WWE News: Should Air Boom Be Forced to Drop the Tag Team Titles?

The flurry of WWE suspensions continued yesterday when WWE.com announced that one-half of the WWE Tag Team Champions, Evan Bourne, was suspended for 30 days for his first violation of the Wellness Policy.

Bourne is the fifth WWE performer who has been suspended in the past four months, and he may be the sixth if reports that Tough Enough winner Andy Leavine was suspended are indeed true.

News of Bourne’s suspension has prompted a huge debate on the Internet about why so many stars have been popped by the WWE’s Talent Wellness Program in recent months, and most reports are stating that the company is cracking down on the use of synthetic marijuana, which caused the sudden surge in positive tests.

But now that we have an idea why these stars are getting caught and subsequently being suspended, we have to wonder what it means for their futures in the WWE.

Guys like Darren Young and Heath Slater can’t really fall down much farther on the WWE totem pole, but Bourne is in the midst of the biggest push of his WWE career. He recently formed “Air Boom” with Kofi Kingston, and they are currently the WWE Tag Team Champions.

They likely won’t be holding the straps for much longer, though.

We’ve seen in the past—usually due to injury rather than suspension—that a number of WWE stars have been stripped of or forced to relinquish a title when they are unable to defend it for 30 days.

Sound familiar? Because that’s exactly how long Bourne will be out.

So, the WWE now has a few options for what to do with Kingston, Bourne and the WWE Tag Team Championships: 

1. Air Boom can be stripped of the titles.
2. Kingston can choose another partner to fill in for Bourne.
3. The WWE can completely ignore that “30-day” rule and simply allow Kingston and Bourne to remain the tag champs whenever Bourne returns.

While I wouldn’t even be remotely surprised if WWE officials went with option No. 3, I think the fairest option for all parties involved is No. 2.

Of course, we know that professional wrestling is hardly ever about fairness. But Kingston should not be punished for Bourne’s mistake.

Kingston may not be the best tag team wrestler we’ve ever seen, but he’s made me actually care about a division that I didn’t give two craps about over the last several years. He fits well in his current tag team role because his high-flying offensive style is over with the crowd, and he plays that babyface-in-peril role to perfection.

He should be one of the faces of the tag team division, while Bourne should be replaced.

Stripping Air Boom of the WWE Tag Team Championships is only going to shrivel an already depleted tag team division, but no one should be “rewarded” with a title run after testing positive for a banned substance and being suspended for it.

Having another wrestler—someone like Zack Ryder or John Morrison—take his place as one-half of the tag champs would teach Bourne a valuable lesson, and it would also provide for some interesting future storylines.

Perhaps Bourne returns early next month and wants back in the tag team, but Kingston is torn between Bourne and his new tag team partner. This could lead to a feud between Bourne and Kingston’s new tag team partner, and it would possibly result in a heel turn for one of the three guys involved.

The possibilities truly are limitless…as long as you don’t strip Air Boom of the tag team titles.

That would be a decision that the WWE would immediately regret, because let’s face it—Bourne and Kingston are one of the few legitimate tag teams the WWE has, and anyone else who holds the titles (like Wade Barrett and Cody Rhodes or Dolph Ziggler and Jack Swagger) would provide only a temporary solution.