Flooding the tag division

[Heartbreak_Kid_707]

Not long ago wwe's tag division was non existant. With Basically the same 4 teams battling every ppv and every week with The Usos, Los Matadores, New Day, and Lucia Dragons. Now as of late wwe has been signing a lot of talent plus a lot of NXT callups. And I think their flooding their tag division with too many teams. I love the tag division, but they have quite a few right now. A few not been on TV recently but still a tag team. A lot of good ones, and a few just hanging on. But you have New Day, League of Nations, Lucha Dragons, Usos, Social Outcasts, Golden Truth, Dudley's Boys, The Ascension, Enzo and Cass, The Vaudevillians, Team Puerto Rico (coming soon), Karl Anderson/Luke Gallows, and Prime Time Players that I can think of. And an NXT roster with some ready to come up like Blake/Murphy, The Revival, and American Alpha. That's 13 on the main roster and 4-5 on nxt that's ready.

So, when is too many?

 

[Wrestlingaholic]

Well, it's a division. A division is pointless if it has too few participants. Like you say, the same three or four teams on rotation was hardly ideal.

Cast your mind back to what many people believe we're the golden days of tag team wrestling in WWE, the late 1980s. In the first two Survivor Series ppvs, both events had really good 10-TEAM tag matches - twenty wrestlers, ten on each side. The 1988 version is STILL one of my favourite elimination matches of all time.

Even when TLC rejuvenated the division at the turn of the Millenium, there were several teams vying for the gold: Edge & Christian, the Dudleys, the Hardys, Too Cool, the Acolytes, the New Age Outlaws, the Holly Cousins, Lo Down, Head Cheese, Bossman & Bull Buchanan - and that doesn't include ensemble groups like the Radicals or later Right to Censor.

More teams potentially leads to better storyline development as writers have to find time to put more of them on tv. It also potentially gives certain stagnant singles wrestlers a new lease of life (Golden Truth, the ensemble Social Outcasts) - people often complain when WWE throw together two randoms to make a team but the fact is one of the most popular teams in history were the New Age Outlaws, and before they teamed up they were basically having a six month feud on ppv pre-shows, they were doing nothing.

If this 'flooding', as you call it, leads to another Renaissance of the tag team division then I am all for it. Obviously the onus is on the writers, but even having this number one contenders tournament is a positive step, all 8 are 'legit' teams, and it's not even every team!

The two greatest periods of WWE were noticeable for one thing in particular: the vast majority of the roster was treated as relevant by the writers/bookers. This is something that has been missing in recent years, but with the rapid rise of the NXT tag division obviously someone upstairs has noticed that there is a market, and, much like the new improved women's division, increasing the number and viability of the tag division can only be a good thing in the long run

 

[Navi]

Not long ago wwe's tag division was non existant. With Basically the same 4 teams battling every ppv and every week with The Usos, Los Matadores, New Day, and Lucia Dragons. Now as of late wwe has been signing a lot of talent plus a lot of NXT callups. And I think their flooding their tag division with too many teams. I love the tag division, but they have quite a few right now. A few not been on TV recently but still a tag team. A lot of good ones, and a few just hanging on. But you have New Day, League of Nations, Lucha Dragons, Usos, Social Outcasts, Golden Truth, Dudley's Boys, The Ascension, Enzo and Cass, The Vaudevillians, Team Puerto Rico (coming soon), Karl Anderson/Luke Gallows, and Prime Time Players that I can think of. And an NXT roster with some ready to come up like Blake/Murphy, The Revival, and American Alpha. That's 13 on the main roster and 4-5 on nxt that's ready.

So, when is too many?

'A tag division needs teams and no they won't be on TV each week maybe, but there is 7 hours of TV to be filled and no reason why tag teams can't take some of the burden.

You have New Day (champs), Uso's are stale, Lucha Dragons will most likely seperate or Kalisto will drop the US title. Are Golden Truth a team yet? And Team Puerto Rico are just a repackaging of Los Matadores. So that's not a new team, just an old one given a face lift. I think the Dudley's will just hang around long enough to put Enzo and Cass over, PTP haven't been together as a team in months.

I'm not even thinking about the Ascension, they went no where, and the Vaudevillians just debuted so give them a chance. I also wouldn't call the LON and Social Outcasts tag teams, they are more like factions. You wouldn't call the Wyatt's a tag team and they have the same amount of wrestlers.

Maybe part of the reason we are seeing so many new ones is because you can't have your main eventers like Reigns and Ambrose teaming up all the time to fill that hole. It seems that now that they've taken care of the Women's division they've turned their attention to the tag team division.

With regards to Blake/Murphy, I haven't seen them in awhile, and the Revival still have a rematch with American Alpha in NXT, so they might be down there for a little while longer.

Also with the new addition of the Bullet Club, they will probably end up a faction as well, with either Styles or Balor. Strange that someone would say they love the tag division, and then complain that there are too many teams, where there was hardly any before. You should be glad they even care about it.

 

[TB77]

Flooding the division is exactly what they needed to do. It was getting very stale with only 5 or so teams constantly wrestling each other. With the latest editions I count about 13 teams New Day,Usos,Dudleys,LON,Social Outcasts,Ascention,Lucha Dragons,Wyatts,GoldenTruth,Colons,Enzo/Cass,Vaudvillians,& Bullet Club. This opens up so many possible feuds. Just like in the late 80's you know have upper card teams mid card teams and lower card teams. Which is important because if everyone is on the same level then nobody stands out. By having so many teams it helps to keep teams like Usos and Dudleys busy with other rivals and not always in the title picture. Which will allow New Day some fresh feuds. With the lower card teams around it helps build up the mid card teams and eventually getting them into title contention.
Finally the WWE has a tag division worth watching and I for one am excited to see how it all works out.

 

[Kizzani]

This is crazy classic for wrestling fans, yet they still wonder why the product is so bad. Nothing is enough. When the divison was so bad and low people clammered for more, so it is delivered and now they complain. So the next time you wonder why Cena or Roman are still face or why the Wyatts are heels...look in the mirror. You will simply complain. I am so thankful WWE doesn't listen to the goofy dirt sheet cry babies.

The worst thing is many of these teams will head back to main event, they are just holding a tournament to showcase talent.

Bottom of the Barrel- Every division has them
Ascension will crawl back to the shadows
Golden truth is air time filler or comic relief
Social jobbers will just be those Zach Ryder types.

Not yet over, not irrelevant....YET!!
Lucha Dragons - Singles titles, injuries lead to end
Dudleys- 1-2 year contract to sell merch and dvds, will be next year Hall of Famers upon retirement
Usos-With New Day going face, they have no purpose.
Matadores- would be lower, but repackage.

The new- We love to over push them and see who rises.
Vaudvillians
Bullet Club- for now they are still tag team
Enzo and Cass - this is my choice to repeat history. (Enzo kicks Cass through a window....hey barber beefcake 1 more show?
2 of these teams will rise, 1 will vansih and be repackaged.

The top:
Like the or not New Days has been pulling off amazing promos and where some hacklete, panties wadded, wannabe UFC fighter FAILED to deliever ice cream bars, The new day has given us Booty 'o's cereal. They can add more marshmellows and repackage the end is no where near close.....Because...New Day...Rocks!

 

[Starkist]

I am a personal fan of tag team wrestling. The more tag teams the better. This is one thing WWE is not slacking in right now compared to TNA. If they are going to treat it like a division then it needs the participants to be in it. I will take what WWE is doing for the tag division versus throwing two random guys together. See Golden Truth which reminds me of Booker T and Goldust.

 

[MizMark11]

Someone said this in a thread about all the new people debuting in WWE in the last week or so (sorry, I forgot who this was), but you don't have to worry about so many new faces if you don't expect them all to be stars.

For how many years have people said we need more tag teams? Just think about it: we have an eight team tournament right now, which wouldn't have been possible a year or two ago. After all, how many times did we got New Day vs Usos?

Not all of these teams are going to get to the top of the division! Golden Truth is a joke team that probably won't be around that longer, the Ascension is nothing at this point, Prime Time Players were forgotten about even before Titus got suspended, and the Social Outcasts are pretty much there to make others look good (both singles and tag teams). Like others have said, the League of Nations doesn't really count as a tag team either because they've had really little interaction with the tag team division (a part from the New Day and squash matches). Also it's clear that Sin Cara needs the Lucha Dragons more than Kalisto does, but I bet it'll be over before long.

So really, you have New Day as the champs and Enzo & Cass, Anderson & Gallows, the Usos (despite how stale they are), the Dudleyz, and the Vaudevillains as teams that could believably challenge for the titles. Maybe Primo & Epico too, but we need to see how they do when they re-debut. To me, that's not too much at all.

Plus, what happens if there is a brand split? If they bring back two sets of tag titles, that's enough for six or seven teams on each show. Seems pretty decent to me.

tl;dr - the more teams, the better.

 

[MINISTRYrising]

I am loving the Tag team Division at the moment and adding more teams makes it even better. If the teams they were bring up were not ready or at all over with the fans, then I would question the logic of call so many of them up at once. But Enzo & Cass and the Vaudevillians have been ready for quite some time now and are both over with the fans. Anderson and Gallows on the other hand were two of the biggest free agents around who's signing had draw a lot of buzz, so it made sense for them to go straight on to the main roster. however I don't expect all these teams to remain on the main roster though we currently have the new day, the Dudley's, the usos, lucha dragons, Enzo & Cass, the Ascension, Goldust & r-truth and the Vaudevillians. And if you add gallows and Anderson along with the league of nations, social outcasts and the Wyatt's, it takes the number to teams to twelve. So I wouldn't be surprised to see a couple of teams like Ascension turn up back in NXT. other then that I am more then happy with WWE's new approach to the tag team division.

 

[Heartbreak_Kid_707]

'A tag division needs teams and no they won't be on TV each week maybe, but there is 7 hours of TV to be filled and no reason why tag teams can't take some of the burden.

You have New Day (champs), Uso's are stale, Lucha Dragons will most likely seperate or Kalisto will drop the US title. Are Golden Truth a team yet? And Team Puerto Rico are just a repackaging of Los Matadores. So that's not a new team, just an old one given a face lift. I think the Dudley's will just hang around long enough to put Enzo and Cass over, PTP haven't been together as a team in months.

I'm not even thinking about the Ascension, they went no where, and the Vaudevillians just debuted so give them a chance. I also wouldn't call the LON and Social Outcasts tag teams, they are more like factions. You wouldn't call the Wyatt's a tag team and they have the same amount of wrestlers.

Maybe part of the reason we are seeing so many new ones is because you can't have your main eventers like Reigns and Ambrose teaming up all the time to fill that hole. It seems that now that they've taken care of the Women's division they've turned their attention to the tag team division.

With regards to Blake/Murphy, I haven't seen them in awhile, and the Revival still have a rematch with American Alpha in NXT, so they might be down there for a little while longer.

Also with the new addition of the Bullet Club, they will probably end up a faction as well, with either Styles or Balor. Strange that someone would say they love the tag division, and then complain that there are too many teams, where there was hardly any before. You should be glad they even care about it.

Yea Golden Truth was entered into the tag team tournament. Social Outcasts were entered into the tournament too.

. I love the tag division and don't want too see it flooded. you mentioned teams like Lucha Dragon will break and go singles, and the Dudley's are just there 1-2 more years and then gone, the ascension went nowhere but their still here so yes it will thin out to normal but its too crowded right now. And LoN enters in almost all tag matches (almost) that's why I added them.

I also love elevators but I don't want too see a hundred people get on 1 lol

 

[Jack-Hammer]

I've got no real problem with it, at least as of right now, because it gives WWE an opportunity to have meaningful feuds going on that don't necessarily have to revolve around the tag team titles. As of right now, it looks like Enzo & Big Cass are feuding with the Dudley Boyz, Anderson & Gallows attacking the Usos suggests a program and we have the tag title tournament going on. It's been a while since WWE has had the potential for a variety of different tag team feuds going on at once. The WWE Tag Team Championships are the top priority, obviously, but that doesn't mean that they couldn't have other meaningful tag team feuds going on that don't revolve around the titles.

This also doesn't mean that every team is going to be a big deal but, again, that doesn't mean that they can't serve a purpose.
The New Day
The Usos
The Dudley Boyz
The Lucha Dragons
The Vaudevillains
The League of Nations
Enzo Amore & Big Cass
The Wyatt Family
Karl Anderson & Doc Gallows
The Golden Truth
The Social Outcasts
The Ascension

If WWE can get its shit together with the Wyatt Family, if the Vaudevillains can catch fire and if they can decide what they're doing with the Lucha Dragons, then there's a helluva potential tag team division

 

[Y 2 Jake]

You can list a hundred tag teams but only a few will be in the title picture at any given time. They've got enough tag teams to pad out their weekly TV in meaningless matches.

It's a bit like the IC and US title scenes being flooded because WWE have thousands of mid level nobodies.

 

[Heartbreak_Kid_707]

You can list a hundred tag teams but only a few will be in the title picture at any given time. They've got enough tag teams to pad out their weekly TV in meaningless matches.

It's a bit like the IC and US title scenes being flooded because WWE have thousands of mid level nobodies.

I didn't name a hundred teams to all be around the tag titles. I simply named the amount stating that right now they are padding the division.

Plus I think you guys missed a key question in my OP......WHEN IS ENOUGH TOO MANY?

 

[Y 2 Jake]

Can you ever have too much variety when most of the teams are just fall guys?

*Rhetorical question

 

[Navi]

I didn't name a hundred teams to all be around the tag titles. I simply named the amount stating that right now they are padding the division.

Plus I think you guys missed a key question in my OP......WHEN IS ENOUGH TOO MANY?

No you didn't name 100 tag teams, you named the ones that make up the WWE tag team division. There is no problem with padding the division at all. With the amount of injuries the WWE has seen over the last year personally I don't blame them. Having more in their case is a lot better than having less.

I'll answer your question "When is enough, too many?" with this. When we don't have to watch the same teams week in and week out battle over the same prize. When a natural tag team like the Uso's don't become stale because they are used so often. When the division becomes exciting to watch again. That's when enough is too many. I just don't see that we're at that stage right now.

 

[manstis1804]

With all the hours WWE has to fill, having that many tag teams is great. What I wish they would do is start having tag guys work singles matches more often on TV, help build up the singles midcard and upper-midcard, and save more of these barnburner matches between guys like Styles/Owens/Zayn/Jericho/Ambrose/etc. for PPV. In general, I'd like to see more matches per show, less long matches on TV. They're having talents go to hard on TV and house shows imo.

 

[Heartbreak_Kid_707]

I think it may be time for a brand split again.

 

[Vanilla Midget]

They added three teams in the last two weeks. Three tag teams, and they're airing vignettes for a fourth. I don't know if I would call this flooding.

If anything I would call this adding depth to thin division. That's what any division needs, a healthy amount of groups or guys, so you have a proper lower/mid/upper card structure.

What the division really needs is one more heel turn. I think the Vaudevillians are meant to be heels, but they haven't done or said anything particularly heelish aside from wrestling babyfaces.

Someone between the Usos, Primo and Epico, and the Lucha Dragons needs to be heel, and a top heel at that. I'd say Usos make the most sense, as despite being a kid friendly team they're young enough that they would get pushed to the top of the division and be a serious threat to the titles.

They added a bunch of new talent, and everyone is acting like the sky is falling. We have a tag title tournament, which is the most structure the division has seen in years. How is this specifically a bad thing other than people are of the opinion it's too many? Will some get lost in the shuffle? Absolutely. Will the cream of the crop rise to the top? Hopefully.

I don't think the brand extension is returning. The roster is too devoid of stars to carry each show. This is a roster refresh, and there may be releases in the future, or we'll finally see NXT debuts (or re-debuts, looking at you Ascension) of Raw/Smackdown stars.