Royal Rumble, Credit: WWE.com
A look back at the worst five WWE superstars to win the Royal Rumble match.
With the 2017 Royal Rumble just weeks away, the company is gearing up for their march towards Wrestlemania 33. The WWE normally runs this same simple formula at the turn of each year as they produce a title contender at the Rumble match, wet their fans appetites with a February show, and then bring it all together at Wrestlemania.
So suffice to say, the Royal Rumble is an extremely important show. A deserving Rumble winner combined with a thrilling title feud throughout the first quarter of the year can set the tone for the last 9 months of the calendar. On the flip side, however, if a Rumble winner does absolutely nothing to excite the WWE Universe it can make the future very difficult to navigate, essentially making Wrestlemania an event that nobody wants to see.
This idea hasn’t been any more apparent for 3 of the last 4 years. The winners of the 2013, 2014, and 2015 Royal Rumble were soundly booed and the fans outright refused to accept the victor as the No. 1 contender to the biggest championship in American professional wrestling. With a plethora of potential winners in this year’s match, it’s anyone’s guess who’ll survive and get the automatic title shot. Let’s hope they don’t make the same mistake 4 out of 5 times.
Speaking of mistakes, ahead we break down the 5 worst Royal Rumble winners.
Credit: wwe.com
5. Lex Luger – 1994
No disrespect to “The Total Package” but Luger’s co-win at the 1994 Royal Rumble and his subsequent title match at Wrestlemania X was essentially a microcosm of his tenure with the then WWF. Originally brought in as the nonsensical “Narcissist”, Lex had a chance to become the face of the company after Hulk Hogan’s departure from the company in 1993.
It made sense. After spending 6 years in the NWA/WCW and winning every major title that promotion had to offer, Luger seemed like the perfect replacement for The Hulkster. He had the body builder chiseled look, long blonde hair, and outstanding babyface charisma that with some work, could connect him with the audience as the #1 good guy. There was just one problem. The WWF refused to commit to Luger and the idea of him being a main event attraction.
And then the 1994 Rumble rolled around. Luger, clad in his captain America garb, entered 23rd, eliminated 5 people and found himself across the ring from the guy who the company deep down wanted to be the next big thing, but were also hesitant to commit to, Bret Hart. So instead of making a definitive decision on who should win and go to Wrestlemania and face Yokozuna, the two men toppled over the top rope together, negating a solo win.
So at Wrestlemania X both men faced the 600 pound Sumo wrestler. Luger took him on early in the card and managed to lose via a bogus disqualification while Hart went on to win the belt in the main event. There was nothing inherently wrong with Luger’s win or Lex for that matter. But you can chalk this failure up to the WWE’s inability to make a decision and dig their heels in.
WWE.com
4. John Cena – 2013
When John Cena won his first Rumble in 2008 the WWE fans were only slightly against him. That night in Madison Square Garden, Cena stood tall after one of the better Rumbles in the event’s history. And although the crowd response to his win was mixed, it was still a massive moment for “The Leader of Cenation” as he reigned victorious after coming back after 4 months on the shelf due to a torn pectoral muscle.
Now if any detractors were angry about Cena winning that night, it was his fans that should’ve been angry once he got to Wrestlemania 24 as he somehow along the line got his title shot turned into triple threat match with Triple H involved. Then to top it all off he loses that Wrestlemania match after being pinned by the current champ, Randy Orton. So let’s get this straight. Cena gets injured and makes a triumphant return at the Royal Rumble that the fans don’t 100% hate, just to lose cleanly in in his title match. Huh?
So if 2008 was enraging enough, here comes the 2013 Rumble. Going into the event the clear and concise most popular superstar in the company was current WWE Champ, CM Punk, although the WWE didn’t like to acknowledge that. As the champion for 434 days, Punk was the man who carried the company on his shoulders through some trying times while Cena and Punk’s Royal Rumble opponent, The Rock, hobnobbed with the Hollywood brass. The WWE Universe could see the writing on the wall especially after Cena picked up the Rumble match victory. And by the time The Rock dethroned Punk in the main event that night, it was official, it would be a Cena/Rock Mania main event for the second straight year. I can still hear wrestling fans gagging.
So, of course, the inevitable happened. Cena and The Rock went to war again but this time nobody cared. Even worse, the guy that should’ve been the main event stole the show as CM Punk and The Undertaker tore the house down earlier in the night. It’s tough to say that a 15-time world champion isn’t a deserving Rumble winner, but in 2013, the WWE got it very wrong and they really haven’t gotten it right since.
Photo Courtesy of WWE.com
3. Batista – 2014
Want to know how badly the WWE misread this one? Batista, who went into the match as a supposed babyface, walked out of the CONSOL Energy Center in Pittsburgh after his win flipping the near 16,000 fans in attendance the bird. It wasn’t just that Batista had spent the last 3 years in Hollywood, it wasn’t just that Daniel Bryan was clearly the guy everyone wanted in the main event of Wrestlemania, it wasn’t even that Batista’s return to the WWE was one of the most anti-climactic returns the wrestling world has ever seen. It was really just that the whole thing was so predictable.
When The Animal returned to WWE programming one week prior to the Rumble, it was very clear why. The WWE brass clearly were not sold on Daniel Bryan being a major superstar and thus brought back Batista to be the man to carry the Mania main event. As if that didn’t infuriate 99% of the fans who believed Bryan was the guy, it was made even worse that Batista immediately came off like the Hollywood star he turned into. He was smug, dismissive, and those skinny jeans were just too much to handle for the fans who refused to let the WWE cram him down their throats.
So when Batista entered the match at No. 28 it immediately became clear. Not only was Bryan not going to the win the match, there was now a good chance with only 2 remaining entrants, he may not even be in it at all. Poor Rey Misterio at No. 30.
So Batista survived by ironically eliminating a very hot and crowd-supported Roman Reigns and punched his ticket to Mania. What makes his win, not the worst in the events history is that the WWE actually smartened up and got Bryan into the main event of Wrestlemania where he captured the title. But still, it was pretty bad. And within 6 months of that Rumble, with the damage to Batista’s reputation proving too much, The Animal was once again gone.
WWE.com
2. Roman Reigns – 2015
Just when you thought 2013 and 2014 enraged the WWE Universe enough, along came the 2015 Rumble. 12 months prior, Roman Reigns was the guy that every fan in attendance at that year’s event was screaming for to take out Batista. But oh how things can change in just 1 year. After being eliminated last by Batista, Roman spent the rest of 2014 slowly but surely turning into one of the most hated superstars in the WWE.
But let’s not blame all of this on Roman. The WWE’s creative team needs to take if not all the blame for what’s happened to his character, then at least the brunt of it. Why they would try and turn Reigns into Cena 2.0 after how badly that first experiment ended up is anyone’s guess but it would be outright shocking if his career can be salvaged after what’s been done to him. It seems the more the fans resist, the more Reigns is toted out there as an unstoppable force and that was never more obvious than at the 15 Rumble.
And if Batista’s potential win was obvious, Reigns win was that times 10. From the second he emerged from the locker room at number 19, the boos were deafening. And to make matters worse, this was an absurdly bad Royal Rumble. Anytime you have Kane and The Big Show determining the outcome of one of the biggest matches of the year, you’re asking for mediocrity. And there was no more mediocre moment as the ending, as the two washed up giants lay prone on the ropes while Reigns dumped them over. Not even The Rock could save this pathetic hour as he was soundly booed as he saved his relative from a post-match attack.
Now unlike the year before, the WWE didn’t do anything to correct their mistake, placing Reigns in consecutive Wrestlemania main events. Reigns eventually took a step back to the mid-card in the middle of 2016 but with the 2017 Rumble looming, here we go again as he steps right back into the title picture with a shot at Kevin Owens and The Universal title on the line. WWE fans, cross your fingers. This could be another long year.
Credit: WWE.com
1. Vince McMahon – 1999
For all the terrific storylines and decisions that were made throughout the Steve Austin/Vince McMahon feud of the late 90’s and early 2000’s, there were a few horrible ones as well. Chalk the 1999 Rumble up as one of those horrible decisions. Never in the history of the event has a non-wrestler won the match and for some bizarre reason, Vince Russo, the creative genius he was, booked good old Vinny Mac to stand tall over 29 other actual wrestlers.
The logic in this entire match made virtually no sense, however, the idea started off great. Locked in the somewhat early stages of their legendary feud, Vince, in an effort to keep Austin away from a title shot from his Corporate Champion, the Rock, booked StoneCold as the #1 entrant. Shawn Michaels, the acting Commissioner at the time then booked Vince to be #2. Most people believed that this would lead to a 2 minute-long beat down of Vince which would ultimately lead to his elimination.
But that’s when insanity overtook logic. The Austin/McMahon fight spilled outside the ring and into the backstage area where Corporation members assaulted The Rattlesnake sending him to the hospital. For the next hour, neither man would be involved in the match, which in any other universe would mean an automatic elimination, but not this time around. Eventually, Austin returned and he and Vince were the final two. So most people were thinking, “Ok, well I guess this kind of makes sense.” And then suddenly even that logic was wrong as Vince dumped Austin over the top rope.
Yes, that’s really what happened. Now unlike the last 3 on this list, at least this was a surprise. But what a ridiculously awful one and a waste of a huge moment that could’ve been saved to put someone else over. Of course McMahon didn’t go on to Wrestlemania and of course Austin did, but why get to it this way? Having a non-wrestler achieve such a huge honor lowers the prestige of this type of win and makes the product seem silly and poorly thought out.
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