There was a time when a tag team of Braun Strowman and Richochet felt like some sort of cruel joke from Paul “Triple H” Levesque and the crew in creative. While the duo had shared the ring together before, working eight matches together including two Royal Rumbles before the “Monster of all Monsters” was fired, they never really had much of an outward relationship, at least until November of 2022, when Strowman decided to fire off some ill-conceived tweets making fun of small, flippy wrestlers on his way home from Saudi Arabia. Strowman surmised that, after securing a win over Omos at Crown Jewel in a match folks compared to Hulk Hogan-Andre the Giant at WrestleMania III, fans really only wanted to see big hoss fight and that performers who are smaller and instead build their offense on “flippy moves” would be better served bagging groceries.

This, understandably, drew the ire of wrestling fans the world over, including from Ricochet, who fired off a pair of tweets owning Strowman online like he would own him in the ring.

Fortunately, WWE gave the duo an opportunity to do just that, and after a little interference from GUNTHER and Imperium, Ricochet came out on top and eventually won the whole SmackDown World Cup Tournament thanks to an upset W over Santos Escobar in a match that featured Legado Del Fantasma being expelled from ringside. When GUNTHER attacked Strowman after his World Cup Semi-Finals match, Ricochet came back to the ring to help his foe, and the duo formed an unlikely tag team that officially debuted on the pre-Christmas episode of SmackDown in a Miricle on 34th Streetfight, and the results were, surprisingly, very good.

Facing off against GUNTHER's underlings, Ludwig Kaiser and Giovanni Vinci, the team worked incredibly well as a unit, with comedy spots like Strowman getting Samantha Irvin to kiss a passed-out Ricochet via mistletoe in revive him and “Hulk him up” for a massive comeback, or Ricochet standing on his giant pal's shoulders to secure a win via an assisted splash. Goodness, the duo even looked like a natural tag team, with both performers having shaved heads and big bushy beards.

Will WWE actually run with GUNTHER and Ricochet as a tag team? Will the duo work together as a babyface pairing to go to war against IMPERIUM and maybe even The Usos, depending on how things shake out? Only time will tell, but it's clear the duo feel comfortable working together, and that felt almost impossible one month ago.

Braun Strowman and Ricochet have mutual respect in the WWE ring.

Speaking with Megan Morant on SmackDown LowDown after his big win over IMPERIUM, Strowman expressed his respect for Ricochet before doubling down on his desire to beat GUNTHER for the Intercontinental Championship.

“You say it’s unfinished and you’re absolutely right,”  Strowman said. “GUNTHER cost me the World Cup Tournament, and Ricochet took advantage of it, and I don’t blame him for it. I would have done the exact same thing and when you’re in a tournament to when you win, you do whatever you have to do to win and props are where props are do, Ricochet was the better man that night. But GUNTHER, on the other hand, is an absolute dirtbag and those two clowns that run around with him that just think they can stick their nose into anyone’s business whenever they want to, well they found out tonight that that don’t always happen on my watch. GUNTHER, on the other hand, I am not forgetting about what happened. You have that Intercontinental Championship and I promise you, if I ever get a chance to get my hands on you, I would love to be the Monster to take that title off of your hands and put it where it belongs, around my waist. I’m coming for you, be ready.”

Though Ricochet wasn't asked about his feeling following the match, he did comment on gaining Strowman's respect ahead of his bout against Escobar in an interview with Cathy Kelley, with any beef between the duo clearly squashed.

“I was going to go into this match no matter what to make sure that Braun Strowman respected me at least,” Ricochet said (h/t TJR). “He can think what he wants, he has his own opinions, but I was going to come in tonight, knowing very well that as soon as we leave this match he is going to respect me. Of course, it wasn’t my idea to have Imperium come out, and obviously, it wasn’t because they beat me up.”

Even if their pairing is purely a one-off, at least fans were afforded a chance to see one of the best Miricle on 34th Streetfights featuring the odd couple pairing, which is a nice coda to a story WWE probably didn't want to tell but made the most of.