10 Totally Wasted Wrestling Factions
Good performers plus brotherhood and unity doesn't always equal greatness.
Safety in numbers has long been an idea that humanity has clung to, and being a form of performance art that dramatically mimics the real world professional wrestling has grappled with factions since the day it was born. The stable truly is a staple of professional wrestling.
Going way back you have family factions such as the Vachons and the Cormiers, before the boom period of the 1980s saw legendary groups like the Four Horsemen take over. The success of the New World Order meant that the Attitude Era could also be ironically coined the Stable Era, as gang warfare was the norm.
The sheer amount of stables in pro wrestling history guarantees there have been many duds. For every nWo you have the Magnificent Seven, for every Ministry of Darkness you have the Oddities. Bad ideas are generally bad ideas, regardless of whether the group is led by Ric Flair or The Jackyl.
But what of those factions that could have given us so much more? Pro wrestling history is littered with the coming together of men and women for good causes, only to be struck down by that mightiest of offensive moves, the pen of the booker.
Here are 10 wrestling factions that were well and truly wasted opportunities.
10. Kai En Tai
Making their WWF debut the night after WrestleMania XIV by attacking Taka Michinoku, the group known as Kai En Tai had been working together for years prior in Japan. Originally comprised of Terry Boy, SATO and Shiryu, Taka Michinoku and Shoichi Funaki soon joined them and they experienced moderate success.
Despite being attacked by them in their WWF bow, Taka soon joined forces with his former teammates. They soon became nothing more than a comedic afterthought, famously threatening and coming close to causing a permanent separation between Val Venis and his most prized physical possession. I'm sure Vince McMahon found it hilarious.
The sad truth is that the group was horrifically under-utilised in WWF to a mix of their size and, depressingly, their nationality. In WWF, the group was made up of Taka, Funaki, Dick Togo (formerly SATO) and Mens Teioh (Terry Boy). All four were tremendous performers, and if the WWF had decided to take their light heavyweight division seriously the group could (and should) have acted as a legitimate heel threat within it.
As it was Togo and Teioh left fairly swiftly, leaving Taka and Funaki to move on as a comedic tag team known only for terrible overdubs. A waste of talent for sure.