5 times tag teams broke up and a singles star was born

The Charismatic Enigma It is very precarious to split up a successful tag team with the perennial question arising – can the superstars involved replicate their tag team success in their singles career?Many have fallen surprisingly short. This list takes a look at those superstars who went on to have a highly successful singles career after splitting up from their tag team partners.

#5 JBL

JBL’s post-2004 career renaissance was astonishing

This was a career renaissance that nobody had expected. Justin Hawk Bradshaw had never caught on as a singles superstar. Whether it be as a part of the Undertaker’s minions or as the APA, JBL always had a partner by his side – mostly Farooq.

So when Farooq decided to take up a backstage role in 2004 and Paul Heyman decided to reinvent Bradshaw from a beer drinking Texas cowboy to a smooth talking wall street millionaire, the experiment seemed certain to fail. However, it didn’t.

JBL captured his only WWE Championship within months of adopting this new persona by beating crowd favourite Eddie Guerrero and never looked back.

He carried SmackDown on his back as the heel champion during that 10-month reign in 2004-05 which included successful title defences against the likes of Guerrero, Booker T, The Undertaker, The Big show and Kurt Angle before finally dropping the title to an emerging baby face named John Cena at Wrestle mania 21.

JBL would continue to be in the main event over the years, feuding with Batista, Shawn Michaels and Chris Jericho and he would capture the Intercontinental and the United States titles as well.

For a man who had was never considered a major singles star during his initial nine years with the company, it was indeed gratifying to become a grand slam champion (winning the World, IC and US titles) in less than 5 years’ time.

JBL retired from the ring in 2009 and is now the colour commentator of Raw besides occasionally gracing the ring to deliver his pundit Clothesline from Hell to unsuspecting superstars.

#4 Jeff Hardy

Nobody thought Jeff Hardy would become a successful singles star in the WWE

Jeff Hardy always had something special about him.

Even during the classic age of the TLC in the 2000s when the Hardy Boyz waged war with the Dudleys and Edge & Christian, Jeff’s suicidal high-risk manoeuvres had directed special attention to himself.

There wasn’t much character development for Jeff during that period and nobody really believed that the sub 220 pound Jeffrey Nero Hardy could ever make his mark as a single superstar. Oh, how wrong we all were!

The initial split of the Hardys put Jeff in a limbo with brother Matt gaining the ascendancy with his Mattitude gimmick whereas the younger Hardy did not have a persona to work on.

Despite highly acclaimed matches with the likes of the Undertaker and Rob Van Dam, he was eventually stuck with a ‘lost soul’ gimmick which even though he put his heart and soul into, was deemed a failure when he was released from the WWE in 2003.

Hardy had already captured the Intercontinental and European titles by then, but it was his second coming in 2006 that finally shut the naysayers up for good. After interrupting his old sparring partner Edge’s WWE Championship victory celebration, Hardy was booked quite strongly from the start of this run.

The crowd was always behind the charismatic enigma and Hardy added more Intercontinental gold to his collection. With his popularity at an all-time high, WWE had no choice but to put Jeff into a PPV WWE title match with Randy Orton.

The positive response to that match saw Hardy’s stock rising again and he went on to beat superstars who would have been booked to crush him during his first run with the WWE – like Triple H, Shawn Michaels and The Undertaker.

The fans almost blew the roof off the HSBC Arena in Buffalo, New York when Hardy finally captured the WWE Championship after beating Edge and Triple H in a Triple threat match at the 2008 Armageddon PPV. He would capture the world title on two more occasions before leaving the WWE as a successful singles superstar in 2009.

#3 Seth Rollins

Seth Rollins is the current face of the WWE

Most of the WWE fans were surprised when the Shield split in 2014. They were even more surprised to see Seth Rollins coming out of the split as the heel.

Seth’s character was the least developed among the Shield trio and Dean Ambrose seemed to be the logical heel in the group to play the foil for Roman Reigns’ dominant face persona. However, the WWE Creative did something that eventually panned out to be a huge success – they chose Rollins to be the guy to get the heat for the dissolution of the Shield.

Rollins immediately made his impact felt when the man who had been overshadowed for two years finally got his chance to announce himself on the main stage. People were amazed by Rollins’ skills on the mic and while his in-ring skills were always great, more emphasis was placed on the same once he broke out into a singles superstar.

Rollins quickly became Mr. Money in the Bank and proceeded to have a widely applauded series of PPV matches with Dean Ambrose. He became the focal point of the Authority and went on to have a classic triple threat match with John Cena and Brock Lesnar at the Royal Rumble.

The Coupe de grace came at Wrestle mania when he injected himself into the main event featuring Lesnar and Roman Reigns owing to his Money in the Bank privilege and walked out the WWE World Heavyweight Champion to a thunderous ovation.

Rollins went on to hold the title for over 200 days which included successful title defences against Cena, Reigns, Ambrose, Sting and Randy Orton to name a few. During the course of his reign, he transformed himself from being the ‘Future of the WWE’ to becoming the ‘Man’.

Rollins’ title reign would end in an anti-climax after getting injured in a house show in Dublin and being forced to vacate the title. But rest assured that once he is back, Rollins can look forward to leading the WWE into the next decade as the company’s leading singles star.

#2 Edge

Edge would capture 11 world titles during his career

Edge is a textbook example of how a wrestler should evolve in the WWE.

Initially making his mark as one-half of the legendary Edge and Christian tag team, the Rated R Superstar went on to become one of the greatest singles superstars in WWE history.

Making his debut in 1997, Edge soon aligned with Gangrel and Christian and the trio became known as ‘The Brood’. However, the true potential of the two Canadians came out after they ditched Gangrel and took on a cocky, fast-talking persona of ‘The Chairmen of the WWE’.

Their TLC matches with the Hardy Boyz and the Dudley Boyz revolutionised the tag team division and Edge was soon a whopping seven-time tag team champion.

There was a lot of uncertainty over splitting up such a talented tag team but when the inevitable happened in 2001, Edge smoothly transitioned himself into singles superstar – winning the United States and Intercontinental championships in no time.

The decision to branch Edge out as a single wrestler was irrefutably vindicated in 2005 when he captured the WWE championship for the first time. He would win a total of 11 World titles in the WWE over the course of legendary feuds with the likes of Cena, The Undertaker, Jeff Hardy and Batista.

In fact, when injuries forced Edge to retire in 2011, he had captured a total of 31 major championships in the WWE – 17 singles titles and 14 tag team titles!!! A truly versatile sports entertainer indeed.

In a scenario quite unlike other tag teams that split, his former partner Christian would taste World title victory as well (twice) making the Canadian duo the best tag team partnership to branch out as successful singles stars in the WWE.

#1 Shawn Michaels

Shawn Michaels would become the face of the WWE during the mid-nineties

The undisputed number one. That moment when Michaels sent his partner Marty Jannetty through the glass of Brutus Beefcake’s Barbershop in1991 not only signalled the end of the popular Rockers tandem but also heralded the coming of age of the new brash face of the WWE.

The Rockers were quite over with the crowd as an entertaining tag team duo and with the team never having tasted an official tag team championship victory, there were people in the WWE ‘s top brass who felt that the split shouldn’t have come that soon.

Good thing that Vince McMahon wasn’t one of those guys.

The transformation into a singles heel brought out a whole new edge to Michaels’ character and he soon became the ‘Showstopper’. In a short amount of time, Michaels became the darling of the WWE fans who loved to hate him or vice versa.

As he once said, Michaels was ‘attitude’ before it became a catchphrase and he proceeded to have amazing feuds with the likes of Bret Hart, Razor Ramon and the Undertaker. He would win two Royal Rumble matches and would pioneer the ladder match concept before capturing the WWE Championship on multiple occasions as well.

HBK’s brazen and controversial attitude helped the WWE to transition itself from a family oriented product to the new edgier stuff that fans became crazy about. Michael’s DX faction regularly went over the top in their antics and made the WWE relevant in pop culture once again long after the Hulk Hogan wave had passed.

Michaels would drop his title to Stone Cold Steve Austin and retire from in-ring competition in 1998 owing to a back injury. His personal life would drop to new lows during his years away from the squared circle, but he would return in 2002 a reformed man, having accepted Christ into his life.

Michaels would solidify his reputation as one of the greatest performers of all time during his second singles run as well that included another amazing series of matches with the likes of Triple H, Kurt Angle, Chris Jericho and the Undertaker.

His old partner Jannetty would become a one-time Intercontinental champion, but would never capture the heights that his former tag team partner achieved in singles competition