The SmarK Rant for WWE Vault presents Tag Teams You Forgot About!

The SmarK Rant for WWE Vault presents Tag Teams You Forgot About!

Originally written 10.28.25

I’m still half asleep after staying up to friggin’ 1AM watching the World Series. Hopefully the game that will have happened already tonight by the time you read this won’t run 18 innings as well.

Anyway, another light and fun entry from the awesome possums at the WWE Vault today, showcasing forgotten tag teams.

WWE World tag team title: The Unamericans (Lance Storm & Christian) v. Kane & The Hurricane

Yes it’s the debut of HURRI-KANE from RAW in September 2002. Hurricane was freshly moved over from Smackdown and makes his debut here, as the babyfaces clean house on the Unamericans, but Storm puts Hurricane down with a back elbow for two in the ring. Christian with a backbreaker for two and he goes to a chinlock, and a neckbreaker for two. Hurricane with the Eye of the Hurricane and he makes the hot tag to Kane, as Kane is of course a tremendous hot tag guy. He clotheslines both heels and goes up with the flying clothesline on Storm, but Regal runs in and knocks out Kane with a tag title while Test takes the ref. Maybe the Blue Jays should have tried that on Ohtani. That only gets two. The refs deal with Test and Regal on the floor while Hurricane tries to fight off the heels alone, but Kane makes the save and we get DOUBLE CHOKESLAMS and Kane pins Storm to win the tag titles at 6:27 for a giant pop. A very fun match. **1/4

Doug Furnas & Phil Lafon v. The Hardy Boys

We’re on Shotgun in December 1997 for this one. I don’t think people have specifically forgot about Furnas & Lafon, to be fair. They were into their heel era, as Lafon slaps Jeff around in the corner and the Hardys regroup with the double-team in the corner. But then the heels bail and Jeff tries a quebrada, and completely misses the ropes with his feet, landing with a flat back bump on the floor while Furnas and Lafon freak out and make sure he’s not dead. Having established that he’s OK, they beat on him back in the ring and Lafon gets a bow and arrow, but Jeff dropkicks him as we take a break. Back with Furnas hitting an overhead suplex for two and Lafon follows with a leg lariat for two. To the top and Lafon gets an inverted suplex for two. Jeff comes back with a bulldog out of the corner and makes the hot tag to Matt, who runs wild with slams and thankfully does a better quebrada than his brother, for two on Lafon. Jeff with a springboard splash for two. It’s BONZO GONZO and Jeff gets backdropped to the floor, taking an insane bump, and Lafon finishes Matt off with a DDT at 5:15. Jeff is fucking crazy. **1/2

Deuce & Domino v. Ric Flair & Batista

Back to the giant fist era for a tag team I always forget, complete with faux doo wop entrance music. And they were the tag team champions?! I was definitely not in the loop for this period. How did Cherry not stick around and get turned into a giant star? Holy shit. Who cares if she could wrestle, they should have been able to print money with her. Batista drops Deuce and beats on him in the corner before taking him down with a short arm clothesline and working the arm. Over to Domino, who slams Flair and goes OH! before dropping an elbow for two. Cole explains the lore here: Cherry is Domino’s sister and Deuce’s girlfriend. Damn they have a backstory and everything. Domino with a dropkick on Flair, but Deuce misses an elbow and we take a break. Back with Batista getting a hot tag and beating on Deuce, making it clear he’s #2. Flair with the figure-four but Domino saves, allowing the greasers to take over and work Flair over in the corner. Deuce, looking more Tommy Dreamer than his own famous father, drops a knee on Flair for two. Domino goes to an armbar and Deuce comes in with a high kick for two and goes back to the armbar. Flair fights out of the corner with chops, but Deuce cuts off the hot tag with a clothesline on Flair before a second attempt succeeds. Batista comes in and destroys them, hitting Domino with a Black Hole Slam, but Great Khali wanders out to provide distraction. So D&D double-team him with a high low and the ref calls for the bell for KICKING TOO MUCH ASS at 10:48. Also we learn that their finisher is called CRACK ‘EM IN THE MOUTH before cutting away to the next segment. Seems like these guys had potential and they gave up on them way too soon. Especially Cherry. This was a surprisingly good TV main event with an awful finish that combined two of my least favorite tropes to drag it down a ton, though. **1/2. I think I saw Domino do stuff elsewhere as Cliff Compton either before or after this period and he was pretty decent, but I don’t remember Deuce at all.

Lo Down (D-Lo Brown & Chaz) v. Kaientai

From Jakked in December 2000, as D-Lo and Chaz desperately search for purpose as a team by becoming some kind of vague Middle East gimmick. Puffy pants and a headdress are of course a necessity for this kind of life change. Of course these days we know only the best people sell their souls to Middle East overlords and they would be overwhelming babyfaces. They double-team Taka and give praise to Allah a lot, but not actually praying to Mecca or anything, just pantomiming it for heel heet to show they’re bad guys. Taka and Funaki manage a quick double-team, but Lo Down do a double powerbomb on Funaki to finish at 4:00. This was terrible and the Lo Down gimmick went nowhere. Ironically, they were just a year too early with it.

Too Much v. Terry Funk & Bradshaw

Back to July 1998 on Shotgun, the pre-show episode before Fully Loaded. This was the initial form of Too Cool, when they were doofus heels. Bradshaw beats Taylor down to start, but Taylor hits him with dropkicks before walking into the fallaway slam. Bradshaw drops elbows on him, but Too Much sends him into the floor with a double dropkick and we take a break. Back with Terry Funk coming in and slapping Christopher around before hitting a DDT out of the corner. He tosses Brian and Bradshaw beats on him out there while we edit out the dulcut tones of Kevin Kelly and Michael Cole for some reason. That’s a shame. Back in the ring, Taylor declares “TERRY FUNK, YOU MADE ME MAD!” and throws chops on him, but Funk hits him with a DDT for two. Funk with an Oklahoma roll and Cole declares “This is hilarious!” in case we didn’t know how to react. Thanks. Funk with a double clothesline on the geeks and Bradshaw comes in with a big boot on both guys and the Clothesline from Hell finishes at 5:49. Well this was a match. *

NWA World tag team title: The New Midnight Express v. The Rock N Roll Express

Back to Unforgiven 98 for one of the low points in the career of Bob Holly. And that’s saying something. The RNR use the Rockers’ old theme for some lazy recycling. Bombastic Bob works a headlock on Robert, but the RNR double-team and the NME is already having arguments and colliding. The MX regroups with an abdominal stretch on Ricky as this crowd is super dead, and Cornette does a comedy routine with the ref as we go back to 1984 with no success. Bodacious Bart with a backbreaker on Ricky for two and Bob drops an elbow for two. Bart powerslams Ricky and Bob goes up and misses the Alabama Jam, and it’s “hot” tag Gibson as they all slug it out. The Midnights collide yet again and the double dropkick hits Bart. But Cornette comes in behind the ref’s back and misses an elbow for added “heat”. So Robert rolls up Bart, but Bob bulldogs him and Bart gets the pin to retain the titles at 7:00. Another horrible match. DUD

The Pitbulls (Jamie Noble & Kid Kash) v. Sterling James Keenan & John Bowman

Noble and Kash doing a vague dog-related gimmick is definitely forgotten, but Sterling Keenan of course got much more successfully repackaged later on as Corey Graves. The Pitbulls quickly double-team Bowman and hit him with a double legdrop off the middle rope for two. Bowman hits Kash with a belly to belly and it’s over to Keenan. The Pitbulls double-team him with chops and Noble slams him for two. Kash misses a charge and it’s back to Bowman, but Noble stomps him down in the corner. And Kash hits a clothesline on Bowman and Noble gets the pin at 4:40. I don’t really understand what this gimmick was supposed to be.

PG-13 v. Sonny Rogers & Al Brown

This is from RAW in 1995, before they become the NOD’s hype men, and were instead USWA tag team champions building to a feud with the Smoking Gunns that didn’t go anywhere. They double-team Rogers with a double legweep as Vince can’t remember which one is JC Ice and which is Wolfie D. Brown manages to get a tag and Wolfie cuts him off, allowing JC to take the ref while Wolfie hits Brown with a top rope bulldog for two. Double bulldog follows while Jerry Lawler explains their move names and backstory, and Wolfie slams JC onto Brown for the pin at 3:51. No one cared.

Tekno Team 2000 v. Barry Horowitz & Brooklyn Brawler

The jobber side is infinitely more talented than the star team here. Back to RAW in 1996 as Troy takes the Brawler down with a hammerlock and powerslams him. Over to Horowitz, but Travis comes in with a splash for two. Troy with a bodypress for two but the Brawler breaks it up. So they backdrop him and send him to the floor, and they finish Horowitz with a Rockerplex at 1:55. I guess they were kind of going for a new generation pretty boy team with TT2000 but it just failed on every level possible and even invented new ways to fail that other promotions hadn’t thought of yet.

For me this was a pretty weak compilation. Not just in the sense that the matches were all pretty blah, but because WCW alone could generate a three hour compilation of “tag teams you forgot about” and be a lot more fun than this was. Just off the top of my head you could include the New Breed, Master Blasters, Magnum Force, Mulkeys, etc. Like here, the Pitbulls were forgotten because they were just a forgettable nothing tag team that went nowhere together and got split up again right away, not because they were like “ha ha” terrible or a hidden gem or whatever. A better one would have been The Basham Brothers, for example, where it was a legitimate attempt to make something a big act and it failed miserably and took everyone down in the process. Or La Resistance.

Anyway, this is fine to kill an hour, but much like these teams, it’s pretty forgettable.