch, by the D-Generation X vs. Legacy match at Summerslam 2009. I know their later submission and HIAC matches were more highly lauded, but I absolutely love this particular match to this day, because it has everything I want from wrestling, and the level of skill on display in terms of pacing, selling, athleticism, etc. is astounding.

[Supremo]

The saviours of the Tag Division were right there. Modern day Road Warriors. Never forget what Chris Jericho took away from us.

[FLips]

My main issue with tag teams currently is they have too many singles matches and/or are made up of singles guys. When I invest in a tag team I don't want to see just FTR Bald in a singles match, or just Nick Jackson, or just Otis or Luke Gallows. I want to see the team be almost exclusively a team.
It's the same way I never wanted to see D-Von Dudley or Hawk or Doug Basham singles matches.

There are no tag divisions anymore, just tag teams that bleed over from the singles division. Give me one set of belts, maybe two at a push for "roster split" convenience and just let me see solidified teams fight for those belts. Right now I couldn't tell you who the tag champs are in either company with confidence. My guess would be The Young Bucks, A-Town Down and DIY? I have no single clue about any of the trios ones, they need scrapping.

[Devon Malcolm]

The Young Bucks.

[JLM]

I really really miss when a tag title match between two full time teams could main event an AEW show. I love a traditional tag team match so much. It's like easy mode in-ring storytelling, any audience can follow it and you can do so much with the format. I was really hoping when they did the Tag Casino gauntlet that they'd get behind one of their full time teams and put them up against the Bucks, and instead they did the thing I hate the most and had a super team up of two singles guys win it. One of the worst things you can do to a tag division. 

Could not agree more with @BomberPat suggesting that the trios division needs to be set apart and have a different rule set. We even have the perfect candidates in the new incarnation of LFI. Mortos and RUSH unshackled in wild multiman scrambles would be bloody brilliant.

But yeah, the main issue with the tag division itself is that it's just not getting focus at the moment. The titles have been sat with The Bucks, melted into the EVP/Elite saga and both the titles and division have  been kept on hold. It's frustrating because AEW *does* still have a bunch of dedicated tag teams. FTR, Bucks, The Gunns (criminally under-utilised right now, they're SO GOOD!), GYV, Outrunners, MXM Collection, Private Party, The Acclaimed, The Righteous, Gates of Agony, Top Flight, The Kingdom. I'm aware some of them are cold/way down the pecking order, but some of them have also been very hot in the past and could easily be heated up again. Others on that list could still at least be decent foils for the hot teams. The Righteous and Gates of Agony are both great heel obstacle teams you could use if you wanted to actually get behind The Outrunners. 

I dunno, the tag division and titles are just not on Khan's list of favourite toys right now and it makes me sad. I wish I had better insight or analysis than that. 

 

[ReturnOfTheMack]

1 hour ago, FLips said:

It's the same way I never wanted to see D-Von Dudley or Hawk or Doug Basham singles matches.

 

I never wanted to see a Doug Basham tag match either.

[Lion_of_the_Midlands]

4 hours ago, ReturnOfTheMack said:

I never wanted to see a Doug Basham tag match either.

I took my nephews to a Smackdown house show at Sheffield Arena in 2004. We were sat in the back row and could see over the top of the curtain into a tiny bit of the backstage area. We were treated to The Basham Brothers v Bob Holly and Billy Gunn amongst other things. The finish looked absolutely shite and there was a clear fuck up by Bob Holly. None of them left the ring happy and from our vantage point we could see a backstage altercation between the 4 of them that ended when Doug Basham smacked Billy across the face and gestured that he should fuck off, which he did. I couldn't tell you what happened after that as we were been treated to Nidia v Jamie Noble in a match where Jamie was blindfolded.

So I won't hear a word against Doug Basham.