It has been a solid three-months since the Top 7 last ventured into Wrestling List territory, which is right around eleven weeks too long. One could easily compile wrestling Top 7s each week and happily keep cranking them out until the end of time. This week we will take a look at tag teams. Tag teams definitely had a shelf life—one guy would move onto a singles career, fans would get tired of their same schtick over and over, or tag team wrestling could basically disappear as it has a couple of times in WWF/E history. Grab that little tag rope that they used to have and enjoy the list.


7. The Rockers

This was a hard list to cut down to seven. Teams like The British Bulldogs (with Matilda), The Dudley Boys, The Steiners, The Natural Disasters, and Strike Force had to be left off. OK, maybe not the last one. The Rockers needed to go above those if for no reason other than they had the single-greatest breakup in history—Shawn Michaels tossing Marty Jannetty through Brutus Beefcake’s Barbershop window. Jannetty, who was always clearly the Scottie Pippen/Garfunkel/Alan Colmes of the two, was still part of one of the most innovative teams of all-time.


6. New Age Outlaws

In the intro, it was mentioned that part of the reason tag teams’ shelf lives run their course is because of a stale schtick. The New Age Outlaws had this on full display. Their “ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, children of all ages” routine was fresh and entertaining until all 19,000 people in every arena nationwide could repeat it along with them, which led to the realization that neither Road Dogg nor Billy Gunn had anything else to say. They won like 9 titles though during the era when it changed hands every couple of weeks, so they have to be considered one of the best. As they went their separate ways in singles, both of them were not very good, although Gunn’s “I’m an ass man” song is one of the greatest entrance themes ever.


5. The Hardy Boyz

Though they never won any titles, they are one of the most memorable teams ever because they came very close to killing themselves in the name of entertainment on dozens of occasions. No other team did more 360s off the top rope, falls to the floor, and just general insane punishment than Jeff and Matt. They helped set the bar so high that others after them had to legitimately risk serious injury just to not bore the crowd.


4. Demolition

“Here comes the Ax, and here comes the Smasher, ooo Demolition, walkin’ disaster.” The masks. The face paint. The psedo-dominatrix wrestling tights. The Insane Clown Posse basically took this gimmick and became a rap group. Demolition was similar to the Undertaker in that they were much, much better as bad guys, but when they were cheered so much for being such bad asses, there was no choice than to turn them “good.”


3. Rock and Sock Connection

One gimmick that was often used in wrestling was teaming up two of the very top wrestlers together and giving them a little run as a tag team. The Megapowers, Macho Man and Hulk Hogan, had a decent run until the exploded at WrestleMania V (we did get quite a rap album out of it in 2003 though). Stone Cold and Undertaker won the tag belts together right before they fought for the WWF title. No combination of top guys was pulled off better than The Rock and Mankind, a.k.a. The Rock and Sock Connection. Both wrestlers were nearly at their peaks of popularity at this time and had the crowd feeding off every word and action that they made. The peak of the peak was a ten-man tag match in Dallas which had one of the loudest crowds in Raw history.


2. Hart Foundation

While Bret was easily identified as the more talented of the two, The Anvil was still always incredibly entertaining with his one-liners, his goatee, his frequent pulling of it, and his patented laugh. They were always better when Jimmy Hart was running around with them too. Is he perhaps the greatest wrestling manager of all-time?


1. Legion of Doom

They were Demolition with better matches. Those spiked football pads that they wore to the ring ruled, and they had one of the best finishing moves (the clothesline a guy off Animal’s shoulders deal) of any team.