The Motor City Machine Guns

The Motor City Machineguns are a professional wrestling tag team consisting of Alex Shelley and Chris Sabin. The team currently works in the American company Total Nonstop Action Wrestling. They're also the current IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Champions in New Japan Pro Wrestling. The team name, which has been variably Motor and Murder City, is a play on the nickname of Detroit, Michigan, the hometown of both Shelley and Sabin.

Career
Shelley and Sabin first started teaming in Pro Wrestling ZERO1-MAX in 2006. On August 25 they took the ZERO-1 MAX International Lightweight Tag Team Championship from Minoru Fujita and Ikuto Hidaka, holding them for almost two years before dropping them back to Fujita and his new partner Takuya Sugawara. After returning Stateside, the pair had short runs in the independent promotions Pro Wrestling Guerrilla and Ring of Honor under the names Motor City Machine Guns and Murder City Machine Guns respectively until their main employer, Total Nonstop Action Wrestling (TNA) requested their wrestlers stop taking bookings with certain independent companies.

It was not until April 2007 that the team debuted in TNA, where hence they had been singles X Division wrestlers. After showing brief teamwork while wrestling as opponents in an Xscape match at the annual Lockdown pay-per-view they became regulars in the tag team division, first using the Murder City name, On an episode of TNA Today Shelley implied that this was against the teams wishes, saying that "Murder City" was the real name, and "Motor City" was the PG version. After being together for a few weeks in TNA, Kevin Nash—who already had a history with both men—was brought in as a manager, ending his previous alliances with Jay Lethal and Sonjay Dutt in the process, though his association with the group was short lived.

The team continued to work in independent promotions in parallel with their work in TNA, getting a run with the Illinois-based All American Wrestling's Tag Team Championship between September 2007 and January 2008. In November, when TNA's Team 3D (Brothers Ray and Devon) began a feud with the X Division as a whole, Shelley and Sabin became their main opposition. During the feud, for which Sabin and Shelley were joined by the X Division Champion Jay Lethal while Johnny Devine was put with Team 3D, the heels stole the X Division championship belt,

At Against All Odds Sabin, Shelley, and Lethal won a Street Fight with the existence of the X Division as a whole on the line. In addition, their win put a requirement on Brother's Ray and D-Von that they had to get their weight below 275 pounds in order to compete. In April 2008 they returned to Ring of Honor, losing to the Age of the Fall (Tyler Black and Jimmy Jacobs) and defeating the Briscoe Brothers (Jay and Mark) on the 18th and 19th respectively.

They were members of Team TNA alongside Kaz and Curry Man in the 2008 edition of the TNA World X Cup, but lost to Team Mexico at Victory Road. They returned to Ring of Honor in August 2008. On August 1 in Manassas, VA they fought Austin Aries and Bryan Danielson to a 20 minute time limit draw and then a 5 minute overtime draw. The next day in New York City they were defeated by Kevin Steen and El Generico when Steen forced Sabin to submit to the Sharpshooter. They slipped into the role of tweeners, showing disrespect to Christian Cage, A.J. Styles, Consequences Creed, B.G. James and The Latin American Xchange however still being cheered heavily by the fans and showing respect for the fans.

On the October 30 edition of Impact!, The Machineguns along with A.J. Styles, Samoa Joe, Jay Lethal, Consequences Creed, Petey Williams, Eric Young and ODB formed a faction of younger wrestlers called The TNA Front Line to oppose The Main Event Mafia.

At Turning Point, they disrespected Mick Foley as he was addressing the TNA originals backstage.Despite this and recent showings of disrespect, they have remained fan favorites and a part of the team opposing the Main Event Mafia. However, they would turn villainous months later attacking Jay Lethal and Consequences Creed after losing a tag team match to them. As part of their gimmick they were now described as "TNA Frontline members in name only". At Final Resolution, the Guns were attacked by Suicide

On January 4, 2009, Sabin and Shelley defeated No Limit (Tetsuya Naito & Yujiro) at New Japan Pro Wrestling's Wrestle Kingdom III in Tokyo Dome to win the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Championship. They follow in the footsteps of American Dragon & Curry Man as the only other gaijin team to win those titles.

At Genesis, Shelley defeated Sabin in the finals of a tournament to become the new TNA X Division Champion

At Destination X, Shelley lost his X-Division title to Suicide in an Ultimate X match that also involved Consequences Creed, Jay Lethal and Chris Sabin.

Ever since then, the Guns and Lethal Consequences (Jay Lethal and Consequences Creed) have been unsucessfully trying to unmask Suicide, claiming he is Daniels.

In wrestling

 * Finishing and signature maneuvers


 * ASCS Rush(Spinning sole kick by Sabin followed by a superkick from Shelley and then finished with a simultaneous jumping enzuigiri by Sabin / superkick by Shelley combination)
 * Click Click Boom (Powerbomb by Sabin / Double knee backbreaker by Shelley combo)
 * Double superkick to a seated or a kneeling opponent
 * Made in Detroit (Sitout powerbomb (Sabin) / Shiranui (Shelley) combination)


 * Aided dropkick
 * Bullet Point (Baseball slide (Shelley) followed by a Hesitation Dropkick (Sabin) to on an opponent held in the tree of woe position)
 * Air Raid (Sabin holds an opponent in a fireman's carry while Shelley hits a diving double foot stomp onto the prone opponent followed by Sabin hitting a fireman's carry takeover onto Shelley's knees or the Cradle Shock)
 * Doomsday dropkick
 * Double and stereo enzuigiris to one or two opponents respectively
 * Kneeling side slam by Sabin followed by a frog splash by Shelley
 * Running arched big boot (Sabin) / enzuigiri (Shelley) combination to a cornered opponent
 * Springboard dropkick by Sabin into a reverse STO by Shelley
 * Standing shiranui by Shelley after using Sabin's hands for elevation
 * Spinning leg sweep (Sabin) / Spinning wheel kick (Shelley) combination
 * Thunder Express (Inverted sitout side powerslam by Shelley into a running cutter by Sabin)


 * Managers
 * Kevin Nash


 * Signature gestures
 * Pointing to their right palm with their left hand, roughly corresponding to Detroit's location on a map of Michigan.
 * A combination of Shelley's "hand over head" and Sabin's finger gun gestures.


 * Theme music
 * "Beautiful Disaster" by 311 (ROH and PWG)
 * "Six Barrel Shotgun" by Black Rebel Motorcycle Club (ROH)
 * "1967" by Gearz with Dale Oliver (TNA)
 * "1967 (Remix)" by Dale Oliver (TNA)

Championships and accomplishments

 * All American Wrestling
 * AAW Tag Team Championship (1 time)
 * Pro Wrestling ZERO1-MAX
 * ZERO-1 MAX International Lightweight Tag Team Championship (1 time)
 * New Japan Pro Wrestling
 * IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Championship (1 time, current)
 * Total Nonstop Action Wrestling
 * 2007 Tag Team of the Year