NWO at 25 gives us cause to remember other great heel trios of sports

Twenty-five years ago today, the New World Order was formed at WCW’s Bash at the Beach.

It’s honestly an almost-inarguable top-five moment in pro wrestling history, and one that set off a chain of events leading to the apex of the WCW vs. WWE (then WWF) Monday Night Wars of the late 1990s. Then, of course, the gap widened in the WWE’s favor, to the extent that Vince McMahon subsequently bought out WCW in 2001 right before WrestleMania X-Seven.

But Hulk Hogan, having been the centerpiece of the art form in the 1980s rock-‘n’-wrestling boom, and even a main eventer with the WWE into the 1990s, left the company in 1993, later joining WCW in 1994. He had still been an older version of the same guy people began growing tired of in his first two years with his new company, leading to the decision to famously turn him heel at the 1996 Bash, where he was revealed to be the mystery third-man joining newcomers Scott Hall and Kevin Nash, creating one of the infamous trios we’ve seen in sports and or entertainment.

If you were a traditionalist, it might’ve irked you, because Hogan was never supposed to become a bad guy — not to mention the bad guy. (Well, save for Hall, of course.) But, the nWo notably grew into one of the most over factions in wrestling history, and to this day, you’ll see the occasional nWo t-shirt worn by someone at an airport, a mall, a basketball game, and probably even a porno if you look hard enough.

Their infamy became influential as it became cool to like the bad guys, a sensibility that resonates with wrestling fans to this day. It’s also spread to other sports, which brings us to other divisive and successful trios we’ve seen in athletics since the nWo’s July 7, 1996, formation.

(Also, this ain’t a ranking, so go debate someone else if you’re picky about the order!)

When Chris Bosh joined Dwyane Wade in Miami, we could already theorize about how competitive they’d be in the Eastern Conference. But when LeBron James made his notorious decision to join them, it literally changed sports and sports media for the next decade. In the party to address the American Airlines Arena, the LeBron-Wade-Bosh trio was even introduced to us in a WWE-style celebration to the haunting sounds of the instrumental to underground hip-hop classic ‘Simon Says’ by Pharoahe Monch. Do you know what the opening bar Pharoahe Monch says in ‘ Simon Says,’ dawg? That’s what The Heatles wanted you to do, and you did. Mission accomplished.

Making the list instead of The Shield, because we liked them very quickly for continually power bombing Ryback and John Cena, is the current Roman Reigns-run faction on SmackDown! The best thing going in the WWE has been the angle involving Reigns and The Uso twins, which has been unfolding on Friday nights. Reigns had been shoved down the throats of wrestling fans as a babyface for years before finally embracing a true heel role beginning last summer. The Tribal Chief has been the WWE Universal Champion for over 300 days going back to last August and is The Head of the Table for one of the company’s most captivating factions in years. Unfortunately, one Uso twin, Jimmy, was arrested for his second DUI in two years, as was reported yesterday. Hopefully, he gets the health care he needs ... and a Lyft account.

Lionel Messi, Neymar Jr., and Luis Suárez played together on FC Barcelona from 2014 to 2017. In that time, the trio won multiple La Liga championships, the 2015 UEFA Champions League, and the FIFA Club World Cup that same year, among other titles during that span. They also scored 122 goals in a season and broke their own record with 131 goals the following year. Excellence generally is easy to dislike by the average consumer, which gets heightened here because of the characters involved. Messi is widely loved, but gets criticized simply for being as great as he is, and is often in the shadow of Diego Maradona, who brought Argentina a World Cup in 1986. Neymar’s bordered on a bad-boy image for years, and the recent sexual assault allegations that led to a Nike split didn’t help. And Suarez is a biter, not in a way that Eminem bit AZ on his debut album Infinite, but literally biting people.

Ruby Riott, Liv Morgan, and Sarah Logan were the rare three-women stable in the WWE, debuting in 2017 and running until Logan’s release early during the COVID pandemic. Unfortunately, Riott was also relieved of her duties just last month.

Still, the Riott Squad was one of the backbones of the division, while a stable, as the foil to many different women competing across the company. They continually attacked fan favorites, like Becky Lynch, Sasha Banks, and Bayley, which is an obvious heel tactic despite the abundance of Liv Morgan fan pages. (Understood.) It probably should’ve resulted in a Ruby Riott Championship combined with Moran & Logan reigning as Tag Team Titlists, but they were memorable nonetheless.

In a way, Eddie Guerrero would’ve been so proud of these dudes. As far as players go, the most notable were José Altuve, Carlos Correa, and Alex Bregman. What more needs to be said about the Houston Astros cheating scandal at this point? Maybe, as former Miami Marlins President David Samson said on his and Dan Le Batard’s platforms before, other teams got mad because the Astros did it better? Everyone’s trying to do what they can to advance, and we pointed fingers at the Astros because they got caught following an immense level of success. And, well, the shit they did was pretty explicit. Sounds a lot like pro wrestling, as does their championship, which has not been vacated. It’s like Vince McMahon is booking Major League Baseball, for better or worse … might be better, actually.

You either really love these dudes or you really don’t. Tom Brady and Rob Gronkowski are still out here winning Super Bowls in Tampa Bay, but in New England, them combined with head coach Bill Belichick was a recipe for you to rejoice or roll your eyes. Much like an excellent wrestling faction who would always come out on top, there was no in-between on how you felt about them. They won six Super Bowls between 2002 and 2019, and Brady & Gronk added a seventh several months ago. Every single wrestler or group who has won this many times over, or some equivalent, is hated on by those supporting others chasing them, or they grow even more beloved by their respective base. Also, winning while on a team nicknamed The Patriots is some real wrestling heel shit. It took us a while to really respect the WWE-version of Kurt Angle, for example.

One of the best and most wrestling hateable trios in the art form has been the Santos Escobar-led Legado Del Fantasma faction in NXT. The Mexican-born Escobar formed the group with Joaquin Wilde and Raul Mendoza last June and has shaken up the Black and Gold brand ever since. Escobar held the NXT Cruiserweight Championship from May 27, 2020, through April 13, 2021, making for the second-longest run in the title’s history. Escobar perfectly plays the villain role in a way that avoids lazy comparison to fellow Mexican Alberto Del Rio, thankfully, and his abilities should set him up to be a star on the main roster when the time comes … unless the WWE does what the WWE does.

Kevin Durant, James Harden, and Kyrie Irving, much like the other aforementioned groups, provide little in-between for how you feel about them. You either really wanted them to win a title this year, or you really didn’t. You either love that they got together, or you really hated it. And chances are, you might even be secretly glad they lost in Round 2 despite the injuries, and if so, you might be an asshole, but you’re probably made to be a wrestling fan. Excellent in one’s craft could be something to get behind, but when it’s all assembled on one team, stacking the deck against whomever you root for and or your general ideologies, that’s when you get annoyed at the sight of whoever may be on the other side. That said, the Durant-Harden-Irving crew is one that strikes emotions, making them eligible for easy placement here, regardless of whether or not they eventually get a title.

Let’s stay with the Durant teams because y’all really despised it when he joined the Golden State Warriors. You really really really did. The three here would have to include Durant and Draymond Green, who is as WWE as anyone in the NBA could possibly get in many regards. From there, you can’t leave off Steph Curry, and Klay Thompson could be one of the inevitable fourth guys that joined the nWo later on, like Syxx. Curry gets more of a unanimous approval rating in the media than he does among fans and NBA Twitter, but he’s also so damn good, making him quite easy to dislike to the casual observer. In any event, they got together and won two titles right away. They honestly probably would’ve won a third had the ACL of Thompson and the Achilles of Durant not imploded against the Toronto Raptors in the NBA Finals two years ago. Secretly you might be glad that happened, too, you jerk.

Vince McMahon had (and needed) a ton of help when fucking with Stone Cold Steve Austin during the Attitude Era, and early on, the meant assistance from his stooges, The Stooges, Paterson N’ Brisco. Pat Patterson and Gerald Brisco were legitimately backstage producers and spent years on the creative side of the WWE, but were also prominent on-camera as a tandem alongside McMahon in the late 1990s. It was at a time where wrestling was bigger than it had ever been and probably ever will be. Steve Austin had the universal approval rating of a for-sale AK-47 at a small-town Walmart. McMahon, Patterson, and Brisco were more reprehensible than wearing a Kansas City Chiefs home uniform at a bullfighting event. Thus, we had gold seemingly every Monday Night.

In every wrestling promotion, there are just dudes you can’t stand, regardless of whether or not they’re actually championship-worthy or anything resembling it. For generations, Duke has recruited players that a bunch of y’all can’t stand and love to see lose for understandable reasons. As YouTube was growing and the internet increasingly became something we couldn’t live without, some of the early stuff, dangerous as it was, stuck with you in a way that’s almost admirable. A lot of college basketball viewers can’t stand Duke, and anytime they lose before the Final Four, there are people nationwide who rejoice. They used to call Greg Paulus “Tea Bag” because … well … 

It wasn’t until the program started leaning into more one-and-dones that this faded a bit. People didn’t quite collectively despise Zion Willamson, RJ Barrett, and Cam Reddish the way people did Jay Williams, Shane Battier, and Carlos Boozer, or JJ Redick, and whomever, or Kyle Singler, Jon Scheyer, and Paulus. Luckily, Christian Laettner, Grant Hill, and Bobby Hurley came years before Hogan, Nash, and Hall.

It sounds like the plot to a show: An unapologetic Christian quarterback masks the sins of his apparently murderous tight end and their habitually rebellious head coach. This, in some regard, describes the big three from the University of Florida football program in the late 2000s Florida football program, Tim Tebow, Aaron Hernandez, and Urban Meyer. They, Tebow especially, is as divisive an athlete as you’ll find, and honestly, if he could wrestle a lick, he ought to give that a shot. Riley Cooper, Percy Harvin, both Pouncey twins, and a bunch of others who made it to the NFL, which could form its own nWo collective. Today, Tebow is playing for Meyer on the Jacksonville Jaguars, and Hernandez, well … you know.