Basham Brothers

File:TheCabinetJBL.jpg

The Bashams with other members of "The Cabinet"

The Basham Brothers are a heel professional wrestling tag team on World Wrestling Entertainment's ECW brand consisting of Doug Basham and Danny Basham. Because each bears such a strong resemblance to the other, the Bashams were billed as brothers in WWE storylines; in reality, however, they are not even related. The Bashams also teamed on WWE SmackDown! and Ohio Valley Wrestling where they are former WWE Tag Team Champions and OVW Southern Tag Team Champions.

WWE history

The Basham Brothers made their official WWE debut on the May 29, 2003 edition of SmackDown! defeating Rikishi and Spanky. Shortly after this The Bashams (as they were commonly known) were later aligned with the valet, Shaniqua. As well as being portrayed with a bondage-based S&M gimmick, the "brothers" often switched places mid-match, so the "fresher" wrestler was always in the ring. In almost all cases the referee acted oblivious to the switch, despite their easily differentiated faces and won their first WWE Tag Team Championship from Los Guerreros on the October 23, 2003 edition of SmackDown!. The team would go on to lose the titles in February 2004 to Rikishi and Scotty Too Hotty. The Basham Brothers and Shaniqua faced Scotty 2 Hotty and Rikishi at WWE No Way Out 2004 in a handicap match for the tag team titles but lost the match when Shaniqua was pinned. Right after this match The Basham Brothers would lose their manger Shaniqua as she was sent to OVW for training. For the next few months the Basham Brothers were regulars on WWE Velocity despite a few occasions On SmackDown! generally losing in the outcome.

The Basham Brothers would go on to join John Bradshaw Layfield's cabinet stable on the November 25, 2004 Smackdown!. Known as JBL's Co-Secretaries of Defense. Their role was often to sacrifice themselves to prevent Layfield from getting harmed after he had provoked an opponent. The Bashams would once again win Tag Team gold defeating four other teams including Rey Mysterio and Rob Van Dam, Luther Reigns and Mark Jindrak, and Eddie Guerrero and Booker T. The Basham Brothers lost the titles to Rey Mysterio and Eddie Guerrero at WWE No Way Out on February 20 2005 from here on The Bashams would either be Jobbing on SmackDown! or defeating any team that came in their path on Velocity. The Basham Brothers quit Layfield's Cabinet on the June 16, 2005 episode of SmackDown!, claiming that they were tired of being "JBL's crash test dummies" and not getting enough respect.

On June 30, 2005, Danny Basham became one of the last minute trades in the 2005 WWE Draft lottery, which saw him jump from SmackDown! over to WWE RAW. This left both men in singles competition in WWE on different brands. Both had short-lived, unsuccessful singles runs. Both men would soon disappear completely from WWE programming but would reunite in WWE's revived ECW brand in July 2006 as masked enforcers for ECW leader Paul Heyman. As Paul Heyman's Personal Security Team/Enforcers throughout 2006, they would wrestle with no identity and would not be acknowledged by WWE as the Bashams. This supposedly anonymous gimmick could be easily recycles with replacement members in the case of injury, as was proven when Derek Neikirk took Danny's place when Danny suffered injury.

Signature moves

• Last Impression (Doug's Running leg lariat)
• Brain Damage (Danny's Chokebomb)
• Double Brain Damage (Aided Chokebomb)
• Ball and Gag (Russian leg sweep / clothesline combo)
• Meat Curtain (Catapult / diving bulldog combo)
• Double top rope missile dropkicks onto an elevated opponent

Championships and accomplishments

• Ohio Valley Wrestling

• 1-time OVW Southern Tag Team Champions

• World Wrestling Entertainment

• 2-time WWE Tag Team Champions

Trivia

• Doug Basham and Damaja (Danny Basham) had been embroiled in a bitter feud in Ohio Valley Wrestling just before getting called up by WWE.