Fantasy Booking WWE Money in the Bank 2021: Tag Team Ladder Matches

Continuing on with this year’s fantasy booking for extra Money in the Bank briefcases (part 1 here), let’s focus on the question “What if the tag team division had a ladder match?”

There aren’t enough Superstars left to pick from to make a women’s division match here, unfortunately. That division is bare bones and even if you counted NXT women’s tag teams, it would mostly just be them and Mandy Rose/Sonya Deville, so it’s not worth discussing. Hopefully, next year will be a different story.

As such, this will focus entirely on just the men’s tag team options from Raw and SmackDown at this very moment. I’m also sticking to this year’s idea of eight competitors, which means eight tag teams in this scenario.

With that in mind, I hereby present to you my breakdown of how I personally think this would go down, and I invite you to do the same in the comments below!

List of Potential MITB Competitors

Here’s what we’re working with for our potential options on Monday Night Raw:

1. The current champions, AJ Styles and Omos, are out of the running.
2. The New Day is ineligible as Kofi Kingston and Big E are busy elsewhere on the card.
3. RK-Bro is a no-go since Riddle is in the true ladder match.
4. Not only is John Morrison also in the ladder match, but The Miz is injured, ruling them out.
5. Lucha House Party
6. Mace and T-Bar
7. Shanky and Veer
8. The Viking Raiders

SmackDown’s contributions are the following:

1. Dominik Mysterio and Rey Mysterio are ineligible as they’re the current champions.
2. The Street Profits are up in the air, as Montez Ford hasn’t been seen in several episodes.
3. The Usos may be up in the air, as Jey Uso has been out of action in recent weeks, too.
4. Alpha Academy
5. Apollo Crews and Commander Azeez
6. Dirty Dawgs
7. Shinsuke Nakamura and Rick Boogs

Picking the eight tag teams is both easy and difficult. Most of the options are already decided, so it’s just a matter of the unknowns (which, naturally, WWE would have more information about than what we’re working with, so we wouldn’t be in the dark about whether or not Jey Uso or Montez Ford was available to use in any way.)

Narrowing Down the Field

Here’s what I’m thinking would make the most sense:

• Alpha Academy
• Apollo Crews and Commander Azeez
• Dirty Dawgs
• Lucha House Party
• Mace and T-Bar
• The Usos / Mansoor and Mustafa Ali / Shanky and Veer
• The Street Profits / Shinsuke Nakamura and Rick Boogs
• The Viking Raiders

Without knowing about The Usos and The Street Profits, you need backup ideas. Obviously, the best case scenario is for all of the teams in bold. However, if The Usos and/or The Street Profits are unable to compete, you can fill their spots with two of the other three teams.

With Mansoor and Mustafa Ali, they’re not an official tag team. Given how they’ve interacted recently, though, there’s solid ground they would make more sense than even Shanky and Veer, who haven’t appeared much and would be better off staying out of it until WWE wanted to properly push them.

MITB Winner and Plans

If Alpha Academy had a stronger presence, they could be a fun act with this. However, Otis still has some stink on him from botching the last Money in the Bank (not his fault, mind you), so I’d stay away from that.

Crews has the Intercontinental Championship. That renders this a waste to put it on that team.

Dirty Dawgs have had their fair share of the spotlight. I don’t think anyone would go nuts for their victory or really bother to track the trajectory of that cash-in.

Lucha House Party? Not credible enough. Sorry, guys.

Not a chance for Shanky and Veer, nor Boogs and Nakamura, as both teams wouldn’t even ideally be in the match.

Frankly, I don’t think The Viking Raiders would need something like this. They’ve proven they can just win a No. 1 contender’s match and earn a title shot anyway, which is stronger for their characters than carrying around briefcases.

The real options here are: 1) Mace and T-Bar, 2) Ali and Mansoor, 3) The Usos, and 4) The Street Profits.

Between those, I’d lean more toward The Usos. Being able to win this imaginary Money in the Bank scenario and cross it off their bucket list makes sense, as they’re one of the most prolific and important tag teams in the past decade, having already reached Hall of Fame level. Plus, they’re so often booked to lose in order to protect Roman Reigns that they need to score some legitimately important victories to reestablish their credibility and offset those beatings.

On top of that, The Usos as heels would have no problem cashing in on The Mysterios and stealing the tag titles away from them. That’s not something you could properly do with The Street Profits, even though they’d have more fun with the aesthetic of the briefcases.

Back to Reality

Naturally, WWE has never approached this idea. It’s certainly not happening this year, which is why this is all just a fantasy.

But since we’ve had the tag titles defended inside Elimination Chamber, there’s room to play around with this concept in the future.

What happens if a tag team member tries to cash in, but the other doesn’t want to? Is it valid? Do both teammates have to be present?

Like with all these thought exercises, that’s where you get to have your fun by telling us your ideas of what you’d do in this scenario. Go ahead and drop a comment below to keep the discussion going!