Breakup Breakout / Pro Wrestling

"Jannetty tried to dive through the window to escape!"

When a wrestling tag team or stable are inevitably split up, it's almost a guarantee that this trope will come into play.

NOTE: In the case of a female wrestler or valet becoming the breakup breakout to the male wrestler(s) she managed/teamed with, that is Smurfette Breakout.

United States

• The Rockers are the most infamous example of this in professional wrestling, so much so that they were the former Trope Namers. Shawn Michaels is one of the biggest stars of all time. Marty Jannetty hasn't been relevant in years, and what he's most famous for is being the man that the left behind half of any broken up tag team is compared to. The impact of this breakup is so prevalent that to this day, the rise of any hot new Tag Team will inevitably result in speculation about which member will end up as "The Jannetty" when they inevitably breakup. There are some wrestling fans who attribute the floundering of modern tag team wrestling (both within and outside the WWE) to this speculation of betrayal the moment two wrestlers form a pair and, by extension, the Rockers. In some circles, the phrase "Shawn Michaels killed tag teams" is uttered without irony.
  • In Jannetty's defense, relegating him to irrelevancy while pushing Michaels wasn't the original plan. At the time The Rockers broke up, Michaels and Jannetty were considered equals in ability and charisma, and the then-WWF expected to get two singles stars out of the breakup. However, a couple of poorly timed injuries hamstrung Jannetty's biggest pushes and his partying lifestyle ended up getting the better of him. And considering Michaels' antics at times in his career, that's saying something.
• In 1996, Jannetty teamed with Leif Cassidy to form the New Rockers. The team wasn't successful and Jannetty ended up being released after losing a WWF Championship match to his former partner Shawn Michaels. Cassidy was sent to ECW after the breakup and went back to his original persona as Al Snow. He became a main eventer in ECW and was a moderately successful mid-carder during the Attitude Era, while the high point of Jannetty's post-WWF career was losing a PPV match for the WCW Cruiserweight Title against Chris Jericho.
• During their NWA and AWA days, Terry Bollea and Ed Leslie were a tag team of kayfabe brothers, known alternately as Terry & Ed Boulder, and Hulk & Dizzy Hogan. Bollea, of course, became Hulk Hogan. Ed Leslie became best known as either Brutus "The Barber" Beefcake, or "that guy with no talent who only has a job because he's friends with Hogan".
  • Fortuitously, Brutus Beefcake would go on to play host to the break up of the Rockers, as Shawn Michaels's heel turn happened on his barbershop set (note the barbershop pole in the image above).
• Sting and Ultimate Warrior formerly tag teamed as the Blade Runners. This isn't really an example; although Sting was ultimately the bigger star, both were World Champions at their peak and Sting benefitted from longevity and backstage stability that Warrior didn't have. What is an example is an earlier venture of theirs: "Flash" and "Justice", as they were then respectively known, came into wrestling as part of a five-man group of bodybuilders-turned-wrestlers known as Power Team USA. The other three members ("Commando" Mark Miller, "Glory" Garland Donoho, and "Fury" Ed Brock) went on to do absolutely nothing. Jim Ross joked that they retired to "Parts Unknown."
• Kevin Nash spent most of his early career in various undercard tag teams in WCW, and went on to more success than any of his tag partners, most of whom became little more than footnotes in the business.
  • He started as Steel, one half of the Master Blasters alongside Iron (Cory Pendarvis). After Iron left the business only a few months in, Blade (Al Green) was brought in to replace him. Al Green's biggest star turn afterward would be pretending to be a dog in the dark late days of WCW.
  • After a short singles run as Oz, Nash became Vinny Vegas and went back to tag teaming. During this period he teamed with the Diamond Studd and Diamond Dallas Page - and although those two were very successful by Jannetty standards, neither of them had quite the success that Nash did.
  • Nash's final tag team was with Big Sky. He then went jumped ship from WCW to WWF, where he went from undercard tag guy to singles main eventer. While Nash is undoubtedly the more successful in the wrestling world, Big Sky - under his usual pseudonym, Tyler Mane - went on to be a rather successful character actor. His biggest role was as Sabretooth in X-Men (a role that was originally slated for Nash, but WCW weren't willing to lose him long enough for the shooting).
• The Hart Foundation - OK, this team had Bret Hart, who went on to become a multiple-time world champion and hall of famer, and... Who?^note It was at first his brother-in-law Jim "The Anvil" Neidhart, later on it was his brother Owen Exactly^note "Who" was a gimmick used by Neidhart in 1996.
• Edge & Christian have multiple examples of this relating to them.
  • Christian has had an extremely successful career and would have been the Breakout had he been teaming with anybody besides Edge, who became one of the most successful wrestlers of all time. Edge has had three times the amount of World titles Christian has, and in a bigger company at that. Christian has held more independent titles and is a first generation Grand Slam Champion, the one accomplishment that Edge never managed (though he did manage to become a second generation Grand Slam Champion, albeit retroactively).
  • They've both gone on to far, far more success than their original leader in the days of the Brood, Gangrel. Despite being the leader of the Brood, Gangrel was never expected to become a future superstar like E&C though - he was brought in so they got the benefit of working with a veteran.
  • During their indy days, E&C were part of a stable called THUG Life which also contained Rhino Richards, Joe E. Legend, Bloody Bill Skullion and Zakk Wylde. Rhino (without the "Richards") had a successful career and held the ECW World Title although he didn't come close to the success that E&C did. On the other hand, Legend only had a short stint in WWF as Just Joe. Neither Skullion or Wylde ever did anything important enough to warrant having a Wikipedia article, but Skullion bounced around the Canadian indies for a decade and a half while Wylde last wrestled in 2002.
  • Edge and Christian is also a "rivals" version of this with the Hardy Boyz and The Dudley Boys, at least on a collective scale. Of those three teams, E&C have gone on to have the greatest amount of success, sharing over a dozen world titles between each other and one of them even being inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame. The Hardy Boyz would've been their equal, especially Jeff Hardy, who is arguably the most popular singles performer out of all three teams, had it not been their notoriously troubled personal lives, which put them in second place. The Dudley Boys are in a firm third place, and while they've had their share of singles success (particularly Bubba / Bully Ray, who is multi-time world champion in TNA), they've always been more concerned with their success as a team than any individual accomplishments. Considering how E&C won both of the trio's TLC matches, those matches become oddly prophetic in hindsight.
  • This plays out into its own storyline in All Elite Wrestling: After reuniting briefly with Edge in the 2021 WWE Royal Rumble, Christian would sign to AEW while Edge would continue having a solid run in WWE, forming and subsequently getting booted from The Judgment Day before fading into the midcard and having one final match with Wrestling/Sheamus. Meanwhile in AEW, Christian would become a rising star in his own right, culminating into his widely acclaimed 2023 heel run as the TNT Champion with Luchasaurus and a newly turned Nick Wayne at his side. And just as Christian's reign has hit its stride, Edge debuts at WrestleDream to try and rekindle one last tag team run before he retires. Instead of accepting, Christian violently rejects Edge's offer, and thus begins their AEW feud.
• The Hardy Boyz is a peculiar one because when it comes to titles, Jeff has been far more successful than Matt. Jeff was WWE Champion (and a two-time World Heavyweight Champion later on) while Matt had the WWE "Platinum Phoenix" version of the ECW Championship, which is relatively meaningless in comparison. When they first broke the team up, it looked like Matt was going to be the Breakout with his popular "Version 1" character while Jeff struggled with personal demons. Then the Version 1 gimmick was hamstrung by WWE creative while Jeff got his life back together and began ascending the card. The debacle in which Matt's girlfriend Lita dumping him for Edge started a downward spiral in Matt's career that would culminate in him faking suicide and getting temporarily blackballed from both WWE and TNA. Jeff, who in addition to being generally well liked by both marks and smarks, also brought in a periphery demographic of teenage girls, and wa incredibly successful while Matt struggled. Although in 2014 Matt began to get his life back together and redeem his name in pro wrestling, it still looked like he'd be stuck in his brother's shadow indefinitely. Then in 2016, Matt began working on the Broken Universe angle, and this new character would become so wildly popular that it got TNA legitimate mainstream press. This also lead to the Hardys reuniting in both TNA and WWE and additional tag title reigns for the brothers. Matt eventually took a release from WWE to go to AEW where he concluded the Broken Universe and went back to the "Big Money Matt" character he'd played on the indy scene while Jeff was demoted to extra in WWE. Going strictly by title history, as of this writing (August 2021) Jeff still has Matt beat when it comes to accolades, and he is still the more well-known of the two, but it could be argued that Jeff never reached the levels of popularity that Matt did and that Matt is in fact the Breakout.
• The Radicalz: Eddie Guerrero and Chris Benoit went on to become major stars, while Dean Malenko and Perry Saturn did not. Though only the latter two are still alive.
  • Saturn was previously the breakout star of The Eliminators, his tag team in ECW. Saturn had runs in WCW, where he was a very successful midcarder, and later WWE, where he was initially successful but slid down the card. It's still a lot more than his partner John Kronus ever got. Ironically while the Eliminators were active Kronus was seen as the better half of the team.
• "Stunning" Steve Austin and Brian Pillman of the Hollywood Blondes. Austin became six time WWE champion and the only man to win the Royal Rumble thrice. To be fair, the main reason for this was Pillman's untimely death at age 35. At the time, both Pillman and Austin were both very over high mid-carders (Austin being only a few months into developing the foul-mouthed, beer-swilling, anti-hero we know him as today). In fact, Pillman's death came at the beginning stages of a feud between the two.
• The Thrillseekers: the early career team of Chris Jericho and Lance Storm. Storm had a highly respectable career - he briefly held every undercard singles title^note United States, Cruiserweight, Hardcore in WCW at the same time. However, he's easily overshadowed by Jericho, who found huge success in multiple promotions, and even got buzz outside of wrestling as the lead singer of his band Fozzy.
• Beer Money, Inc. is made up of two Breakup Breakouts in itself:
  • America's Most Wanted - One would be a very popular homegrown face in Impact Wrestling; the other was Chris Harris, who went on to become IWC phenomenon Braden Walker, who is only remembered for telling a knock knock joke during his insanely brief one-month run in WWECW.
  • Team Canada - Bobby Roode is easily the biggest star of the bunch, became the longest reigning Impact World Champion before his popular "GLORIOUS" run in WWE. Eric Young has been a solid worker as both heel and face throughout his career and also won the TNA world title.^note His runs with a comedy gimmick having a mixed reception notwithstanding. Jack Evans didn't do too badly but never saw other national TV work until his appearances in AEW. Teddy Hart's career was marred by backstage issues, while Petey Williams continued to be a solid indie regular and the originator of the Canadian Destroyer. Meanwhile, Johnny Devine, Tyson Dux, A-1, and Ruffy Silverstein have all done nothing.
  • As for Beer Money itself, for the reasons listed above, the breakout is easily Roode. Though James Storm hasn't had a bad recent career himself working Impact and NWA.
• D-Generation X - Not a total example as Shawn Michaels was already a big star when the group started, but of the other members of the group only Triple H discovered any real long-term success. Road Dogg got stale and couldn't get over either as a singles wrestler or with other tag team partners. Billy Gunn did only a little better than his fellow New Age Outlaw, as his popular team with Chuck Palumbo flopped pretty hard after their pseudo-homosexual partnership gimmick ended, though in the twilight of his career he would claim the AEW trios title alongside The Acclaimed. Chyna had one of the most notorious falls from grace in wrestling history, and X-Pac became the Trope Namer for X-Pac Heat.
• During the last days of WCW, AJ Styles was half of a tag team called Air Raid with a guy named Air Paris. He even briefly renamed to Air Styles. After WCW closed, Styles was scooped up by TNA but Paris wasn't. Styles is a multi-time world champion in Impact and WWE, whereas Paris hasn't had so much as a stint in any of the "big seven" (WWE, AEW, TNA/Impact, ROH, CZW, PWG, Chikara). Paris has done well for himself in some NWA promotions but then, Styles has done so too.
• The Steiner Brothers: Scott Steiner became a WCW Champion in 2000 and worked in the WWE and in TNA, while Rick mostly retired from wrestling after WCW closed and currently serves on a local school board. Ironically, before the split, Rick Steiner was considered the better of the two, but Scott gained career longevity with the "Big Poppa Pump" persona, whilst Rick's own later attempt to turn heel flopped.
• Harlem Heat: Booker T becomes a six-time, six-time, six-time, six-time, six-time, six-time World Heavyweight Champion. Stevie Ray floundered in the nWo's B-Team, did some color commentary, then quietly retired. Nowadays he's working for Booker at his wrestling school.
• The British Bulldogs broke up when Dynamite Kid had to retire due to chronic back injuries and a falling-out with his tag partner (and real-life first cousin) Davey Boy Smith. Smith renamed himself to The British Bulldog and had a fairly long run as an upper midcarder in WWF. However, outside of WWF/E, Dynamite Kid is a legend for all the right (great wrestler, great feuds, many accomplishments, made lots of money), and wrong (Napoleon syndrome, domestic disputes) reasons.
• CM Punk is a six-time World Champion and was one of the top faces of WWE, and his return to wrestling seven years later caused him to instantly became the most over wrestler in AEW. Thus, he turned out to be the Michaels of many groups:
  • His debut in professional wrestling was as part of a tag team called The Chick Magnets alongside CM Venom in a tiny promotion that ran shows out of a warehouse called Lunatic Wrestling Federation. Venom never made it out of the LWF.
  • The Second City Saints: Colt Cabana (aka Scotty Goldman) got released from WWE after a brief run as a jobber, was 2-time NWA World Champion during one of that title's periods of irrelevancy, and eventually got signed to AEW, fell in with the Dark Order for a while, though was quickly taken off TV and shuffled off to the revived ROH (supposedly because of Punk's tumultuous relationship, though those rumors caused many problems). The third man in the stable, Ace Steel, was forgotten to history aside from being "that guy who trained CM Punk", being the jobber who played Donald Trump in one of Raw's all-time worst segments, and possibly biting Kenny Omega.
  • The New Breed (2007): Although he was a part of for all of two weeks, by that point everyone knew that Punk was the only one of them that had any future in the company as a wrestler. Matt Striker was the only one who lasted a notable length of time, and he did so as a TV personality, having not wrestled in years by the time he was released in 2013. Elijah Burke has had reasonable success in TNA as the Pope D'Angelo Dinero, and is easily the second-most successful member of the group, but could never compare to the levels Punk reached.
  • Punk's sole tag team championship in WWE is with Kofi Kingston, who he retained a close friendship with (both on and offscreen) even after their partnership ended. Kofi has had a successful career himself, being one of WWE's signature midcarders and part of the wildly popular stable The New Day, and even accomplished something Punk never did — becoming a WWE Grand Slam Champion. All that being said, general agreement is that Punk is the overall bigger star, being widely regarded as one of the greatest professional wrestlers of all time.
• Buddy Roberts has been on both ends of this trope. He teamed with Jerry Brown as the original Hollywood Blonds, but when they split up, Brown stayed in the Florida indy scene and Roberts went on to form The Fabulous Freebirds with Michael Hayes and Terry Gordy. Once the Freebirds formed, they were notorious for their refusal to break up - if a promoter tried to split the team all three of them would leave the promotion. That being said, Roberts was primarily on the team as the "workrate guy" - Michael Hayes was a great talker but a poor worker and Terry Gordy was a great worker, but as the big man of the team his ability to sell without losing his mystique was limited. When the Freebirds finally split up - on their own terms - it was with Hayes and Gordy turning face on Roberts. Roberts retired shortly after the Freebirds split while Hayes and Gordy went on to mixed success elsewhere.
• "Dark Angel" Sarah Stock:
  • She is the breakout to Christie Ricci from their "Sexy Girls" tag team. Ricci has done pretty well for herself and has been featured on television specials in Mexico, but Dark Angel is considered one of the greatest luchadoras of all time.
  • However, she found herself on the receiving end with Rosita in Las Primas. Rosita was mostly more obscure, until she found a role in WWE as Zelina Vega and became much better known.
• MNM: Johnny Nitro became John Morrison, won the ECW World Championship back when it meant something, joined another successful tag team with The Miz, was an upper-midcarder on WWE SmackDown, left WWE to become Lucha Underground Champion, AAA Mega Champion and Impact World Champion, and rejoined WWE in 2019. Joey Mercury... had a few spots returning to ROH, and later joined CM Punk's Straight Edge Society and was part of a two-man team of enforcers (with Jamie Noble) for Seth Rollins.
• John Morrison and The Miz — everyone figured Miz would be lost in the midcard on Raw after the tandem broke up while Morrison moved on to bigger and better things on SmackDown. However, The Miz became the breakout star of the two, winning the WWE Championship in 2010. Morrison left the company the following year. Morrison has had a respectable WWE and non-WWE career (see above) but Miz is a very well-known WWE lifer and future Hall of Famer.
• WCW had Three Count, a boy band stable consisting of Evan Karagias, Shannon Moore, and Shane Helms. Of the three, Helms has had a moderately successful WWE career as The Hurricane and as Gregory Helms, Moore was mostly a jobber in WWE but had some tag team success in TNA, and Karagias hasn't done anything. Although Helms' status of Breakup Breakout came during his WCW days, when he started using the Vertebreaker as his finisher and was given an elaborate entrance and custom theme song.
• This happened with Curt Hawkins and Zack Ryder as the latter was established as a hot new heel on ECW with his memorable catchphrase and theme music, while the former ended up part of a go-nowhere tag team with Vance Archer. Ryder would widen the gap when he debuted his Web Original series, Z! True Long Island Story. his internet following turning him face and getting him a US Title run in 2011. Hawkins was cut in 2014 after years of jobbing, and came back to WWE in 2016, but never came close to the heights his former tag team partner was reaching at the moment, let alone years earlier. Brian Myers and Matt Cardona were both released in 2020. While both went to Impact Wrestling, Cardona remained the more relevant as he reinvented himself by playing up his success from WWE while trolling the hardcore wrestling fanbase and winning multiple titles. Which includes the NWA Worlds Heavyweight Championship.
• Even if he had moderate success, Billy Gunn hit superstardom in comparison to what happened to Bart Gunn from The Smoking Gunns. Bart Gunn won the (real fighting) Brawl for All tournament, then lost to Butterbean in 30 seconds and was immediately fired. This ended his US career, though he did have a nice run in Japan; turns out legitimately knocking out "Dr. Death" Steve Williams, one of the legendary gaijin wrestlers, gives you a lot of "real fighter" cred there.
• The Rock started out as part of The Nation of Domination alongside Faarooq, D'Lo Brown, The Godfather, and Mark Henry. Rocky of course first became arguably the most popular wrestler of all time, and then made it into Hollywood, eventually reaching A-list status. The Godfather never really did much in the ring (although his post-Nation gimmick made him a favorite during the Attitude Era, leading to induction in the WWE Hall of Fame), and D'Lo Brown was a successful upper midcarder during the Attitude Era, but never broke into the main event and his star faded around 2003 or so. Mark Henry won the World Title in 2011, putting him in a clear second place.
• The World's Greatest Tag Team: Charlie Haas and Shelton Benjamin. After the team split up Shelton got three consecutive victories over Triple H, became a three time Intercontinental champion, a former United States Champion and was the highlight of the Money in the Bank match at every WrestleMania (he, tied with Kane, appeared in more MITB matches than any other superstar). Charlie Haas was primarily used as a jobber-to-the-stars and occasionally part of an unsuccessful makeshift tag team. He was even released and re-hired a couple times before being released for good in 2010. A strange subversion here in that the WGTT as a tag team actually has more drawing power than either Haas or Benjamin separately. When they reunited in Ring of Honor, the fandom rejoiced.
• Not to say that Chuck Palumbo has had an extraordinarily successful career, but he's had a better one than that of his tag partner in The Perfect Event, Shawn Stasiak. Palumbo had a good run as WWE Tag Team Champion with Billy Gunn, was later part of the WWE incarnation of the Full Blooded Italians, and was part of the Voodoo Murders stable in AJPW. Stasiak got to play a gimmick where he was deliberately clumsy, and now works as a chiropractor.
• The British Invasion's breakout was Nick "Magnus" Aldis, though it didn't look like the case at first. Rob Terry was the first to get a singles push, even going over Magnus (who was taken off TV) and becoming Global Champion, before settling into an "insert muscle man here" role in various teams (Robbie E, The Menagerie...) until his 2015 release. Doug Williams had a fairly strong run in the X Division until he left in 2014. Magnus, however, worked his way up from ignominy, from teaming with Samoa Joe to being Dixie Carter's chosen World Champion, and after his release ended up being the face of Billy Corgan's relaunched NWA.
• WWE had the Spirit Squad, a five-man stable consisting of male cheerleaders Kenny, Johnny, Mitch, Nicky, and Mikey. Out of the five only Nicky has been continuously employed in the WWE, having been repackaged as Dolph Ziggler, enjoying singles success and eventually becoming a Triple Crown champion. Ironically, the whole Spirit Squad gimmick was used to put over Kenny. That worked to his disadvantage, as he forever became associated with the gimmick. Even years after the breakup, Kenny Dykstra was still the butt of Spirit Squad chants and jokes. Mikey, although never as popular as Ziggler, had a solid career on the independent scene as Mike Mondo. Kenny and Mikey eventually returned to WWE in 2016, but they were brought it basically as a joke to Ziggler for his past in the Spirit Squad, and they still never came close to Ziggler's popularity.
• When The Acolytes/APA broke up in 2004, Bradshaw reinvented himself as the Corrupt Corporate Executive John "Bradshaw" Layfield, when he held the WWE title for almost a year. Ron Simmons (to be fair, a former WCW Champion before the APA) was basically reduced to being the "walk on and say DAMN" guy.
• Legacy: Ted DiBiase was initially planned to be breakout with him turning face against Randy Orton and he had starred in the Direct to Video sequel to The Marine. The plans got derailed when Orton's popularity caused him to be booked as a face against DiBiase and Rhodes. After WrestleMania 26, Ted was given his father's gimmick and failed to get over even with Virgil and later Maryse by his side. Meanwhile, Cody Rhodes was drafted to Smackdown and became "Dashing". Cody's been a mainstay of the show, winning the WWE tag team championship for the fourth time with Drew McIntyre, being in World title contention, getting another gimmick overhaul, and winning a WrestleMania match against Rey Mysterio. Rhodes won the Intercontinental Championship on an episode of SmackDown on August 12, 2011 and went on to become one of the top heels in WWE. DiBiase left wrestling in 2013, while Rhodes later found success as a face and with a new heel gimmick "Stardust" before leaving in 2016. Since then? ROH World Champion and Executive VP of his own promotion All Elite Wrestling before finally returning to the WWE, main events WrestleMania thrice, and finally winning the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship^note the unification of the WWE Championship and the WWE Universal Championship; now called the Undisputed WWE Championship at Night Two of WrestleMania XL.
• The American Males: Marcus Bagwell would turn on his tag team partner Scotty Riggs to join the New World Order. The newly rechristened Buff Bagwell would become a capable hand in the nWo and would enjoy a run in the upper midcard upon the group's dissolution until WCW was bought out by WWE. Scotty Riggs would join The Flock as a job guy for Raven and toil in obscurity upon that group's dissolution. After Riggs jumped from WCW to ECW, he was put in an angle with Rob Van Dam and it looked like he might avert this, but the match between Riggs and RVD was underwhelming, and ECW folded not too long afterwards.
• Extreme Expose included Layla and Kelly Kelly, the latter arguably the most popular diva on the roster. The other girl, Brooke Adams, got released just after they split. While Brooke did go on to be a very respectable wrestler in TNA, she never did anything in WWE, leaving her the Jannetty.
• In 2004, the tag team "Los Guerreros" was broken up after Chavo Guerrero Jr. attacked his uncle Eddie. Their feud culminated at the Royal Rumble, with Eddie winning. About a month later, both of them became successful at No Way Out, with Chavo winning the Cruiserweight Championship and Eddie winning the WWE Championship. Chavo never quite became as successful as his uncle in the long run (Eddie was already more popular anyway), but was nevertheless a good wrestler.
• Despite showing equal charisma as singles stars, when Team 3D broke up, Brother Ray became Bully Ray and one of the top heels of the company whereas Brother Devon languished in the midcard, only getting a very brief push as TV Champion (the push coming a month after he won the title and being forgotten about after two months). When their contracts expired in August 2012, Ray stayed and Devon left, both with good reason: Ray was in the Bound For Glory tournament for the World Title, and Devon's Television Title was getting no television time. He came back, but ultimately as a lackey for Bully Ray as part of Aces And Eights, and came nowhere near Ray's level, as Ray became TNA World Champion, and when Devon chose to retire and become a backstage producer for WWE, Ray became a third of ROH's Trios Champions with The Briscoe Brothers.
• GLOW
  • The tag team of Hollywood and Vine. After GLOW closed, Vine did nothing of note. Hollywood stayed in the wrestling business in various capacities, and is very easy to find on the Internet to this day, although most of her work is in pretaped and often NSFW matches.
  • T&A was made up of Tina Ferrari and Ashley Cartier. Tina spent years in various women's promotions before arriving in WWE in 1999 as Ivory and would go on to become a 3x WWE Women's Champion. Ashley never accomplished much beyond her and Tina's run with the GLOW Tag Team Titles.
    • Tina/Ivory could actually be considered the breakout member of the entire GLOW roster, as she's the only one to go on to have a respectable career in wrestling after the promotion closed its doors, and the only one to wrestle for WWE.
  • Of Thunderbolt and Lightning, Lightning showed up more as a singles wrestler and continued to show up in post Glow promotions such as the short lived LPWA, sometimes as Cheryl Rusa.
• When Men on a Mission broke up, Mabel became King of the Ring, and then had midcard runs in WWE as Viscera and Big Daddy V. Mo on the other hand never did anything of note again - he spent several months as Mabel's manager Sir Mo, and then quietly disappeared never to return to WWF/E. That said, Mo is still alive; Mabel/Viscera died in 2014.
• Claudio Castagnoli started out in the European indy scene as part of a quartet called Swiss Money Holding with Ares, Marc Roudin, and Don Heavy. Obviously, Claudio is the breakout - he got a WWE job as Antonio Cesaro (later shortened to just Cesaro), and after being let go by WWE moved to AEW, again using his real name. Ares was a fairly successful indie wrestler in the States before retiring in 2014. Roudin stayed semi-active in Europe through the early 2010s before retiring. Heavy only lasted a couple years and was retired by 2004.
• Same thing with The Kings of Wrestling. Cesaro actually made it to the main roster in the WWE and has had several title reigns, primarily in the tag team division. Chris Hero, on the other hand, was on NXT twice (in addition to competing on its UK brand during his second time in the company) and got released both times without ever making it past said brands. Ironically, Castagnoli was at best Hero's equal and at times the lackey of the Kings, one time unwillingly.
• The Nexus. This was a fairly large stable and provides plenty of examples, so here goes:
  • Daniel Bryan, the first to be kicked out of the group, is also the first one to win a world championship and in less than four years became the most over wrestler in the entire company, even beating out CM Punk and John Cena. Now, he's arguably the most over wrestler since Stone Cold and the Rock.
  • In second place is latecomer Husky Harris, who was repackaged as Bray Wyatt, formed The Wyatt Family, and got a huge push, though in 2014 he racked up a nasty PPV losing streak that hurt his momentum and credibility pretty badly. Fortunately, he regained momentum around 2016 thanks to a revived Wyatt Family and won the WWE title in 2017. And in 2019 he was successfully repackaged again, becoming insanely over as a Depraved Kids' Show Host with a Wrestling Monster alter ego "The Fiend", eventually capturing his second world title a few months after his reintroduction. However, his push didn't last, and he sadly died prematurely in 2023.
    • Speaking of The Wyatt Family, Erick Rowan is the only one who didn't win a singles title throughout their WWE tenure. Bray Wyatt and later addition Braun Strowman were the only ones^note Randy Orton was already a multi-time World Champion when he joined in 2016 to win World Titles, with Wyatt winning it three times while Strowman winning it once. Strowman is technically also a Triple Crown Champion^note He's a 1x Universal Champion, a 1x Intercontinental Champion, and a 2x Tag Team Champion. However, the Universal Championship isn't included as an official requirement for the Triple Crown despite being officially recognized as a World Title, in addition to being a (Greatest) Royal Rumble and Money in the Bank winner (both of which he achieved in 2018). The late Luke Harper was a 1x Intercontinental Champion and, following his departure, a 1x AEW TNT Champion before his untimely death.
  • Third place goes to Wade Barrett, the former leader and ironically the one the stable was suppose to propel to superstardom, who became a five-time Intercontinental champion and a King of the Ring (2015) winner before leaving the company in 2016. He returned as an announcer in 2020, although he is no longer an active wrestler.
  • Skip Sheffield, who was kicked out after breaking his leg (causing him to be out for well over a year), was repackaged as the uber-monster Ryback. Ultimately his success was short-lived, and by 2014 he was only on TV as a tag team jobber with Curtis Axel. Though he had his push rebooted by the end of the year and became the Intercontinental Champion in 2015, he pissed off management by complaining about his salary and place on the card before being taken off of TV and eventually released in 2016.
  • The only other member to have any real success was Michael McGillicutty, who joined the group months into its existence and eventually became Paul Heyman protege Curtis Axel. See Ryback's section above on where Curtis Axel ended up, though. The rest are either released or jobbers, the most prominent being Heath Slater, who formed the heel stable 3MB with Jinder Mahal and Drew McIntyre. However Slater is still a very popular Ensemble Dark Horse despite his release from WWE in 2020 and has continued to be popular in Impact and the indies.
    • And speaking of 3MB, Jinder Mahal and Drew McIntyre, who got hired back later and surpassed Heath Slater in the company: Jinder bulked up, became the Modern-Day Maharaja, and held the WWE Championship for 170 days; after kicking around the indies and TNA for awhile, McIntyre returned and had a reign as NXT champion, then teamed with Dolph Ziggler and won the Raw Tag Team Championships, then wins the 2020 Royal Rumble, then finally the WWE Championship itself from Brock Lesnar at WrestleMania 36, and would become a two-time World Champion by the end of the year by reclaiming it from Randy Orton (incidentally the man Jinder beat to win the title).
• Brian Kendrick:
  • In various WWE developmental leagues, there was the team of Spanky (Kendrick) and American Dragon. Kendrick could obviously never surpass the uber-popular Bryan, but he did get appearances in Pro Wrestling ZERO1 out of it, and an expy in Fire Pro Wrestling as a result.
  • He was the breakout in London and Kendrick (although London was a more established solo star at the time of their formation); he hung around for about a year after the team split, and got a decent singles push as The Brian Kendrick. Paul London, meanwhile, was released just a few months after the team was broken up, and had the best of his career in ROH.
• Damien Sandow got his start in WWE under the name Idol Stevens as half of the Teacher's Pets. He's had a far more successful career than his tag partner KC James.
• Eric Alexander, later known as Mr. E, was a perfectly acceptable mid card wrestler in IWA Puerto Rico and WWC on his way to the main event who equaled or out shined all his tag team partners everywhere he went, excepting his Puerto Rican Nightmares tag team partner Eddie Colón in WWE. While Primo's WWE career is hardly the stuff of legend, "Eric Escobar" was seemingly called out of developmental just to reintroduce Vickie Guerrero to WWE TV and to mock his pre WWE success.
• Paige joined WWE's FCW and formed the "Anti-diva Army" with Sofia Cortez. They broke up when NXT replaced FCW and it seemed like Sofia was going to leave Paige behind. Then Cortez got injured and released while Paige became NXT's first Women's Champion, and later a star on the main roster. And, after being forced to retire prematurely due to injury, came out of retirement to sign with AEW as Saraya and win that company's women's world title in 2023. Ivelisse, these days, is known more for attitude problems than any level of success.
• While it's unfair to call anyone the breakout of The Shield (all three became huge stars), Seth Rollins has overshadowed many of his previous alliances. He was this to the Black and the Brave in AAW (thanks to Marek Brave's injury and first retirement), and to the Age of the Fall, which propelled him into Ring of Honor's main event scene while Jimmy Jacobs languished in the upper-midcard. He's even this to the entire cast/roster of Wrestling Society X, which, while boasting what would become major names on the independent circuit, could compare to his success in the WWE. The closest would be Matt Sydal (Evan Bourne), who would at least get signed to the WWE and actually win a title during his time there.
• Speaking of Shield members, Jon Moxley (Dean Ambrose) also outshined his tag partner in the Switchblade Conspiracy, Sami Callihan. Callihan did get signed to NXT as Solomon Crowe with a promising black-hat hacker gimmick, but for whatever reason WWE bookers never got behind Crowe and used him so rarely that he requested his own release. Callihan would go on to become Impact World Champion and run his own promotion in Ohio. Ambrose became a major star in WWE, becoming one of the most popular wrestlers on the roster, winning numerous titles and even becoming world champion. And after leaving WWE due to horrendous booking, he became one of AEW's mainstays, winning that company's world title multiple times and also becoming the first (and so far only) wrestler to have held more than one of AEW's three singles titles.^note Mox has held the World Championship and International Championship; he has yet to claim the TNT Championship. You could argue that Ambrose/Mox is also this to CZW as a whole, as he has outstripped nearly every major wrestler of that promotion in success and is the first CZW alumnus to become world champion in WWE.^note However, he's not the only CZW alum to have held AEW's world title; MJF has held both promotions' world titles.
• For an extreme example, Roderick Strong started in the Florida independent scene with his "brother" Sedrick. Roderick went on to success in TNA, Ring of Honor, and WWE NXT, while Sedrick faded into obscurity in the Florida indies.
• Raven's The Gathering in TNA has an obvious Jannetty in Julio Dinero, who faded away after leaving TNA. Raven was an established star before forming it, Mickie James became one of the hallmark female wrestlers of the 2000s, holding both WWE women's titles and the TNA Knockouts Title, and CM Punk became a star that needs no introduction.
  • CM Punk may be the breakout compared to them but Julio Dinero and Chris Hamrick, are the breakouts from the Hot Commodity stable compared to EZ Money and Elektra, while James is definitely the breakout from her BBOW tag team partner Candie.
• The Beautiful People featured three successful members: Madison Rayne (multi-time Knockouts Champion and bona fide future Hall of Famer, now in AEW), Velvet Sky (also a multi-time Knockouts Champion, now retired), Angelina Love (also a multi-time Knockouts Champion, but plagued by issues like visa troubles cancelling her push and terrible storylines). They also featured Lacey Von Erich (ate pins for the group and vanished after being released in 2010).
  • Velvet Sky is herself a breakout from another tag team. Born Jamie Szantyr, she was a tag team champion as Talia Madison, with her "sister" Tiffany, in the adult-oriented Women's Extreme Wrestling. Talia saw the success mentioned above while Tiffany faded into obscurity. It's possible that there are people who watched Velvet in TNA who didn't even know of The Madisons.
• Jay Lethal was originally a member of Special K (a Ring of Honor stable full of rich kid druggie ravers) under the name Hydro. The fact that Hydro clearly had a lot more ability and potential than his stablemates was repeatedly addressed in-universe, and he was eventually adopted by Samoa Joe as his protege. His career went upwards from there, with a long run in TNA followed by a return to ROH as one of its top wrestlers. As for the other full-time Special K wrestlers though, who knows what Izzy, Dixie, Angel Dust and Deranged are up to these days? As of 2016, mostly semi-active or inactive.
• Crazzy Steve outlasted the other members of The Menagerie (Knux, Rebel and The Freak), and went on to become a tag team champion alongside Abyss as half of Decay. That being said, Knux and the Freak were well-established veterans at that point.
• In 2013, NXT featured a Girl Posse Power Stable called "the Beautiful Fierce Females" or "BFFs" consisting of Summer Rae, Charlotte Flair and Sasha Banks. Since the group's split, both Flair and Banks became pillars of WWE's revitalized women's division and won the Women's championships multiple times (NXT and main roster combined), while Summer never won any title and her main roster tenure is mostly remembered for her being the valet of Fandango and the disastrous Gooker-winning Love Dodecahedron Story Arc involving her, Dolph Ziggler, Rusev, and Lana before getting injured in 2016 and released a year later.
• The Funkadactyls, the Tag Team of Naomi and Cameron. The former became a two-time (SmackDown) Women's Champion and a notable player in WWE's revitalized women's division, while the latter became infamous for her troubles outside of the ring (and her prior Q & A stint on Tough Enough with host "Stone Cold" Steve Austin).
• The defunct WWECW brand functioned as a proto-NXT, a place where new talent was sent to in order to get TV experience. Of its entire roster throughout its run, the most successful alumnus is CM Punk, who became a star comparable to John Cena and Randy Orton. Second place is a tie between The Miz and Sheamus, who both went on to become World Champions and have been on the roster for a long time, but never came close to Punk’s standing. After that is Bobby Lashley, whose first stint in WWE was extremely brief but mostly spent near the top of the card and then eventually came back a decade later to became a proper main eventer. Then John Morrison, who never grabbed a higher title but quickly became one of WWE’s most popular stars. And finally Jack Swagger, who did briefly rise to the main event but fell back down quickly afterwards. Guys like Christian, Matt Hardy, Mark Henry, Big Show, and Kane don't count, as they were well-established long before WWECW existed and were only sent there to carry the show for the sake of the younger talent, nor do the ECW originals like Rob Van Dam and Tommy Dreamer, who were mostly there for the nostalgia factor.
• Domino of Deuce 'n Domino, even though he was the first to be released. Deuce would adapt the name Sim Snuka and would join the Legacy stable, but that flopped and he was soon released, retiring later. Domino returned to Ohio Valley Wrestling and found success under his real name of Cliff Compton.
• The Sumerian Death Squad, made up of Dutchmen Tommy End and Michael Dante, were one of the most successful tag teams in the European circuit during the early 2010s. The team split when End went over to WWE in 2016. He quickly found success rechristened as Aleister Black, winning the NXT Title and becoming one of the brand’s top stars, and now leads the House of Black in AEW as Malakai Black. Dante stayed in Europe to compete as a singles star and has maintained a relatively low profile.
• In training at the Monster Factory, the team of Flexx Appeal was made up of Tommy Maclin and Mike Spanos. Maclin became WWE's Steve Cutler and Impact's Steve Maclin (see below for what he did), and Spanos didn't become much of anything.
• Originally known as The Interrogator, Kurrgan became the breakout star of The Truth Commission, eventually retiring to act in such prominent films as Sherlock Holmes (2009) and 300. Recon (Barry Buchanan) later got a run as Big Bossman's sidekick Bull Buchanan and he and The Goodfather held the WWE World Tag Team Titles as Right To Censor. Sniper (Luc Poirier) went back to Europe and retired.
• Dan Spivey went through this a few times. He and Scott Hall were a tag team in Florida as American Starship, Eagle and Coyote. Hall, of course, went on to success in WWE and WCW. Spivey also fell victim to this with both of his teammates in The Skyscrapers, Sid Vicious and "Mean" Mark Callous, who became The Undertaker.
• While the women better known as Ivory and Lita had made anonymous appearances as members of The Godfather's Ho Train before they were officially introduced, Victoria is the breakout from the entourage. She and Mandy (Frostee Moore) were the only ones to be named while part of the group, as part of the "Save The Hos" campaign against Right to Censor. Victoria went on to success in WWE and TNA, Mandy didn't.
• WCW in 2000 introduced a group called The Natural Born Thrillers, who were a weak Ur-Example of what The Nexus would be ten years later. With the bulk of the group (Shawn Stasiak, Chuck Palumbo, Mike Sanders, Reno [Rick Cornell] and Johnny the Bull) retired, and Sean O'Haire deceased, Mark Jindrak qualifies as the breakout of the group, though it took him a while. After washing out of WWE, he went on to New Japan Pro Wrestling and eventually to CMLL in Mexico, where he reinvented himself as "The Golden Eagle" Marco Corleone, and won the CMLL World Heavyweight Title in 2017.
• New Jack became a bigger star than his Gangstas teammate Mustafa, though D'Lo Brown, who started as part of their entourage in SMW, has achieved far more than either of them.
• Eddie Kingston became this to his The Wild Cards teammate "Black" Jack Marciano in CHIKARA, due to Marciano retiring.
• Doom (Ron Simmons and Butch Reed) broke up after The Fabulous Freebirds (Michael Hayes and Jimmy Garvin) defeated them for the WCW World Tag Team Titles at WCW WrestleWar 91, February 24, 1991.^note In the kind of unbelievably dumb decision that could only have come from WCW, The Steiner Brothers had already defeated the Freebirds for the titles at a TV taping six days earlier, thus giving the Birds a negative title reign of -6 days. Reed disappeared in May 1991 and returned at WCW Clash of the Champions XX on September 20, 1992, when Simmons was over a month into his reign as the first African-American WCW World Heavyweight Champion. That night, Simmons successfully defended his title against Cactus Jack. Reed and The Barbarian defeated Barry Windham and Dustin Rhodes. Shortly after this, Cowboy Bill Watts fired Reed for missing a flight. Simmons went on to success in WWE and was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2012. Reed never worked for a major promotion again.
• Ernest "The Cat" Miller was the breakout of his team with Glacier. While he never won a title in pro wrestling, once he split away from Glacier he got to show a lot more personality, first as a heel, then as a face.
• There was a team of Unrelated Brothers in the New England-based ICW/IWCCW promotion called The Madisons (unrelated to Velvet Sky's team above), T.D. and GQ Madison. They were 3x ICW/IWCCW Tag Team Champions. T.D. later made his name in ECW as Tommy Dreamer, GQ disappeared.
• Lanny Poffo was the Jannetty to his brother Randy Savage. Savage became a 6x World Heavyweight Champion (2x WWE, 4x WCW). Poffo never won a title outside of a territory or independent promotion.
• CHIKARA's Juke Joint Lucas Calhoun is a breakout by default. He arrived in 2014 as Volgar, a follower of Jimmy Jacobs in The Flood, the amalgamation of Heel groups out to destroy CHIKARA. He was often seen with a second masked guy named Callux (the first of two), who never wrestled a match in CHIKARA since Eddie Kingston destroyed him under Jimmy Jacobs' orders.^note See And Then What? for more.
• Wesley Blake is possibly the most prolific career Jannetty for how many partners have left him behind:
  • After the team of Blake and Murphy broke up, both men were stuck on jobber-to-the-stars duty for over a year. Then Buddy Murphy was moved into 205 Live where he became one of its top stars and would win the Cruiserweight Championship, then up to the main roster, and in August 2019, put in a main event angle with Roman Reigns and has scored an upset victory over Daniel Bryan, and after a feud with Aleister Black, became the "disciple" for Seth Rollins's "Messiah" gimmick and won the Raw Tag Team Championship with him.
  • After being an NXT afterthought for many years Blake would form the Forgotten Sons alongside Jaxson Ryker and Steve Cutler, a group that remained stagnant and unpopular until a surprise call-up to the main roster and tag title feud with The New Day in 2020. However, just as they were gearing up for a SmackDown Tag Team title match, Jaxson Ryker decided to make a politically-charged post on social media during the height of a politically tense time in the United States^SpecificallyHe made a very pro-Trump and anti-Black Lives Matter Movement rant online during the absolute peak of said movement. The Forgotten Sons were immediately removed from TV after this and their push and feud with The New Day were given to the team of Cesaro and Shinsuke Nakamura who proceeded to get the Tag Title reign that was likely supposed to be for Blake and Cutler. The Forgotten Sons group was essentially erased and never mentioned again. After a few months, Ryker - despite his deeds breaking up the stable - came off best in the short term after returning as The Heavy for Elias (though since his release he has largely been a leper in the industry as he's doubled down on far-right extremist thought).
  • Blake eventually returned alongside Cutler as King Corbin's "Knights of the Lone Wolf"^note How he's still a "Lone Wolf" when he has Knights is anyone's guess, which may be why the group was dropped so fast. They didn't last, as a little over a month after the gimmick debuted, Cutler was released in February 2021 over COVID protocol, with Blake leaving a couple of months later. Even then Cutler joined Impact Wrestling, began to show a new more exciting side of himself as Steve Maclin, and became their World Champion, while Blake threw his chips in with...
  • Control Your Narrative - EC3's faux-Fight Club art project that was briefly a wrestling promotion - had as its main pre-established regulars EC3 himself, Braun Strowman, Austin Aries, and Blake. Strowman got re-signed to WWE, EC3 got a steady job with NWA, and Austin Aries continued working dates around the world. Even the first and last CYN trainee, Fodder, got signed to NWA, while Blake seems to have (understandably) put family ahead of wrestling.
• The tag team of A.R. Fox & Liam Ruff who won the Evolve Tag Team titles. After Evolve became defunct in June 2020 and was bought by WWE, Ruff (now Leon Ruff) signed with NXT, initially used as a jobber before a shock upset win of the North American title from Johnny Gargano of all people and enjoying a good run there. Fox however, continues to enjoy success on the indy circuit, so both are doing well. And Ruff's doing better than his other partner, Adrian Alanis, who seems to have disappeared entirely.
• A bit of trivia regarding Homicide's wrestling career - the first big company he worked was Ring of Honor, and his first four matches there were as half of the Natural Born Sinners alongside Boogalou. Boogalou never went on to do much of anything while Homicide would become one of the biggest indy stars of the 2000s and 2010s. However, not only did Homicide never throw Boogalou through a barber shop window, they'd have super-sporadic reunions throughout the years.
• The Riott Squad: Liv Morgan went on to win the 2022 Money in the Bank Women's briefcase and then cashes it on Ronda Rousey later that night to win the SmackDown Women's Championship. Her stablemates Ruby Riott and Sarah Logan were released years prior. The former currently competes in All Elite Wrestling as Ruby Soho, while the latter would return to WWE in 2022 as Valhalla.
• Heavy Machinery. Although Otis's Money in the Bank win was a fluke and he later lost the case to The Miz he did later go on to win the Tag Team titles and, as of 2023, remains a solid midcarder on RAW as part of Alpha Academy, appearing every week. His partner Tucker? He was released soon after his Face–Heel Turn and has mostly wrestled in small indy promotions since.

United Kingdom

• When the Norfolk Dolls broke apart, both Britani Knight (as Paige was then) and Melody started to slide nearly into jobber status but Knight bounced back next year and went on to win multiple title belts in many countries and get invited to SHIMMER while Melodi wouldn't get a big break for another five years.
• British independent star Paul Robinson found himself to be roadkill for two stables he was part of. First there was the Leaders of the New School, in which Robinson found himself overshadowed by Zack Sabre Jr. and Marty Scurll (who still use the Leaders name as a duo today). He at least has done better than the fourth member of the group, Nikko Brixton, who quickly vanished from wrestling after he left them in 2008. Later, Robinson was a member of the Swords of Essex, best known as the stable that launched the career of Will Ospreay. That being said, "The Amazon" Ayesha Raymond, one of the other members, has done OK for herself, but certainly not at Ospreay levels.

Japan

• New Japan Pro-Wrestling has some examples.
  • NJPW's 1984 dojo class speaks for itself: Masahiro Chono, Keiji Mutoh, Shinya Hashimoto, Jushin Thunder Liger, Masakatsu Funaki... and that class also contained Akira Nogami, who's been around major Japanese promotions but always been just "there".
  • Club 7 was a tag team formed by Giant Silva and Giant Singh who acted as Masahiro Chono's bodyguards. After the team's break up, the two took separate ways: Giant Singh went to became WWE's uber-hyped giant, The Great Khali, while Giant Silva (a former WWF wrestler himself) joined Fighting Opera HUSTLE and tried his hand in Mixed Martial Arts before fading into the darkness. Silva, though considered the less bad wrestler of the two by a good margin, unofficially retired in 2011 and only a few remember him, mostly in México and Japan, while Khali still enjoys his WWE fame and made the WWE Hall of Fame in 2021, and would have reached legend status in India even without it.
  • When Yoshi Tatsu and Hiroshi Tanahashi were teaming as the New Japan Dragons, the basic observation was that Tanahashi was the more talented of the two, and the common speculation was that Tanahashi would be signed to WWE while Tatsu would fade into obscurity. One out of two: Tatsu was signed, being used only as a lower carder while Tanahashi became a megastar in his absence. Tatsu only managed to avoid his fated obscurity by being reattached to his former tag partner.
  • One very notable example is the tag team of No Limit. Tetsuya Naito has (despite a rocky start) became one of the most popular and dastardly heels in New Japan's history, forming and leading one of the promotions top heel stables Los Ingobernables de Japon and winning every major singles championship belt he was eligible for (the IWGP Heavyweight, IWGP Intercontinental and NEVER Openweight titles). Yujiro Takahashi went on to become a member of the Bullet Club... and that's about it.
• Toryumon and Dragon Gate have many examples.
  • The stable Crazy MAX, consisting of core members CIMA, SUWA, Don Fujii and TARU, helped to put Toryumon on the map in the year 2000. C-MAX split up for good in late 2005, not too long after the promotion rebranded to Dragon Gate. Of the four members, CIMA is the clear breakout, having consistently been the top billed wrestler in Dragon Gate. Don Fujii may be a distant number two, having held the Open the Dream Gate Title (Dragon Gate's top title) once but been primarily an undercard act. SUWA went on to become a midcarder in NOAH and retired in the early 2010s, and TARU moved over to All Japan Pro Wrestling where, although he did become the promotion's Big Bad, he remained primarily a managerial figure. The only member of C-MAX to really rival CIMA's success is Shingo Takagi, who only joined the stable for the last couple months of its existence. The worst example, however, might have been Jun Ogawauchi, who had his tenure cut short by a seemingly career-ending injury after which he re-emerged in the lowliest of the independent circuit.
  • The minion stable Mini Crazy MAX, was also a case. SUWAcito is the clear Michaels here, as he became KAGETORA and received main event pushes in almost every promotion he was before concluding in a more comfortable position in Dragon Gate. Mini CIMA, played by Takuya Sugi, became a mult-gimmick high-flying sensation of the mid-2000s and might have actually had the greatest resonance of the four, but his career took very irregular twists and never really fulfilled its promises. Small Dandy Fujii became Rasse, a sort of perennial Satellite Character buried in the mid-card forever. And TARUcito, barely nobody remembers him at all.
  • Dragon Gate had a stable called the Royal Brothers, with Anthony W. Mori, Henry III Suguwara, and Phillip J. Fukamasa. Fukamasa barely lasted an entire year, leaving Mori and Suguwara a tag team. Then Suguwara turned heel on Mori (and started using his real name Takuya Suguwara). The breakup was intended to be Mori, as he won the feud handily, but after Suguwara was released for unrelated reasons, he reinvented himself on the indies while Mori slid down the card. When Suguwara came back, he was a much bigger deal in the company than Mori had ever been.
  • Despite the presence of Mini Crazy MAX, Toryumon X's star stable was Sailor Boys, a boy band-themed trio composed by Taiji Ishimori and the Sato brothers. After X's fall, Ishimori went to mainstream promotion to mainstream promotion and became one of the most consistent juniors in Japan, while the Sato brothers moved to the greatly decadent Michinoku Pro Wrestling and there they became indy wanderers specialized in garbage wrestling and unpleasant comedy. Nowadays, even people who have both Ishimori and the Satos in their radar might be unaware, and shocked to learn, that they were once part of the same batch. Forgot Flanders Could Do That is in play here, as back then, before they started turning into garbage wrestlers, the Sato were actually decent technical wrestlers and played very believable sidekicks to Ishimori.
  • After leaving Dragon Gate, the star villainous stable Aagan Iisou divided in two factions, which we could call the Michaels (Shuji Kondo, YASSHI and Takuya Sugawara, who either jumped to mainstream promotions or became indy gods) and the Janneties (Toru Owashi, who moved to Dramatic Dream Team and mostly slipped out of the radar, and Shogo Takagi, whose bad health forced him to make increasingly sporadic indy appearances before vanishing).
  • Yet another Toryumon example similar to Aagan Iisou was Los Salseros Japoneses, an evil salsa band led by Takeshi Minamino who opposed the Sailor Boys. The group was composed of its main and most famous division, formed by Minamino, Mango Fukuda and Pineapple Hanai, and a filler duo that never managed to become their equals, Banana Senga and Passion Hasegawa. Each of them had a Breakup Breakout: Minamino had a Big Bad tenure in Michinoku and later formed a solid tag team with Maguro Ooma, but Hanai wandered aimlessly between storylines and promotions, and Fukuda drifted away to even smaller indies (aside from a brief AJPW tenure in 2014) interrupted by health problems; among the second team, Senga landed a tag team with Tsutomu Oosugi and had some success as indy juniors, but Hasegawa disappeared.

Mexico and Puerto Rico

• Trio Fantasia was a trio of child-friendly characters that made their name in the Pavilion Azteca promotion before becoming major indie draws and eventually ending up in AAA where they were broken up. The member who got the singles push was Super Muñeco, who had a good run in AAA and remained popular even after his ring ability failed him. Super Ratón wasn't so lucky, being relegated to minor shows, while Super Pinocho (the weakest worker, and the one who'd gotten himself fired to break up the team)^note Basically, he attempted an unplanned unmasking of La Parka in order to get a scoop for his photographer friend who had a grudge against AAA. How this would benefit him is not clear. having to retire and lay low for a while after the split.
• El Bronco #1 and Rico Suave, Los Compadres, were both very successful on the Caribbean circuit in their own ways before and after teaming up. However, in 2003 they took on two valets, Black Rose and Destiny. Black Rose became one of Puerto Rico's top women wrestlers in the wake of La Tigresa's arrest (rivaling Génesis, La Amazona and Killer Kat), managed several other successful wrestlers besides Bronco(Los Fugitivos de la Calle, La Zona Illegal, Huracán Castillo Jr), got television work outside of pro wrestling and has done...decently in other regions. Destiny disappeared.
• In a "rivals" version of this, Rey Mysterio Jr. and Psicosis. They debuted together, feuded all through Mexico, Japan, ECW, WCW... then 2001ish WCW released all their luchadores except for Mysterio (and Juventud Guererra). Mysterio later got scooped up by WWE and eventually became a Grand Slam Champion. Psicosis, on the other hand, got a short WWE run and nothing to show for it. When they met in a Royal Rumble, Mysterio just kinda backhanded Psicosis out of the ring. Mysterio's still a major superstar. Psicosis isn't as big in his native Mexico as Mysterio is in the US.
• The Latina Loca Mamis saw Mercedes Martinez beating Shelly Martinez in career terms. Shelly got the first look in WWE and TNA, yes, but was never seen as an effective competitor like Mercedes was. Mercedes also had the better staying power.

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