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Since Adam Pearce took over as booker, he’s greatly expanded the tag team roster and created a wider array of players at various levels and turned ROH’s tag team scene into a full on, multi-tiered division that is hard not to rate as more important (and often more focused on) than the singles division.
With that in mind, I’ve broken down the division into three groups: the Top Players, the Midcard Teams, and the Enhancement Teams, and right now I’m going to take a detailed look at all three tiers of the division.
The Top Players
At its highest level, the ROH tag team division revolves around three teams: Jay & Mark Briscoe, Kevin Steen & El Generico, and current champions the American Wolves. As I said earlier, the ROH tag team division has, more often than not, revolved around the Briscoes. In a lot of ways, they’re like the Bryan Danielson of the tag team division in that they’ve been there from the very beginning, the ROH fans consider them to be their own, and they have great matches every time out. They’ve been the ROH World Tag Team Champions five times, and have been every bit a legitimate and reliable main event act as anyone else in the company.
Unfortunately, injuries severely derailed them in much of 2008 and 2009. The first injury came when Mark Briscoe suffered torn ligaments in his wrist in Spring of 2008 right after they won their fifth ROH tag title, forcing them to vacate the title before even making one title defense. After several months recovering from surgery, Mark returned to the ring only to wind up needing more surgery due to knee issues, surgery which kept him out of ROH for all of 2009 up until about a month ago. Though Jay continued wrestling singles throughout both of Mark’s recovery periods, their absence from the tag division for most of the last year and a half left a huge hole in the division, one that other teams would have to fill.
One of those teams was Kevin Steen & El Generico, who used a terrific match with the Briscoes at the Fifth Year Festival to springboard themselves to a full time slot in ROH, then feuded extensively with the Briscoes throughout 2007. They came in as heels, but their strong work and unique charisma and chemistry with one another quickly made them fan favorites, and they were soon turned face mostly because they were so over that they couldn’t remain heels. Though they had won matches against the Briscoes in the past, they were never able to beat them in a title match, but with Mark’s injury keeping them out of the way, Steen & Generico were able to defeat Jimmy Jacobs & Tyler Black to finally win the title, after which they made two successful title defenses against the Briscoes before Mark’s knee surgery.
It was shortly after Steen & Generico’s title win that the third of ROH’s top teams came together when Davey Richards and Eddie Edwards joined up to form the American Wolves. Before the change in the booking regime, Davey had been slated to become a main eventer and maybe even ROH World Champion in 2009, but even as a tag team wrestler he’s managed to bring himself to as high or maybe even a higher level in the company than he would have been had he gone the solo route. Though the team suffered from stigmas of being thrown together, and of Edwards being the junior partner while Davey was the star of the team, they gelled great as a team and have a great persona that I compare to the Cobra Kai from the Karate Kid, where you have two tough guys who can kick anyone’s butt, and usually will just for fun.
ROH used an attack by the American Wolves on Mark’s knee as a storyline reason to write him out, and then attacks on Steen & Generico led to a feud with them as well. Steen & Generico won the first several matches until the Wolves finally defeated them for the title at an HDNet taping. Now between being the champions and all the attacks, everyone is gunning for the Wolves from the Briscoes and Steen & Generico on down. When Generico suffered a legit knee injury of his own in April, Steen and Jay Briscoe briefly joined forces as a team to battle the Wolves, but that didn’t last long and with Generico and Mark both now healthy and all three teams at full strength, we’re looking at a three way feud that should carry the division at least through the end of the year.
In case you can’t tell, I’m a huge fan of the way this whole angle has come together. I think Pearce has done a great job of taking what seemed to be a thrown together team and making them mean something, and making them out to be one step ahead of the two teams which had previously been seen as the stars of the division. At this point they’ve been a lot more relevant than the Briscoes for some time, and with the Wolves working big time matches against not only against Steen & Generico and the Briscoes, but other teams including Danielson & Black, Strong & KENTA as well as many other teams, it’s hard to argue that they haven’t taken the Briscoes’ spot as the top team in ROH.
I also like how they’ve masterfully woven together this three way feud with the Wolves getting into the heads of both teams by attacking them, and therefore putting Steen and Jay Briscoe in a position where they have to put their deep hatred of one another aside and work together to get revenge on the Wolves, only to have that partnership break down and put them back at odds with one another in addition to the Wolves, who are masterfully manipulating the whole situation.
With all three teams at full strength, you have enough combinations of tag and singles matches to keep this feud going at least until Final Battle and maybe even into 2010. I think we’re going to see everything lead to a three way match at Final Battle where the Wolves will finally drop the title and probably given a receipt for all the trouble they’ve caused all year. From there I think that with the Wolves out of the way, the Briscoes and Steen & Generico will turn their full attention back to each other and pick up their feud where it left off and they can maybe, finally, settle their grudge once and for all.
As for the Wolves, I don’t know if I see them lasting long after dropping the titles. I think ROH has gotten a lot more out of them than anyone expected them to, and it’s done a great job of elevating Eddie Edwards, but I don’t see how you can keep Davey tied up in a tag team for the long haul. Even with him in the team, he’s gotten more than his fair share of time in the spotlight as a single, including a MOTYC against KENTA at Supercard Of Honor IV and earning a shot at the ROH World Title in a gauntlet match. I’d be surprised if they didn’t go their separate ways once 2010 dawns.
The Midcard Teams
But once the American Wolves are out of the way and Briscoes vs Steen & Generico blows off for yet a third time, we’re going to need new challengers to step up into the title picture. Luckily, ROH has cultivated a group of teams that are just underneath the three main teams, but have been built well enough and connected with the fans in a way that any of them can step into the title picture at any time without it seeming contrived.
The Dark City Fight Club are perhaps the most imposing of these teams, thanks to their dominating series of wins on ROH On HDNet in which they usually manhandle their opponents in vicious fashion with a repertoire of power moves and a really awesome double team powerbomb finish. They have already had a brush with the upper echelon of the tag division, facing Steen & Generico and Steen & Jay Briscoe on recent events and also confronting the Wolves on HDNet. I think of any of the midcard teams, the DCFC would be the easiest to slide into the main event and seem like they’re on the same level as the other teams. In fact, I think that if you decided to insert them into the main event right now and make it a four way feud for the title, they’d be able to fit right in.
However, it is getting late enough in the year that it’d be difficult, storyline-wise, to involve them in the title picture before Final Battle. Instead, I think that they’ll be the first major challenger to the title once we get to 2010. I think they probably would have been featured a lot more prominently if Jon Davis hadn’t injured his wrist earlier in the year since they were obviously being pushed hard, but they’ve been kept in the spotlight by coming out and attacking teams on HDNet while Davis recovered. I can see them turning out similar to Steen & Generico in that the fans get so behind them that ROH has no choice but to turn them face, because fans love guys who just beat the tar out of people in visually gratifying fashion, and these guys definitely fit that bill.
Also hovering just below the main event level is the Young Bucks, Nick and Matt Jackson, a team that is very reminiscent of 80s teams like the Rockers, Rock N Roll Express, and Midnight Express in their speed, high flying repertoire, and perfectly synchronized double team moves. These guys are it. They’ve already made a huge splash in not only ROH, but also other promotions like Dragon Gate USA and Pro Wrestling Guerrilla this year, and they literally came out of nowhere to completely win the fans over almost from the moment they stepped in an ROH ring. I can absolutely see them get to a point where the fans are outright demanding that they be given the title.
The only problem I see with the Young Bucks is that they are so good that they could get signed away to a WWE or TNA deal before ROH can get all they can out of them. They remind me a lot of Matt Sydal, not only in their wrestling style, but also because they’re guys that everyone looks at and right away realizes that they’re something special. They’re also obviously leaving their options open by working for both ROH and DGUSA without showing tying themselves down with any particular promotion, just like Sydal did. If they stick around, I absolutely believe that they’re going to be a top level team down the line for ROH, but I give it at least 50-50 odds that they’ll be signed away before that can happen.
The final midcard team is Rhett Titus & Kenny King, and they’re a bit unique in that they both obviously have the skills to go in the ring (especially King), but they rely more on working the crowd and using old school heel tag team tactics for heat than what they do in the ring. That’s not to say they can’t go because they can, and I’ve seen a lot of their matches where it gets really hot toward the end with a lot of action and false finishes, but they don’t go all out every single night, which I think is good because it helps them become more well rounded performers than if the entirely relied on just workrate or just getting crowd heat.
I don’t know if I ever see them becoming a bonafide main event team, and if they do it’ll be like a New Age Outlaws type deal where you know they’re clearly a notch below the top teams but somehow they win the title and then use every cheap trick in the book to hold onto it. Like the Wolves, I think they’re a team that’s only going to last as long as it takes Pearce to decide to break King off and push him as a singles wrestler. As entertaining as Titus is, I don’t think there’s any question that King is the real talent of the team, and I think that their association with Austin Aries is eventually going to be the catalyst to turn King and give him a singles push.
The Enhancement Teams
And finally, the guys who are mainly there to make the other teams look good. One such team is Irish Airborne, who haven’t been around the last two or three months, but were used pretty frequently earlier in the year to put over everyone from the Briscoes down to Grizzly Redwood & Bushwhacker Luke. Irish Airborne was given a moderate push back in 2006 and were even given a win over the Briscoes, but they never really got over the way I think Gabe Sapolsky hoped, and were pretty much gone from ROH by the time 2007 rolled around. I think the exciting, young, high-flying team role is currently being filled by the Young Bucks and there’s really not much of a need for Irish Airborne right now outside of what they’re already doing when they do pop up. I don’t know if I’d have them doing jobs to Grizzly & Luke because I think that’s going a little too far into burial territory, but if they’re going to pop up whenever ROH swings through the Midwest, have a competitive match, lose, and then disappear until next time, that would probably be the best way to use them right now.
Along the same lines you have the Super Smash Bros, a team out of Canada that gets over with the crowd more than Irish Airborne, but are otherwise similar in that they’re a couple of smaller guys who have some nice high flying moves, but that’s about it. They did get a surprise win over Steen & Generico recently, and I have no idea what that’s about since I highly, highly doubt they’re ever going to be a top team in ROH. No matter how pretty their moves are or what kind of pop they get, one guy is really skinny, the other guy is tubby and wears a mask, and the goofy costumes all add up to a team that’s impossible to take seriously as anything other than prelim.
Finally, we have Cheech and Cloudy, two guys I never expected to see in Ring Of Honor ever again. After Special K and Lacey’s Angels went away in late 2005, everyone involved completely disappeared from ROH, and in some cases from the business entirely. Cheech & Cloudy spent the next three years kicking around the northeast indies before finally getting another shot in ROH, and I was at their return show and I was blown away at how much these two had improved. They’ve got great teamwork and a lot of innovative double team moves, and the fans genuinely like them. The problem is that they’re still two really small guys who might get a few nice moves in before getting completely annihilated by whoever they’re in the ring with. I think they’re probably ahead of any of the other enhancement teams just based on their ring work, charisma, and connection with the fans, and I was really happy to see them back and get an ongoing role in the company, even if it’s as a prelim team.
The Next Batch
Altogether, these nine teams form a solid, deep tag team division that’s far above and beyond anything ROH has ever had before. But eventually new teams are going to be needed, because whether teams split up to pursue singles careers or they just run their course, eventually the spots will open up and need to be filled. So what teams can be moved in to fill the void once that happens, probably sometime next year?
The Embassy is locked in a war with Colt Cabana and company right now, but once that feud is over and done with, I’d be surprised if some combination of Embassy members didn’t form a regular team and take a run at the title. If they want to bring in a great talent from the outside, they could bring in Scott Lost to team with his longtime partner Joey Ryan, as the two of them make a great team and I’d love to see Lost get a shot.
Also once the Team Cabana vs embassy feud runs its course, Brent Albright will be freed up to do something in the tag division, and I’d suggest putting he and his on again, off again partner Erick Stevens together as a regular team and give them a shot. They’re two guys I don’t see them doing anything important with on the singles side, so unless you’re going to involve them in yet another war between two factions, this may be the best way to get something out of these two next year.
I’d also like to see the YRR come in, because even though they’ve been occasionally featured in ROH, they’ve never really gotten a sustained run in the company. Longtime fans are at least somewhat familiar with them (or very familiar if they’ve been following the FIP DVD line as well), so once some spots open up it might be a good time to bring them in as a regular act. Kenny King has left the group, but as far as I know the rest of them are still together, and it would be cool to see them do something similar to the Freebird Rule that says that any two members can represent the group in a given match. If King does split off from Titus and go it alone, the YRR would be the perfect team to slide right into the slot of the midcard tag team who works the crowd and gets the heat, but can also get it done in the ring.
This one might be more of a pipe dream and I know I keep saying this over and over, but I’d really, really like to see a Kings Of Wrestling reunion. I see Hero on the rise as a singles star so he may soon move beyond the point where a team with Claudio would be feasible, but I really feel like they got screwed when Claudio was hired and then fired by WWE back at the end of 2006. They had the ROH, CZW, and CHIKARA tag titles and basically ruled the indy tag team scene, and then were forced to drop all three titles and were written apart in anticipation of Claudio’s departure that never happened. A great team was unnecessarily split up long before they had the chance to do everything they could do together. I think it’s a real shame and I think they deserve one more chance at a run together.
You also have the possibility of bringing in teams from ROH’s past, if not for a sustained run, then at least for a nostalgia pop and a fun match. The two teams that spring immediately to mind are the Carnage Crew and Dunn & Marcos. I gather that both teams have pretty much moved on with their lives and probably wouldn’t be interested in coming back full time, but for a one off shot whenever ROH swings through their neck of the woods, I think it would be a nice surprise to see them come out for an impromptu title shot or something.
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So there you have it. As I said earlier, ROH has done a phenomenal job of putting together a stellar tag team division, and with the depth of the tag team roster, I can see the division staying at that level for quite some time to come. Say what you will about Adam Pearce’s booking being too southern in nature, but one thing that was always very important to southern wrestling was tag teams, and the way I see it, that has carried its way through Pearce’s booking into today’s Ring Of Honor.
Stu Carapola can be reached at stupwinsider@yahoo.com.
