At the height of the Bloodline Era, The Usos defeated Randy Orton and Matt Riddle in a “Winner Take All” match to take the Raw and SmackDown Tag Team Championships on a May 20th edition of Friday Night SmackDown in 2022. For nearly two years, the championships have remained unified and shared across Raw and SmackDown.

A lot has changed in the company since May 2022. The WWE was sold under the TKO umbrella, Triple H is in charge and Vince McMahon is not, and the WWE has loaded its roster depth with quality talent and storylines. Two years after the tag titles were unified, it might be time for a change.

When the championships were unified, the tag team division was super thin across the WWE. Randy Orton and Matt Riddle were only supposed to be a tag team for a few weeks, but due to popularity and the minimal number of teams, they ended up winning the Raw Tag Team Championships. The Usos were at the top of their game because of their association with Roman Reigns. Alpha Academy was finding its footing as a tag team, while the Street Profits were probably the only other believable tag team you could put the titles on.

This is a completely different era in WWE and tag team wrestling. The WWE has plenty of viable contenders that can hold the tag team gold.

For Monday Night Raw you have:

• Judgment Day (Damian Priest and Finn Balor; Current Undisputed WWE Tag Team Champions)
• Alpha Academy (Chad Gable and Otis)
• Awesome Truth (The Miz and R-Truth)
• The Creed Brothers (Brutus and Julius Creed)
• DIY (Johnny Gargano and Tommaso Ciampa)
• Imperium (Giovanni Vinci and Ludwig Kaiser)
• Indus Sher (Sanga and Veer)
• The New Day (Kofi Kingston and Xavier Woods)
• Viking Radiers (Erik and Ivar)

And on Friday Night SmackDown:

• Authors of Pain (Akam and Rezar)
• Good Brothers (Karl Anderson and Luke Gallows)
• Latino World Order (Cruz del Toro and Joaquin Wilde)
• Legado del Fantasma (Angel and Berto)
• New Catch Republic (Pete Dunne and Tyler Bate)
• Pretty Deadly (Elton Prince and Kit Wilson)
• Street Profits (Angelo Dawkins and Montez Ford)
• Ashantee the Adonis and Cedric Alexander
• Austin Theory and Grayson Waller… while they last

As you can see, both shows have stacked tag team rosters! We wouldn’t have 9 tag teams across the WWE a couple of years ago. Now we have 9 on each show!

Great tag teams like the Creed Brothers, DIY, New Catch Republic, and Pretty Deadly have yet to win anything on the main roster. You have veteran tag teams like The New Day, the Street Profits, and Good Brothers who could elevate both divisions as champions themselves. And of course, there are tag teams from NXT who could move up any day now and will struggle to make an impact if there’s only one set of titles.

Currently, Judgment Day’s Finn Balor and Damian Priest carry both sets of tag team titles and are recognized as the Undisputed WWE Tag Team Champions. But there is depth in the division to allow WWE to have two sets of tag team champions: one for Raw and one for SmackDown. When you only have one championship to compete for, it limits your options. None of those tag teams can break through because the majority of those tag teams haven’t challenged Judgment Day in their 150+ day reign.

The same happened with the world championship. Roman Reigns unified the Undisputed and WWE Championships back in 2022 at WrestleMania 38, defeating WWE Champion Brock Lesnar, to hold all the gold. Then a year later, WWE is creating the World Heavyweight Championship for Raw superstars.

The idea behind a brand split is for more and equal opportunity across the board to showcase talent and develop storylines. There’s a reason Raw and SmackDown have their own world champion. Raw and SmackDown have their own women’s champion. Raw has the Intercontinental Championship and SmackDown has the United States Championship. Each show now has its own General Managers.

It’s time to split the tag team championships. Create a new design and start a tournament. It’s best for business, for the fans, and for these tag teams.