Earlier this week, Smackdown General Manager Paige announced a tag-team tournament. The winners will receive a title shot against the Bludgeon Brothers. She has now released the names of the 4 teams which will be participating in the tournament.
The Usos, New Day, Sanity, and the Bar are all entered. The most notable team not included in the tournament is Karl Anderson & Luke Gallows. A possible reason the team wasn’t included in the tournament is that they have already lost two title matches on television to the current champions.
Watch Paige’s announcement:
Your fave GM here.. Such a beautiful Sunday and you are all so inquisitive… you want the teams for this #SDLive Tag team tournament, well here they are! And I’ll cheers to that. pic.twitter.com/YmiFMzfIHP
— PAIGE (@RealPaigeWWE) July 22, 2018
Smackdown Tag Team Division vs Raw Tag Team Division
Although the SD tag division consists of fewer teams than Raw’s, it arguably has the stronger ones. New Day are the longest reigning tag champions of all-time, the Usos are arguably the hottest tag-team on the roster, and Cesaro and Sheamus are multi-time champions as well.
Meanwhile, on Raw, the titles are currently held by Bo Dallas and Curtis Axel. The B-Team defeated the Deleter of Worlds at Extreme Rules for the belts. Other Raw tag-teams include the Revival, the Authors of Pain, Ascension, Titus Worldwide, and Breezeango.
Paige As Smackdown General Manager
Paige took over as Smackdown General Manager on the first episode after WrestleMania. The night before on Raw, Paige announced she was not medically cleared to compete. It’s possible she never competes in a WWE ring again but she doesn’t seem to be abandoning hope.
Prior to Paige’s appointment, the show had been run by Shane McMahon and Daniel Bryan. After Bryan’s reinstatement as a wrestler, however, he stepped down as brand GM. Shane McMahon stepped away from the role after WrestleMania as well, citing his problems with Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens as a reason why.