The Tag Team Of Santana & Ortiz Have Been Completely Wasted In AEW
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While AEW has done some great work with its tag team division since the company's launch in 2019, it has completely wasted one of the best tag teams in the world in Santana and Ortiz.
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The pair arrived in the company as one of the most popular duos in the wrestling industry, and many expected them to achieve some incredible things in Tony Khan's promotion when they debuted, but almost three years in, they've been completely wasted.
Whether it's due to their involvement in multiple multi-man rivalries where they've been forced to take a back seat or just the lack of real tag team wrestling they've had the chance to engage in, the pair just haven't been used to their maximum potential so far in AEW, and if Tony Khan knows what's best for business, they'll be given a chance to shine sooner rather than later.
They Were One Of The Best Tag Teams In The World During Their Time In Impact
After initially forming in 2012, and lighting up the independent scene for five years, Santana and Ortiz joined Impact Wrestling in 2017. The pair immediately joined the popular faction LAX and became one of the biggest acts in the promotion's tag team division.
In just two years, they established themselves as one of the greatest tag teams in Impact Wrestling history, winning the Impact Tag Team Championships four times, as well as setting a then record-breaking reign with the belts at 261 days. The record, which was eventually broken by The North, showed just how impressive Santana and Ortiz were as a tag team and demonstrated how highly the promotion valued them.
They dominated the tag team ranks in Impact during their two-year run with the promotion and even won the Impact Tag Team of the Year award in 2018. They showed they were capable of being the number one tag team for a wrestling promotion, and once they signed with AEW, many fans expected they'd be able to achieve similar levels of success, albeit in a much deeper division featuring the likes of the Young Bucks and the Lucha Bros, but it hasn't worked out that way.
They've Spent The Majority Of Their Time In AEW Playing Second Fiddle
One major issue in Santana and Ortiz's AEW run so far, is just how often they've been treated as mere background characters, playing second fiddle to other stars. On the very first episode of AEW Dynamite, they formed the popular faction the Inner Circle with Chris Jericho, Sammy Guevara, and Jake Hager, and while the group was initially one of the best things in the promotion, the longer they spent together, the more it began to hold Santana and Ortiz back.
They spent more time playing supporting roles for Jericho, and never really got the chance to shine as an actual tag team. The majority of their biggest matches came alongside their stablemates, and they weren't given the opportunity to show AEW fans why they were one of the best teams in the promotion.
Once the Inner Circle disbanded, fans hoped it would lead to a renewed push in the tag team division for the pair, and they would finally get the chance to wreak havoc on the division and achieve the levels of success that they've always been worthy of, but again, they quickly fell into the shadows of another singles star.
While their alignment with Eddie Kingston made sense initially, the longer their teaming has gone on, the worse it seems to be for the tag team. They're very rarely given the opportunity to showcase their own personalities and their individualities, and are instead forced to just take a back seat for someone else, and it isn't doing them any favors at all.
Their Biggest Moments In AEW Have All Come Away From The Tag Team Division
From AEW's inception, the company's tag team division has been one of its biggest strengths, and some of the promotion's greatest ever matches have been tag team matches. Whether it was Hangman Page and Kenny Omega's victory over the Young Bucks at Revolution 2020, or the Lucha Bros' win over the Bucks at All Out 2021, there have been some really incredible bouts in the tag team division so far.
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Unfortunately, despite their reputation as one of the best tag teams in the world, almost all of Santana and Ortiz's most high-profile matches have come away from the division. Their Stadium Stampede bouts, as well as the pair of Blood and Guts matches, have been their highlights in AEW so far, which is a damning indictment of how disappointing their run as a tag team has been so far.
