Is Putting the Eight-Time Tag Champions Back in the Tag Division Best for Monday Night Raw?
During the December 8th episode of Monday Night Raw, the World Tag Team Champions, AJ Styles and Dragon Lee, defeated Erik and Ivar of ‘The War Raiders’. After the match, Jey Uso and Jimmy Uso yeeted down to the ring to announce that ‘The Usos’ are coming back to the Tag Team Division. This officially ended Jey’s run, at least for the time being, as a singles competitor. This begs the question: was removing ‘Main Event’ Jey from the main event scene the right move for Monday Night Raw? Is Raw’s Tag Team Division better off with or without ‘The Usos’?
There’s no question that Raw’s Tag Team Division just gained more star power than it has in the past. With ‘The Usos’, ‘The New Day’, AJ Styles, and Dragon Lee, ‘The War Raiders’, ‘The Judgement Day’, and possibly ‘The Vision’, this division has the pieces it needs to flourish. Raw is trying to establish a Tag Division just like Friday Night SmackDown has. Over the course of 2025, the SmackDown Tag Division had quite possibly some of the best matches of the year. On the SmackDown episode after WrestleMania 41, ‘The Street Profits’, ‘DIY’, and the ‘Motor City Machine Guns’ had a banger of a TLC match. Then, at this year’s SummerSlam, a six-team ladder match showed the best of what Friday Night SmackDown has to offer with a 16-minute match full of destruction, chaos, and epic moments. With the five teams Raw has within their division, and the players within that division could showcase just as great matches in 2026 as SmackDown did this year.
It already seems like ‘The Usos’ will be beefing with ‘The New Day’ to establish a new number one contender for the World Tag Team Championships. ‘The Usos’ and ‘The New Day’s rivalry has been well documented, and it certainly could be interesting to see it continue, especially with the roles reversed. While having the eight-time tag champs in ‘The Usos’ back in the division is probably the smart move in the long haul, however, a great story needs to come behind the matches being produced. Styles and Lee should remain champions until the right story deems it necessary to take the belts off of them.
