The Ten Count 7.12.13: Top 10 Tag Team Maneuvers

Tag team wrestling is a favorite of many fans out there. I know it is a division I enjoy very well. While teamwork, personality, and gimmicks are just as important to tag teams as they are to singles competitors, tag teams have one advantage: double team maneuvers. Sometimes they are finishers, sometimes they are signatures. Regardless of how you classify them, they can be very impressive. Just like normal pro wrestling maneuvers, there are some that have become more famous than the people that innovated them. Today I bring you a list of the tag team attacks that I love to see. May I present, my top ten tag team maneuvers.

Easily one of the more fun moves on this list, El Asesino (The Assassin) is a trademark move of Los Ice Creams, the deliciously mischievous tag team of luchadores. While not a finishing move, this technique is very damaging to the opponent. One of the Ice Creams will hold the opponent on his knee while the other runs in and hits a butbutt right into the face. Imagine having the full body weight of a pro wrestling flying at you, rump first. A little bit degrading, yes, and it has to hurt quite a bit. I’m a bit surprised that more variations of this move don’t exist. I guess they do if you count double teams that involve a atomic drop plus a running strike. Anyway, El Asesino is a lot of fun to see, as the tag team performing it are a lot of fun to watch. The Los Ice Creams have quite a few double team attack they love to use against their opponents, but this is the one that I enjoy the most.

Technically a triple team move, The Anthill is the go to finisher for The Colony. They’ve used it to win many a trios match in their home promotion of Chikara. Fire Ant was always the ant to climb on top and come crashing down with a simple body splash. Solider and Worker Ant (or Green Ant after Worker’s unfortunate retirement) would hold the victim above the mat to allow for extra damage as Fire came flying down. To be honest I’m surprised some other trios have not try to upgrade or make a variation of this maneuver. Maybe a senton or an elbow drop from the top as opposed to a splash. Some braver souls may try something with a twist, but I wouldn’t recommend it since you’re leaping off two human shoulders. This move has actually been used from the top rope, if you can believe that. Sometimes dubbed the “Mega Antapult Splash”, which they used to win King of Trios 2011. Sadly, with recent rumors of Chikara being defunct, we may not see The Anthill again for quite a long time. Hopefully The Colony will find another home as a trio in one of the many Wrestling Is promotions.

I’ve always been a fan of the Super Smash Bros. Player Uno and Player Dos (also known as Stu ‘Stupefied’ Grayson) are both fantastic wrestlers who share the same love of video games that I do. Anyway, the SSB have been becoming fast fan favorites on the wrestling scene, having some great matches against the likes of The Young Bucks, Future Shock (Kyle O’Reilly and Adam Cole), Kevin Steen, and El Generico. After using the Pac-Man Fever finisher, which was a double team piledriver, this team starting using a move they dubbed The Fatality. Any Mortal Kombat fan can get enjoyment out of that. The Fatality involves Player Uno picking the opponent up in a gory special and then drop them with a gory bomb. As the opponent is going down to the mat, Player Dos flies in with a diamond dust cutter. A great looking double team that attacks many parts of the body, including the back, chest, and neck. This maneuver requires the tag team partners to know where each other are before it can be attempted. Now this is true for almost every double team in the history of pro wrestling, but this move is doubly true for that fact. Mainly because Player Uno has his back to Player Dos when it starts off. Still, this is a great move that has put down a lot of opponents.

This move uses simple math. Take a regular finisher and multiply it by two. This is probably the simplest move on the list, but of course that is no reason to forget about it. There really isn’t a lot of things more satisfying than hearing the smack of two boots right in someone’s face. This move requires precision from both members on the team, or all three, if the occasion arises i.e. The Young Bucks and Mike Bennett at King of Trios 2013. It is also a move that can come pretty much from anywhere. Opponent alone in the ring? Two boots! Opponent on the apron? Two boots! Opponent on the on the outside floor because they missed a baseball slide and are now confused? You guess it, two boots! This move also leaves room for a bit of variety. I’ve seen a Double Superkick where the victim was kicked in the face and the back of the head. Two boots sandwich! This maneuver is still being used today by many tag teams in many promotions, but only the best tag teams can make it look so painful. It goes without saying that a team with similar heights can perform this technique easier, but I have seen teams do this when the members were of an obvious height difference, so it really is a move any team can do.

You wouldn’t believe how long it took to find a video with just this double team move. Anyway, while neither of the teams that are known for using this maneuver have a name for it, so it seems the technical name for it will have to do. Take a lungblower (or backstabber, if you prefer) and add the body slamming move of a powerbomb. Then you have a fantastic move that provides quite a bit of damage to an opponents back. The idea is to let the body slam down harder onto the knees of one of the attacking wrestlers. It is a pretty brutal move that can sometimes look very dangerous. That may be the reason it is not seen too often anymore, but I am sure there are a couple of teams still using it. Please correct me in the comments if this is the case. It seems as if more people are instead using a single person version of this move, which involves lifting the opponent up like a powerbomb, but then falling back so the opponent lands on your knees. I’m getting off topic, something I do a lot, I realize. The fact is that this maneuver is quite impressive and it does it job when performed, which is plenty of damage.

One of the flashiest double team moves, More Bang for Your Buck is the calling card of one of the most well known tag teams in the indy division, The Young Bucks, also known as Generation Me in TNA. Some of the moves on this list are combining two regular finishers into one double team. This one uses three moves all done back to back that leaves the opponent down for the count. Two of those moves are regular high flying finishers that wrestlers still use today, although the moonsault not as much as the 450. Matt Jackson hits a rolling senton, leaving the victim in perfect position for Nick Jackson’s 450 Splash, then Matt quickly leaps to the top and lands a moonsault. This is another double team that ends right in a pinning situation. One of the reasons this maneuver is so great is just how smooth it looks every time it is done. The Young Bucks have perfected the art of using More Bang for Your Buck against any opponent they are against. Earlier I mentioned that the Double Superkick is used by this team as well, and they usually use it as a setup for this particular move. Both style and teamwork form together to make this a well known and fantastic double team.

For those who don’t know, The Kings of Wrestling consists of Chris Hero and Claudio Castagnoli, also known as Kassius Ohno and Antonio Cesaro, respectively. These two made a tear in the indy scene, and this move help them win many matches along the way. The KRS-1 (Kings Reign Supreme) is a very unique double team move. I usually liken it to a modified double team powerbomb, but even that is incorrect in a couple of ways. I can only imagine the fear of a competitor as they are lifted high in the air, only to fall straight to the mat mere milliseconds after being flipped. This maneuver also ends in a pinning predicament, helpful to anyone trying to win a wrestling match. Unfortunately, it seems the KRS-1 has disappeared from the wrestling, That could be because the The Kings of Wrestling are no longer teaming together…but one can dream of someday seeing the KRS-1 again. Here’s a fun fact, the KRS-1 is named after the rapper of the same name.

The Decapitation was first used by Ax and Smash of Demolition, two big hulking dudes who probably shouldn’t get anywhere near the top rope. That didn’t stop these two from innovating a great technique. Essentially it is a backbacker followed up by a second or top rope elbow drop. There are so many different versions of this move that I could probably do a top ten list of teams that do them. One of the most popular differences is that one team member will just hold the victim in the air, as opposed to using a backbreaker. It might be a safety issue, as the landing for the original Decapitation does look pretty rough. Personally, I really enjoy the Devastation Corporation variation of this maneuver, dubbed the Death Blow, just because it involves a very big dude flying off the top rope with a splash onto some poor, unfortunate soul. That being said, you have to respect Demolition for bringing this double team attack to the world of pro wrestling, as many teams today still use it. The question is will any of those team create a new variant that will wow the audience even more?

This double team finisher has been used by one team in just about every current major promotion in the world. Well known by just about every wrestling fan ever, the Dudley Death Drop has led to many losses for many teams competing in this sport. Bubba Ray (currently Bully Ray) and Devon have been using this maneuver since 1997 to gain multiple tag team championships. The move itself is quite impressive, an assisted elevated cutter, if you want to break it down. A lot of the time, the victim of the move is surprised with this move with virtually no time to react or counter. One of the most well known versions of this move is planting the opponent right through a wooden table, basically guaranteeing that the wrestler who ate the move would be pinned, unless his/her partner could make the save. Of course if it was a tables match the match would end right hen and there. While Team 3D have seem to go into singles competition, and having quite some success, this tag team finisher will always be loved by man fans.

While I was coming up with choices on this list, I had the top two already picked out. The question was which would take the top spot. It would be easy to say that the Doomsday Device came first, but then this entry would be really short. The Doomsday Device is a double team attack so well known that many fans still go crazy when they see it today, regardless of who performs it. Getting hit with this maneuver meant you were done. As far as my memory goes, no one has ever kicked out of a Road Warriors’ Doomsday Device. The Briscoe Brothers, Jay and Mark, have used a slight variation of this to win many matches. The only difference was that Jay would springboard off the top rope as opposed to being perched on the top corner. There have been other variations of this move, such as BJ Whiter and Jimmy Jacob’s Doomsday Rana. There have also been versions where the flying team member will attack with a crossbody as opposed to a lariat. I mentioned earlier how it there must be fear in a competitor being hit with the KRS-1, but I bet it can’t hold a candle to what the victims of the Doonsday Device felt. You’re just sitting in the air, and there is a huge man just waiting on the corner post. Then he just flies at you, causing you to fall backwards onto the mat. This is double team maneuver that seems to have vanished as well, but I doubt it will stay that way.

So there it is, my personal favorite tag team maneuvers. There are a lot of moves that I know I left out of this list, and trust me, it was very difficult to narrow it down to my top ten. Let me know what your favorite double team maneuvers are in the comments below! I hope you enjoyed this week’s edition of the Ten Count. Make sure to check out some other 411 Articles below, and you can follow/praise/complain to me on twitter right here. Support Pro Wrestling!

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