Hello and welcome to part two of the comprehensive look at the life and times of the four time WWE Tag Team Champions, The New Day.

The Longest Reigning Tag Champs

   At Summerslam 2015, The New Day debuted one of their trademarks, Francesca, a trombone played by Woods to distract and annoy their competition. They made their way to ring playing “Empire State of Mind” with revised lyrics. They went on to win a fatal four way tag match and regain the titles they lost a month earlier.

   This reign would last for 483 days. They beat a who’s who of tag teams at the time, including The Dudley Boyz, The Usos, The Lucha Dragons, Gallows and Anderson and Cesaro and Sheamus, to name a few.

   But more important than that was the focus placed on the team throughout 2015. They became featured acts, usually appearing more than once every Raw, and interacting with main event stars. Many publications cited them as the best part of WWE programing that year.

   The New Day were constantly entertaining, and by Wrestlemania 32, they became fan favorites, facing The League of Nations and having a moment with WWE legends Mick Foley, Shawn Michaels and Stone Cold Steve Austin.

   The rest of the year was filled with entertaining antics, including an actual cereal from The New Day coming out, called Booty Os (and yes, I bought a box, ate the cereal, and proudly display it on my shelf).

   The New Day also took a serious turn, facing The Wyatt Family in a memorable feud that had a lot of great character moments.

   The rest of the year they mostly faced The Bar and Gallows and Anderson in lengthy feuds. They then became the longest reigning champions on the December 12 episode of Raw, winning two different triple threat tag team matches in the same night.

   They shattered a record held by Demolition for 28 years. They also have the longest combined reign with the Raw Tag Team Championship at 532 days.

Wrestlemania Hosts and the Superstar Shakeup

   By this point there were concerns about the longevity of the group. Some fans and critics thought the act had gotten stale, and were doubting if they could remain interesting.

   These fears were forgotten however, when The New Day were announced to be the hosts of Wrestlemania 33, and they had multiple segments during the show to hype up the crowd at the Citrus Bowl.

   They came to the ring to start the show in outfits inspired by Final Fantasy XIV. It was a thunderous crowd reaction and they also had the privilege of announcing the return of the Hardy Boyz to the WWE.

   The next night on Raw, Kingston got injured and had to miss about two months of TV time. The team was moved to Smackdown in the first Superstar Shakeup, and vignettes announced their move to the new home. They didn’t appear on Smackdown until May 30, 2017.

   The time off helped them rest and freshened up the group for their return. They made it known that they wanted to take the titles off then champions, The Usos. The two teams had several great segments and matches from June to October of that year, with a Hell in a Cell match that could’ve been a match of the year contender in my book.

   The New Day picked up two reigns with the Smackdown Tag Team Championship during that feud. Following the Hell in a Cell match a truce was made between the two teams and The New Day focused on Survivor Series.

   The group were the torch bearers for Shane McMahon’s brand, leading an invasion of Raw that caused Raw Tag Team Champions Seth Rollins and Dean Ambrose to lose their titles to The Bar.

   This started a rivalry between The New Day and The Shield that ended in a match at Survivor Series 2017. It was a fresh matchup that was a lot of fun, and only furthered the credibility of both groups.

The Future of The New Day

   After Survivor Series, The New Day went back into the Tag Title picture, participating in a four way match for the titles at Clash of Champions. They were not victorious.

   During this time, the group began the practice of force feeding pancakes to their opponents, commentators and fans. No one was safe. They went on to use the power of pancakes to save Kingston from elimination in the 2018 Royal Rumble. However, none of the teammates could win the match.

   Recently, the team faced Chad Gable and Shelton Benjamin in a solid series of matches to determine the number one contenders to The Usos titles. They won, and will face them for the titles at the next WWE pay-per view, Fastlane.

   I honestly don’t know where they go from here, I could see The New Day winning and maybe facing The Bludgeon Brothers at Wrestlemania. Or some sort of multi-team match to get everyone on the card. Maybe they’ll host the show again.

   One thing I’ve noticed is they really haven’t had that definitive Wrestlemania moment. They lost at 31 while still being hated for their gimmick. They lost a non title match at 32 and got beat up by legends, and while hosting 33 was cool, I’m sure they want to have a show stealing match. I know I want them to.

   An interesting idea would be to have them each go for singles titles and see if they could get any success there. It’s something new for them and keeps them featured on TV. I’d love to see one of them go against a heel Bobby Roode for the US title.

   Regardless, whatever they do, they’ll make it work and I’m sure I’ll enjoy watching them.

Come back tomorrow for the final installment in The New Day series, where I’ll go in-depth on what makes the group work so well and how they’ve become one of WWE’s most valuable assets.

Henry Wolski
Executive Editor