How Good Were The Dudley Boyz Actually?
The Dudleyz are former WWE, ECW and TNA champions - but you can prove anything with statistics.
For those unfamiliar with this series - in which the much-debated legacies of key WWE wrestlers is explored in depth - here’s a refresher of the criteria.
In his book ‘Hitman’, Bret Hart establishes a system by which to rate the professional wrestler. He totals the value of three categories, the highest rating of which is 10: in-ring ability, promo skills, and look.
Bret said that Hulk Hogan, based on high numbers in the second and third categories, would achieve a score in the low 20s overall. Dynamite Kid, meanwhile, would score around a 10. You can probably gather that this score is not distributed equally across all three categories. In fact, if you’ve ever heard Tom Billington talk, he’d be lucky to escape with an overall minus number. The near-perfect wrestler - Bret helpfully cites a handy example here in Bret ‘Hitman’ Hart - would score close to 30. Kidding aside, if anybody not named Steve Austin is closest to the perfect rating, it’s Bret Hart in 1997.
This series expands upon Bret’s approach, incorporating additional criterion in order to build the case for and against various wrestlers who frequently crop up in the overrated/underrated debate.
WWE Hall of Famers the Dudley Boyz are one such act. The team regularly tops lists of the best tag teams ever, and it’s easy to grasp why. They won everything there is to be won. They worked themselves into various, very decent spots across a span of decades, plural. They boast (and indeed innovated) one of the best and most imitated tandem finishes ever.
But did they really spend all of that time putting in excellent, consistent work? They wrestled in some of the best matches in wrestling history - but how often did they reach those peaks?
How good were the Dudley Boyz, actually…?