The Piledriver Report 12.06.06: The Rebirth of the WWE Tag Team Division?

Last Monday night, the WWE made me feel something that I never thought I would never experience again. When they announced a match between the Hardy Boys against the reuniting MNM, I let out an excited yell. That’s right, the WWE actually made me pop at the announcement of a tag team match. Never in my wildest wrestling dreams did I ever think that the WWE would provide the fans something exciting to look forward to in the tag team division.

The WWE has been extremely careful in letting the fans know that “for one night only” MNM would face the Hardys at the ECW pay per view. I know that the WWE isn’t the place to be for real tag team wrestling. If you long for the days where you can watch two men form a cohesive unit, then you need to watch TNA. There, you will find the Dudleys, America’s Most Wanted, LAX, the Naturals, and the former New Age Outlaws. In the WWE, you have Charlie Haas teaming with Viscera, Trevor Murdoch partnering with Lance Cade, Ric Flair and Roddy Piper joining forces, and singles stars Edge and Randy Orton holding gold belts.

The WWE has a chance to finally make it right. While watching a shoot interview recently of the Dudleys, they talked about the tag team scene in the WWF when they arrived after a successful stint in ECW. The Dudleys mentioned that even then the WWF wasn’t into pushing their tag team division. However, the WWF lucked into the Dudleys, the Hardys, and the team of Edge and Christian all arriving on the scene at the same time. The days of the TLC classics between those six men is now nothing more then a memory.

For the second time this decade, if the WWE plays things correctly, they could be in the middle of another tag team renaissance. The WWE has six of the best tag team performers under contract at this moment. They have Jeff Hardy and Matt Hardy. While Matt Hardy has been getting nice cheers by the crowd, the WWE continues to keep him on the backburner. Unlike Matt, his brother Jeff has been getting a nice push since his return. He has been receiving a lot of cheers as well. However, one thing has become extremely obvious in the last two weeks. As a unit, the Hardy Boys have been getting electric pops from the crowd, as compared to them as separate solo acts. Where the WWE doesn’t believe tag teams can draw money, an extended tag team run by the Hardys will sell a lot of merchandise. Merchandise sales equals cash. If you don’t believe that, ask Shawn Michaels and Triple H how their royalty checks are doing thanks to all of the DX merchandise that has been flying off of the shelves.

The other tag team in this revamped division should be MNM. Joey Mercury and Johnny Nitro never should have been broken up in the first place. Nitro has had a successful run lately as a singles star, and Intercontinental Champion. However, the WWE thinks he isn’t ready for the main event scene yet. Mercury just got back from a stint in rehab. The WWE obviously doesn’t have any plans for him. As a matter of fact, when the WWE was bringing up the tag team of MNM from Ohio Valley Wrestling, they originally wanted to replace Mercury with another developmental wrestler. Since there are no big plans for Mercury at the moment, and Nitro is stuck in Intercontinental limbo, why not put them back together as a full-time team? Instead of a one-time match pitting one of the greatest teams from the TLC era against one of the greatest WWE teams of the post-InVasion era, give us a feud with long matches between these two units.

Since two teams does not a resurgence make, the WWE needs to throw another legit tag team in the mix. The team that should be inserted into the third slot should be the greatest tag team of all. Some may even call them the World’s Greatest Tag Team. That’s right, reunite Shelton Benjamin and Charlie Haas! When the two teamed together, they were as over as any tag team in the industry. Not only were they over like teams of the past, such as the Midnight Express, Hart Foundation, the British Bulldogs, and the Rock-n-Roll Express. Their in-ring work could match all of them. What’s to stop the WWE from having a Benjamin-Haas reunion? Both men have been mired in the WWE’s undercard. While Benjamin has main event talent written all over him, the WWE refuses to put him in that role because they don’t like the way he reads a script. Charlie Haas has been doing absolutely nothing since his return except hanging with Viscera. The fans would love to see a reunion between the two wrestlers. A second stint for the World’s Greatest Tag Team may be exactly what these two wrestlers need to reinvigorate their careers.

Imagine the matches between the three teams. The Hardys vs. MNM. MNM vs. The World’s Greatest Tag Team. The World’s Greatest Tag Team vs. The Hardys. The WWE can also bring back the TLC match for this new rivalry. With Jeff Hardy, Matt Hardy, and Shelton Benjamin all excelling in this type of match, these three teams could create TLC matches that would easily compete against the Edge/Christian vs. Hardys vs. Dudleys Tables, Ladders, and Chairs matches of the early part of the decade.

The WWE can even throw a fourth and fifth team into the mix. Those two teams are the current WWE and World Tag Team Champions, Edge/Randy Orton and Paul London/Brian Kendrick. Unless Edge is being groomed for another WWE World singles title run and eventual main event match at WrestleMania against Triple H, then they should keep him and Orton as a team. They both have the cockiness and championship pedigree of heel tag teams of the past like Tully Blanchard and Arn Anderson. There is no reason to drop them into the mid-cards once they are done feuding with DX. Keep them as a tag team to war against the Hardys/MNM/World’s Greatest Tag Team. If you want to revamp the tag team scene as being a main player on the WWE’s shows, let Edge and Orton provide some main event talent to the division. They already have a cool team name in Rated RKO. Let them run with it to see how far they can go.

Paul London and Brian Kendrick can be the greatest benefactors of this revamped division. Has there ever been a tag team champion that people didn’t even realize held the belts? That’s London and Kendrick. I actually had to look up who the tag champions were for SmackDown! on wwe.com. I was surprised to realize that London and Kendrick were still the tag team champions on the WWE’s “B” show. While not being household names, London and Kendrick have one thing going for them. They are tremendous in-ring workers. Imagine the kind of high flying spot fest that the fans could witness when London and Kendrick match up against the Hardys. Before Matt and Jeff Hardy teamed up against Edge and Christian, the Hardys were just a mid-level, Sunday Night Heat kind of tag team. Their feud against the two future World single’s champions made both teams superstars. A feud against the Hardys could be exactly would London and Kendrick need to move up to the same level.

When I started writing this article last week, I anticipated the Hardys/MNM contest at December to Dismember would be the highlight of WWECW’s first pay per view since the “rebirth.” I must say, I was not disappointed. While the card did not contain much competition for the title of Best Match on the Card, the Hardys and MNM delivered non-stop action for over 22 minutes. Both teams battled back and forth until the Hardys pulled out the victory. If there was any complaints regarding the match, I feel they should have gone for more pin attempts throughout the match. I remember watching the Randy Savage/Ricky Steamboat contest during WrestleMania III. It was a classic match between two of the best workers in their primes. One of the major points that turned the Steamboat-Savage match from a very good match, and turned it into a wrestling classic, is because there were a ton of near falls in the match. If the Hardys/MNM match had as many close calls, we may be talking about the first tag team classic in a WWE ring in the last several years.

One thing that distracted me during their match was the thought the MNM as a team was just for “one night only.” To me, it showed the WWE’s total lack of any type of commitment to having a competitive tag team division. On Monday Night RAW, it appeared that the WWE may have had a change of heart. First, they announced that the main event for the evening would be DeGeneration X teaming with the Hardy Boys against the WWE Tag Team Champions Edge and Randy Orton along with MNM. It appears that the WWE has decided, at least for the moment, to allow MNM to fight yet another day. Not only that, but it appears that the WWE is teasing a reunion of the World’s Greatest Tag Team. After Shelton Benjamin’s match against Super Crazy, Charlie Haas ran into the ring, started to trash talk a fallen Super Crazy, and started to celebrate with a very confused Shelton Benjamin.

Will the WWE actually start to push the tag team division is anyone’s guess. For all the fan’s know, a reunion of MNM and the World’s Greatest Team could have just been a one night tease. If the WWE does put these units together, the next question that needs to be asked is will the new tag team division be just a half-hearted attempt by the WWE to make the fans happy, like they did with cruiserweight division? Maybe the WWE are just putting these teams back together because DX already killed the existing teams that the WWE had on RAW? Therefore, DX needs new fodder. Who knows what the real reason is for the Hardys, MNM, and possibly the World’s Greatest Tag Tea being brought back together? As long as we get to see great matches, then I really don’t care why Vince decided to do it. Can this (hopefully) revamped division bring back memories of the mid-eighties or the Dudleys/Hardys/Edge and Christian wars from the Attitude Era? I don’t know, but I’ll enjoy watching the matches in order to find out.