The SmackDown Live tag division has simmered down to a two-horse race between current champions the Usos and their now bitter rivals the New Day.
But it wasn’t always this way. When Heath Slater and Rhyno were crowned the brand’s new inaugural champions on September 11th, 2016, the eight team tournament that preceded their coronation displayed a relative wealth of talent that served to bode well for the future.
As well as the winners, the rest of the knockout brackets were filled by American Alpha, Breezango, The Usos, Ascension, Hype Bros, Vaudevillains and, oddly enough, Attitude Era throwbacks the Headbangers. Mosh and Thrasher proved that parodies of 90s alternative rock crowd culture could still draw 20 years later. Who woulda thunk it?
Of that octagon of aggressors, only one team viably remains on SmackDown: the Usos.
Heath Slater and Rhyno were bundled off to RAW, while American Alpha were split well before their time to service the immediately abortive illegitimate son fiasco involving Kurt Angle and Jason Jordan. The latter’s abandoned erstwhile team mate may have found a new partner in the shape of the returning Shelton Benjamin, but Alpha started hot after their promotion from NXT.
After an early title reign – picking up the belts from Randy Orton and Luke Harper – their Steiner Brothers-esque pace, power and agility offered interesting and exciting long-term prospects, and yet, well, you know the rest.
Picking apart this highly lauded and vaunted duo to lumber one of them with the stupidest of kayfabe millstones will no doubt prove to be a costly mistake.
Breezango found themselves more over than ever before by virtue of their actions outside of the ring rather than in it, thanks to the Fashion Files. Their sometimes guests, the Ascension, were once a force to be reckoned with on NXT. Their stock had long since diminished anyway, being relegated to afterthoughts and jobbers to the stars. Nowadays they’re as threatening as cotton, unless you’re allergic to cotton. They would probably be terrifying then.
They never did recover from getting whipped around by the nWo, DX and the APA, did they?
As for the rest, Hype Bros and Vaudevillains are no more, while the Headbangers probably await a minor inclusion in the Hall of Fame for being such good sports.
Nearly a year on, and with just two teams of note contesting for the belts (and who have come to the end of a long feud) it begs the question: how do you solve a problem like the SmackDown Live tag division?
Granted, it’s not often you’ll find a wrestling article paraphrasing the nuns from the Sound of Music, but here we are. That’s what things have come to. Told you it was bad.
As good as the Usos and the New Day have been together, somehow contriving to make an in-ring battle rap enjoyable as well as a number of incredible matches not given enough due by WWE, they risk sliding into Fight Forever Mode if they aren’t given enough contemporaries to play with.
Really, the only solution to the blue brand’s tag division stagnating into oblivion is to bring in some fresh blood. Since WWE have taken an expectedly quick soft stance on the rules and regulations of the brand split – John Cena on RAW, Enzo Amore turning up on 205 Live – it seems some emergency roster surgery might be just the ticket. Pass the scalpel, nurse!
The first port of call for any fresh impetus should be newly dethroned NXT tag champions, Authors Of Pain. Fresh off losing their straps to Sanity at NXT Takeover Brooklyn over SummerSlam weekend, the Authors back up their talk and physiques with displays of real strength and dominance.
After all, their reign in NXT came to a crashing end. The only way should be up for this rather large pairing. Having them run into the ring to destroy the crowing Usos would ignite the spark for a very serious and destructive feud.
After all, the Usos would have no trouble going toe-to-toe with the Authors of Pain. Their acrobatics belie their strength and willingness to take it that bit further. Witness their double powerbomb on the outside to Kofi Kingston during their match at Battleground. It’s what has made them such an attractive proposition in the first instance, and marks just how far they’ve come since their days as bland faces who substituted character for colourful clothing and facepaint.
Similarly, it might be time to finally rescue Gallows and Anderson from their weird, useless exile on RAW. The pair have struggled since the brand split, remaining as afterthoughts when their presence and history offer more than their current status affords.
Even a brief reign with the RAW Tag Team Championships didn’t help and they’ve incurred enough losses on Monday nights to render them ineffective and unable to convey the intimidation they should as veterans of wrestling across the world.
A move to SmackDown might revitalise the ailing team, particularly if it came to a brutal feud with the Usos.
The sticking point with both Authors of Pain and Anderson and Gallows is that both teams are natural heels. They may get cheers, but their needles are very firmly planted in the section marked ‘BAD GUYS’ and a creatively conservative WWE may struggle with slapping together two heels teams in a feud.
That leaves us with one wildcard pick: the Hardys. Sure, they look as if they’re slipping into a programme with Dean Ambrose and Seth Rollins, but do the latter pair really need the rub, especially when there seems to be plenty of fuel in the tank of their back and forth with Sheamus and Cesaro.
The Usos, however, could really use the rub. Taking on and beating Matt and Jeff Hardy would lend even more credence to their dominance of the tag division and may give us some explosive matches along the way.
Besides, there’s only so many more times we can see them paired up with the New Day. It’s time for WWE to take advantage of their own loose rules and revitalise a section of one of their leading brands that less than 12 months ago looked like it could be a jewel in their crown.
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