That is kind of a skewed stat considering that Bret\Anvil were not a team until around 85 (before that it was a different stable under Jimmy Hart) & from 91-94 it was Owen\Anvil for period of that time & there was no Foundation after that until 97 when the family all joined as the heel stable. Not discounting what Bret\Anvil did during their time, but that needed to be said. After Rick\Scott split because of the NWO in early 98, the brothers probably teamed up less than 30 times from then until today. So that means that the largest chunk of those 879 matches stat you posted, came from Rick\Scott were a solid team. Bret\Anvil were damn good & I wont take any victory or reign away from them, but Bret\Anvil were not together as long as Rick\Scott- nor were they as dominant.
Actually 'skewed' would be the fact that you left out the second half of that statement where I addressed exactly what claim I 'skewed'.
in both cases, there's long stretches where they weren't really a team and just had the odd match together. Their times as a full time tag team?
Hart Foundation - 1985 - 1991
Steiner Brothers - 1989 - 1997
In the first half of the statement, I was merely providing data on how long both pairs teamed together in any fashion. In both cases, they had long stretches as an exclusive team, and long stretches as an occasional/one off team (Harts in their Stampede days and at the end in the Hart Foundation stable days; Steiners after 1997 when Scott graduated to a full time singles wrestler).
In either case, your point was that the Hart Foundation was a 'short lived' team. I simply proved that they weren't. 6 years as a full time team is hardly short lived, in any context. The Steiners had 8 years as a full time team, but bear in mind between 1994 - 1996 they didn't really have a full time contract with any company, and were more journeymen (Japanese tours, short spots in WCW, ECW, indy's).
Bottom line... there's no real advantage in this regard for either team.
As far as your points about title reigns, yes some of those WCW wins were short lived, but that is only because Bischoff & the NWO were taking away wins\titles constantly - not because the teams were actually being defeated.
That would be the hotshot Monday Night Wars booking I mentioned, and hardly the Steiner's 'glory days'. As far as I'm concerned for this matchup, not a single one of those reigns is a positive, and the way they were booked during that time takes away from your 'dominant' argument. They were used by Bischoff as tools to put heat on the NWO, not as the dominant, best in the business team they were booked as a few years earlier.
But you clearly have overlooked this following stat when comparing reigns:
NWA US Tag Championship- August 90 till April 91 (225 days) title vacated because WCW started splitting from the NWA brand.
WCW World Tag Titles- February 91 till July 91 (152 days) title vacated because Scott was injured.
So during that time of 377 days, The Steiners were champions & never defeated for either set of belts.
Your dates are a little off, but that's understandable because you're going by TV schedule dates. Depending on what site you're using as a reference, it gets confusing too.
Feb 18th, the Steiners beat the Freebirds for the World titles (on this date Doom are the actual champions)
Feb 20th, the Steiners vacate the US titles unofficially
Feb 24th, The Freebirds beat Doom for the titles they had 'lost' to the Steiners 6 days earlier at Wrestle War 91
March 9th, the Steiners defeating the Freebirds is shown on TV and the Steiners are then officially recognized as WCW Tag Team Champions
April 6th, the Steiners 'officially' vacate the US titles on TV
Confusing? Gotta love the TV taping days, especially in WCW.
Yes they were dominant at this time, and were arguably the best team in the world at this point. They also happened to be pretty much it for WCW's tag division back in 1991. Going back through their matches at this time, so many were against a far past their prime Freebirds combo of Hayes and Garvin (so far past that they were both done after this run), and the infamous Master Blasters, or the combo of Arn Anderson and whomever happened to have their gear bag in the back that night.
Point being... the Steiners were booked dominant, and they were an amazing team... but they didn't really have a great foil in the division at that time.
During that time as well, Rick\Scott won their IWGP Tag Titles March 91 and held those belts for 229 days until November 91 when Rick had to get Norton to fill in for his injured brother & they lost a match to Muta\Hase.
Like I mentioned earlier... you can't really punish the Harts for something like this, because as WWF wrestlers, they weren't allowed to work Japan like an NWA/WCW wrestler could.
Also in the interests of disclosure, during that entire period... they only defended the IWGP titles once.
That, my friends, is being a dominant tag team. You wanted quality over quantity? Well there you go. To me, that stretch of time right there trumps either of the reigns that Bret\Anvil had.
Does it though?
The Harts had longer runs as World Tag Team Champions than the Steiners did. Don't forget, the US Tag titles were secondary tag team titles. The matches were good, and they usually weren't booked as being that much less important than the World titles, but they were still secondary... and those titles meant a lot more a few years earlier when JCP had a stronger tag division. Go back to the competition they had at the time I posted earlier.
In the Hart's first run as champs. They were defending against the Rougeaus, Killer Bee's, Bulldogs in an amazing series of cage matches. Honestly just a higher quality of competition than the Steiners had during that run you keep referring to. In the second, you can throw in Demolition, the Rockers, Powers of Pain... again higher quality of competition. And again, given a longer run than the Steiners ever got with the main titles.
The Steiner Brothers win this tournament.
Probably. Definitely is looking that way. But it's not as cut and dry as some are making it out to be, and when held up to the microscope, the Harts actually do compare better than a lot would probably realize.
I so wish the Steiners would have jumped in the late 80's like so many of the JCP boys did and we could have actually seen this match. It easily could have been the best work either team ever did.