#FiftyMatches: Stealing The Show

Dudley Boyz v. Hardy Boyz v. Edge & Christian

WrestleMania 2000

Tag Team Championship

Ladder Match
April 2, 2000

2000 Pro Wrestling Illustrated Match of the Year

"...And what do you think of these young studs in the WWF?"

-Jim Ross

Like storm clouds gathering on the horizon, you could see this match coming. The definition of "high risk" in the World Wrestling Federation was being redefined by the Hardy Boyz, the Dudley Boyz and Edge & Christian.



For months, these three tag teams had been raising the bar. Towards the end of 1999, the Hardy Boyz and Edge & Christian put themselves on the map with an innovative tag team ladder match. At Royal Rumble 2000, the Dudley Boyz and Hardy Boyz were part of a punishing and memorable tables match.


All the pieces were in place for something special, and on this night in Anaheim, California, on the biggest stage the WWF could provide its performers, the landscape of tag team wrestling in the company and the industry changed forever. Jim Ross clearly expected something memorable as he prepared to call this match live. He started building expectations for what would follow even before all the competitors were introduced.

I don't have to tell you that most of the fans in attendance had never seen anything quite like this before. Just listen to them. The growing buzz from the crowd as the match goes on is one of the most enjoyable parts of watching it today. You don't even have to watch. You can hear the six men involved transforming into superstars. This was their debut performance at WrestleMania, and they took full advantage of their opportunity by stealing the show.

After WrestleMania 2000, fans never looked at the Hardy Boyz, Dudley Boyz and Edge & Christian the same way again. "T.L.C." and "T.L.C. II" would follow. This is "T.L.C. 0". The formula this match was built around was such a success, that it was basically copy and pasted twice over the following year with little variation on the structure of the match or the storyline leading up to it.


In the history of professional wrestling, this stands as a milestone for escalating violence and risk in the WWF. The impact reached into almost every corner of the industry and ushered in an age of "can you top this?" human self-sacrifice that could only last for so long. The WWF and its superstars could not surive the toll of trying to meet increasingly unreachable fan expectations. For a while, they tried. Then, they came to their senses and gave up.

Tag team wrestling at WrestleMania was never the same after this match. There were two traditional two-on-two tag team matches on the WrestleMania 2000 pay per view card. Not many fans remember Test & Albert v. Al Snow & Steve Blackman or Rikishi & Kane v. X-Pac & Road Dogg. The triangle ladder match, however, became the stuff of legend. It chased the traditional tag team format from WrestleMania for a decade. It wouldn't be seen again until WrestleMania XXVI (Big Show & The Miz v. John Morrison & R-Truth).

This match didn't just change tag team wrestling. It forever changed how WWF presents its biggest pay per view events. Because of the success of this match, bigger was now better. More was better. Those attitudes still hold true today in the form of every bloated, multi-competitor match that inevitably appears on a WrestleMania pay per view.

It's hard to say that a single match can change the course of professional wrestling, but when it comes to the triangle ladder match at WrestleMania 2000, you can build a pretty solid case.