On January 5th, 2022,AEWfavorite Jungle Boy and his stalwart dinosaur companion Luchasaurus, collectively known as Jurassic Express, won their very first titles in All Elite Wrestling, upsetting the highly-touted Lucha Brothers (Penta El Cero Miedo & Rey Fenix) to win the AEW World Tag Team Championship. Now, the victory has brought out a slew of AEW tag teams to the top of the entrance stage.
Anyone who’s watchedAEWin 2021 knows that many teams, from Private Party to Men of the Year, to the Dark Order, to Santana and Ortiz and so on, found themselves left off to the sidelines or mired in lesser feuds asthe Young Bucks ruled the roostin the tag team ranks for the majority of the year, having won the tag titles in late 2020 and holding them all the way up until September 2021, where they were finally dethroned by the Lucha Bros in a vicious, bloody steel cage match. Even then, the Lucha Bros themselves seemed indomitable, rebuffing challenges from FTR and Butcher & The Blade up until the end of 2021.
RELATED:The Undertaker To Be Inducted Into The WWE Hall Of Fame
With Jurassic Express having dethroned the Lucha Bros a scant five days into the new year, however, it has opened the floodgates for the majority of AEW’s in-depth tag team roster after having been frustratingly stymied throughout 2021 by two of the best teams around in the Young Bucks and Lucha Bros. As of this writing, Jurassic Express has already turned away challenges by the Dark Order, Private Party, and the Gunn Club in recent weeks, and now have a three-way Tag Team Championship match to look forward to at theAEW RevolutionPay-Per-View on March 6th, 2022. The two teams challenging for the tag titles will be determined via battle royale. A traditional wresting battle royal took place on the February 23rdedition ofDynamiteto determine the first team, and the second team will be determined by AEW’s own tradition of a Casino Battle Royal on the March 2nd episode ofAEW Dynamite.
One of AEW’s greatest strengths since its inception in 2019 has been the amazing depth of its tag team roster and the overabundance of talent contained within, as well as tag team veterans like Matt Hardy and Christian Cage lending their on-air presence to reinforce teams with great prospects like Private Party and the current tag team champions Jurassic Express. SinceJungle Boy and Luchasaurustook the tag titles at the start of 2022, a spotlight has been shone on AEW’s tag division, highlighting some lesser-seen teams held back during 2021, as well as showing just how capable a division over-packed with talent like the AEW tag team ranks can be with the impending tag team battle royals in the coming weeks beforeAEW Revolution.
This increased focus on the majority of AEW’s tag team division should come as a welcome breath of fresh air to fans of the promotion whom have shown frustration withthe tag team scenebeing centered around a mere one or two tag teams throughout 2021 while so many other teams like the recently-reunited Best Friends languished off to the sidelines or found themselves mired in relatively petty feuds. While teams like Dark Order and Gunn Club have had their individual opportunities at the tag titles in the last couple of weeks, the fact that they and others will still be involved in the battle royals shows that AEW is not shying away from any team getting more than one mere moment in the sun to challenge for the tag team titles in the coming year.
Now while it is great that more and more AEW teams are seemingly getting a fair shake in 2022, there is always the chance of some still getting lost in the shuffle, the “double-edged sword” of having an overstuffed tag team roster, and there is always the possibility that this new refocus on the tag division could fall by the wayside in the next few months. However, after nearly a year of fans on the edge of their seats, waiting for the Young Bucks to finally be dethroned from the top of the tag team mountain, it is nonetheless refreshing to see many other teams finally begin to make their own trek to the top.
