2017 Awards: Tag Team/Group of the Year
Now this one isn’t that hard. And no it’s not the Young Bucks. This is for good teams, though they did block me on Twitter so maybe I should….never mind.
What’s better than a great wrestler? Well not much, but something that’s also good is having a bunch of wrestlers who come together and do well as a unit. That’s the basic idea behind a stable and since there aren’t enough of them to get their own category, we’ll throw them together with tag teams, as usual.
Before we get started, I’m intentionally leaving off LIJ and Bullet Club. I know they’re both big deals but I just don’t watch enough New Japan to give a good opinion on them.
We’ll start with a team that I never liked who have turned into a pretty solid combination. Back in late 2016, the Bar was put together and for the life of me I did not get why. I understood the point in putting them into a team but EGADS the build to get there was terrible. It turned out that they worked quite well together as two big Europeans who hit other people really hard is a heck of a combination. Who would have guessed?
Down to NXT for a bit with the Undisputed Era. While the name is still bad (like the Bar), they’ve taken charge of NXT and have already won some gold there, which is a lot more important down there instead of how it would be on the main roster. The team hit the ground running and there’s a good reason to believe they’ll keep right on going. You can almost pencil in Adam Cole as winning the NXT Title in 2018 that’s really not a bad thing.
As much as I can’t stand their leader more often than not, the same could be said of Sanity. Killian Dain is a heck of a monster and I can watch Nikki Cross doing her crazy thing for days. The team also had some success and teased getting closer to the main event scene without actually getting there. This is pretty much the perfect fit for everyone involved and that’s a very good sign for all of them, along with being a great stable at the same time.
One more in NXT, even though they split up pretty early in the year. DIY is one of the better in-ring teams NXT has ever had (and that’s covering some serious ground. They came into the year as Tag Team Champions and then had some great matches over the next few months. Throw in one of the best heel splits in many, many years (if not ever, actually) and there’s no way they weren’t at least getting a mention.
Even though they didn’t have the best year, you have to include New Day, if nothing else just for how long they’ve managed to survive. They should have been a nothing little act that died out in a few months and we’re now on what? Their fourth year? They did host Wrestlemania this year and won some tag titles so there has to be something going on there. There’s always the fun bit of just seeing what they’re going to do to stay relevant, which they somehow keep managing to pull off. Now just get Kofi in the main event.
And that leaves one of the easiest picks of the year. I’ve been a big fan of the Usos since they debuted and MY GOODNESS they’ve turned it up lately. This Uso Penitentiary is getting to be one of the best things on WWE at the moment and they’ve dominated the tag division on Smackdown for months now. The only thing missing for them was leading the Smackdown Siege (they were MADE for that) and that’s quite the resume for the year. The Usos win and it’s really not close.