Last night on Raw, one half of the WWE Women’s Tag Team Champions, Sasha Banks defeated Asuka to officially become the Raw Women’s Champion for the fifth time in her career. After Smackdown Women’s Champion, and fellow Women’s Tag Team Champion, Bayley attacked Kairi Sane backstage; Asuka went to the back to help rescue her Kabuki Warriors tag team partner. This resulted in Banks winning via count-out to win the title once again. With the Golden Role Models holding all current women’s titles, on the main roster anyway, their dominance has drawn comparisons to the Two Man Power Trip of Stone Cold Steve Austin and Triple H.
Before the Bionic Rattlesnake and The Game would partner together, they were first engaged in a lengthy blood feud. After Stone Cold returned from neck surgery, he would attack Triple H after it was revealed the Cerebral Assassin paid off Rikishi to run over Austin with a car at Survivor Series 1999. The King of Kings and the Texas Rattlesnake would face off the next year at Survivor Series 2000 in a match that ended with Austin lifting Triple H, inside a car, with a forklift and drop him 10 feet in the air. Their grudge would escalate further until reaching its conclusion at No Way Out in a three stages of hell match with Triple H emerging victorious.
Two Man Power Trip: Terrible Twosome
In the main event of Wrestlemania X-Seven, Stone Cold turned heel by aligning himself with longtime enemy Vince McMahon to defeat The Rock and win the WWF Championship. The next night on Raw, Triple H, would confront Vince letting out his apparent dismay of the partnership with Austin and teasing a face turn. However, it was not to be – in the main event of Steel Cage match between Rock and Austin, Triple H shockingly came to aid Austin and cost The Rock the match. Afterward Triple H and Stone Cold would align with Vince McMahon as Jim Ross would christen them on commentary The Two Man Power Trip.
The two merciless assassins would go on a tear in WWE. After attacking the Brothers of Destruction and Team Extreme; Austin and Triple H would show no mercy on their path to dominance. On April 5th, 2001 on SmackDown, Triple H would defeat Chris Jericho to win the Intercontinental Championship with Austin brutally attacking Jim Ross for criticizing his partnership with McMahon. The week later, Triple H would actually lose the IC title to Jeff Hardy on SmackDown before winning it back on the next Raw.
After the Brothers of Destruction defeated Edge and Christian to win the World Tag Team Championships, the Two Man Power Trip set their sights on the tag titles by challenging Undertaker and Kane to a match at Backlash 2001. The only other team to hold the WWE title, IC title, and tag titles were Shawn Michaels and Diesel on September 24th, 1995. However, a condition of the tag match would be for Austin and Triple to put up their respective singles titles on the line at the Pay-Per-View. At Backlash, the Two Man Power Trip defeated the Brothers of Destruction to win the tag titles and hold all the primary gold in WWE. After continuing to feud with the Brothers of Destruction, Austin would accidentally cost Triple the Intercontinental title, in a match against Kane at Judgement Day, by accidentally him with a steel chair. Triple H would help Austin retain the WWF title against the Undertaker the same night, however, the seeds of dissension were set.
Two Man Power Trip: Power Outage
On the May 21st, 2001 edition of Raw, Chris Jericho and Chris Benoit would challenge The Two Man Power Trip for the Tag Team titles after making fun of Vince McMahon earlier in the evening. Unfortunately, during the match Triple H suffered a horrific injury as he tore his left quadriceps muscle. Triple H finished the match and was helped to the back by referees afterward. On the SmackDown afterward, Stone Cold would blame Triple H for the loss thereby dissolving the partnership. Triple H would be out of action until January 7th, 2002 missing the entire Invasion storyline. Stone Cold would continue his Heel run into the Invasion and eventually siding with The Alliance before turning face on the November 19th, 2001 edition of Raw.
Two Man Power Trop: Legacy
The alliance of Stone Cold and Triple H as the Two Man Power Trip may only have lasted a little over a month, however, their memorable run left an engaging series of feuds post-Wrestlemania X-Seven. Now that Bayley and Sasha Banks have established themselves as a Two Woman Power Trip, it has led to favorable comparisons to one of WWE’s most interesting partnerships. The Golden Role Models have emerged as the main factor of women’s storylines over on Raw, SmackDown, and NXT over the past year. The Golden Role Models have faced off against Asuka, Lacey Evans, Tamina, Alexa Bliss, and Nikki Cross just to name a few in their quest for championship glory. With Bayley enjoying a current 291-day reign as Smackdown Women’s Champion and Sasha now the Raw Women’s Champion, it truly appears that all that glitters is gold for the former Boss N Hug Connection. Now that they hold all the gold, Bayley and Sasha Banks are set to dominate over WWE as The Two Man Power Trip did before them.
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