Ten Best Tag Teams of All Time: Number 9

You have the Flamboyant leader that knew just how to get crowd riled, the powerhouse enforcer perfect for providing the pain, and the high-flying technician and you have among the most unique tag teams in professional wrestling history.  You also have The Fabulous Freebirds.

The Freebirds were led by the always outgoing Michael P.S. Hayes (the P.S. stood for Purely Sexy), the power was provided by Terry "Bam Bam" Gordy, and the best technician of the three-- and the high-flyer as well-- was none other than Buddy "Jack" Roberts.  While mistakenly credited with being the first wrestlers to have entrance music-- that was Gorgeous George, though the Freebirds were the first to enter with rock music-- they are correctly credited with being the first team that could decide which two of the three members would defend the Tag Team Championship Belts.  This became coined as the "Freebird Rule."

The Fabulous Freebirds are best known for their time in Dallas-based promotion, World Class Championship Wrestling, and their feud with the Von Erichs (David, Kevin, Kerry, Chris, and Mike).  The legendary feud began after Gordy  slammed Kerry Von Erich's head into a steelcage door.

The Freebirds also wrestled in Georgia Championship Wrestling and World Championship Wrestling, the American Wrestling Association, and a brief run with World Wrestling Federation during the Rock-n-Wrestling Connection time period in 1984-- which ended after an altercation with Andre the Giant.

While wrestling in the National Wrestling Alliance, the Freebirds won the NWA Tag Team titles and were allowed to interchange which two members would defend the titles on any given night.  Perhaps, the creation of the "Freebird Rule" is the very thing the Freebirds are known.  Teams such as Midnight Express, the Wolfpac, and Demolition would go on to use this very rule to their advantage-- as would many other teams.

Their name came from Lynyrd Skynyrd's hit single, "Freebird," and was the song used as their entrance song for most of their early run.  It eventually changed to "Badstreet USA"-- recorded by Hayes-- during the team's short stint in WWF.  At this time playing copyrighted music as entrance themes was becoming increasingly difficult to do since broadcasts were beginning to be nationally televised.  WWF had just hired Jimmy Hart and Jim Johnston and became responsible for most of the entrance songs that were created for WWF superstars.  It was Hart who produced Hayes' "Badstreet USA" song that became the staple entrance theme for the Freebirds.

The Freebirds wrestled together until 1994, when they were last seen as part of Global Wrestling Federation.  Hayes, who retired shortly after the team disbanded, went on to become and remains WWE's Head of Road Agents/Producers.  Gordy died of a heart attack, caused by a blood clot on July 16, 2001 at the age of only 40.  Roberts to be 65 before dying of pneumonia on November 29, 2012.

The Fabulous Freebirds vs The Von Erichs