WWE announced that the Bella Twins would receive WWE Hall of Fame inductions in 2020 and that has brought interesting responses from the WWE Universe. While there are fans who are happy to see Brie and Nikki Bella get this honor, there are also fans who are not excited about it.
While the Bella Twins have done a lot in professional wrestling throughout the years, they rarely get any praise from fans. This is because they are not the best wrestlers in the women's division and are almost dwarfed by the talent of today's stars. With that said, here are 10 reasons the Bella Twins are an underrated team as they head into the WWE Hall of Fame.
10 THEY HELD DOWN DIVAS DIVISION
Many people point at the Bella Twins when talking about the drop in the quality of female wrestling during the Divas Era. The WWE Universe had just come off watching Trish Stratus, Lita, Mickie James, and more turn in quality matches before the Bella Twins arrived.
However, once WWE put the Bella Twins at the forefront of the new Divas Era, with a new butterfly title and a lot of focus on drama over wrestling, fans blamed Nikki and Brie Bella. With that said, the two did everything they could to keep people interested in the WWE women and deserve credit for that work.
9 TWIN MAGIC
Twin Magic is always fun, and the Bella Twins mastered it. For those who don't remember, it was Brie Bella that showed up first as a wrestler. She was winning matches that she shouldn't have won by recovering almost instantly from a beatdown to get the pins.
People realized Nikki Bella, who had yet to debut, was hiding under the ring and switching out with her sister. Everyone from the Killer Bees to The Harris Brothers pulled this trick, but the Bella Twins mastered it, and it was a brilliant heel move in any era.
8 NIKKI WAS ACTUALLY GOOD
The biggest complaint about the Bella Twins was that they were not good wrestlers at all. That is not true. While Brie Bella was never very good and seemed to get worse as she got older, Nikki Bella found her groove as a heel.
As Nikki's ex-boyfriend John Cena proved, you don't have to be a great technical wrestler to be a great professional wrestler. Nikki, as a heel, was one of the best storytellers in the women's division and was a solid, above-average heel wrestler. As a tag team, she could also cover for Brie's weaknesses.
7 RING PSYCHOLOGY
If there is one thing that the Bella Twins were good at, it was their storytelling abilities in the ring. Now, to start, they were not that great as babyfaces. That is because Nikki Bella is just naturally a heel in the way she presents herself as a character.
However, when they were heels, these two were masters of getting fans to turn on them. Their work with the Twin Magic was so great, and they played it off perfectly. As a singles star, Nikki Bella served well as one of the top heels in the Divas Division. As for Brie Bella, she was best when feuding with Stephanie McMahon.
6 PUTTING OVER WOMEN'S EVOLUTION
When Charlotte Flair, Sasha Banks, and Becky Lynch arrived in WWE on the main roster, it changed everything about the women's division. For years, it was the Bella Twins and wrestlers of that vein carrying the torch. However, once those three women joined up with Paige, who was already there as a star, things changed.
It worked because of the contrast between the Bella Twins and the women like Charlotte Flair and Sasha Banks. Honestly, the Bella Twins were instrumental in putting the new women over with the mainstream WWE fans who never watched NXT.
5 JOHN CENA AND DANIEL BRYAN
People like to mock Brie and Nikki Bella and claim that they only got over because they dated Daniel Bryan and John Cena, respectively. That isn't fair because the Bella Twins were stars in WWE before they ever started dating either man.
With that said, after the two started dating Cena and Bryan, they improved in the ring. Brie Bella was still not very good when it comes to her fluidity, and she botched too many moves, but she was progressing in her character. Nikki grew the most, becoming a fantastic heel, and one has to think that Cena and Bryan were working with them during this time.
4 LONGEVITY
The Bella Twins arrived in WWE in 2008, following their training in the developmental system in Florida. They worked in WWE for four years and then left for one year before returning in 2013. At this time, they started working on the show Total Divas and moved straight back into women's storylines.
They finally finished up when the Divas Era ended, and the Women's Evolution started, which was around 2015. That put the Bella Twins in WWE for six years, and then part-time for the next four. The two were three-time Divas Champions and stuck around longer than many women of their era.
3 LOVE FOR THE BUSINESS
People like to mock the Bella Twins for their wrestling, but the fact is that they did what they were told, and both have shown that they love the professional wrestling industry. They stuck around when many others left for other projects.
Nikki Bella lost to the women that WWE lined up to lead the next generation. Brie Bella was there to support her husband, Daniel Bryan, through all his turmoils. While they did get the Total Divas television series to help them reach other goals, the Bella Twins have always done what was best for WWE.
2 RESPECT
When wrestlers reach a certain level, they seem to know that they can do whatever they want. Brie Bella was marrying Daniel Bryan and becoming a mother for the first time. Nikki Bella was dating John Cena, the biggest name in WWE, and someone who had more stroke than almost anyone. They were making WWE a lot of money thanks to Total Divas.
Despite this, when Charlotte Flair, Becky Lynch, and Sasha Banks came up from NXT, Nikki Bella didn't use her stroke and put her ego on the shelf. She laid down and put over Charlotte and the rest. When Ronda Rousey came in and needed someone to put her over, the Bella Twins agreed to return to lose to the Baddest Woman on the Planet. They put over stars on their way out of WWE.
1 TOTAL DIVAS
While this has little to nothing to do with professional wrestling, the Bella Twins used the platform of reality TV to shine a light on the women of WWE and the division itself in Total Divas. They were so successful that they got their own show in Total Bellas.
This allowed the Bella Twins to use their celebrity and fame to help shine a light on others, such as Natalya, who got a new lease on her career. Brie and Nikki Bella used their fame and WWE success as performers to help put over the next generation of WWE women.