Evil Vito
12-29-2013, 12:42 PM
<font color=goldenrod>Back in the day, I used to do my own booking of the Royal Rumble every year, including a full write-up of the match itself. The Rumble is usually my favorite PPV of the year, and with it pretty much being the starting point of the Road to WrestleMania, I like that the Rumble provides ample opportunities to begin setting up the card for the biggest event of the year.
The Rumble is still 4 weeks away, and not much is known about the card other than the event’s namesake. So since I’m bored and have the creative juices flowing, I think it would be cool to try my hand at writing the event once again. I fully expect that whatever WWE does will be different than this, and I will try to be realistic with my show. But I’d rather write this now while the PPV has a clean slate rather than having to constrain myself to matches that actually wind up getting booked.
Without further ado, the 27th ever Royal Rumble.
WWE Intercontinental Championship: Roman Reigns vs. Big E Langston (C)
Big E has gotten involved with the Shield in the past few shows, and I can see that interaction continuing over the next month. While they’ve hinted at a unification match with Dean Ambrose on WWE.com and they could feasibly do title-for-title, I don’t think they’d jump to merge two more belts right away. They go with Reigns/Langston and hype the prospect of the two big guys going at it along with a chance for the Shield to get more gold.
I’d actually be intrigued by this big man match. Both guys are really strong yet pretty agile for their size. I’d imagine most of the match goes pretty evenly, with Reigns collecting several near falls. Big E begins to get back some of the momentum and he finally gets Reigns up for the Big Ending, only to be blasted in the skull by Ambrose and the United States title. Langston retains by DQ. Ambrose and Rollins put a stomping on Langston. Reigns doesn’t participate but kind of looks at the other two with a confused expression that says Reigns wasn’t expecting any help. They don’t outright argue but the tension between the Shield is still very much teased.
WWE Tag Team Championships: The Real Americans vs. Cody Rhodes & Goldust (C)
While the tag division is booming right now, there does still appear to be a shortage of heel teams that can be valid contenders. The Shield are tied up in other business and 3MB are a comedy team. That leaves you with The Real Americans or Ryback/Curtis Axel. The Real Americans are way more interesting, deserve a title run at some point, and supposedly were booked to win the belts at TLC up until the last minute.
Based on what I said in the previous paragraph, the result in this match shouldn’t be much of a shock. After a good back and forth tag match, Antonio Cesaro and Cody Rhodes are the legal men. They have some sort of spot that sees Goldust get slingshotted right into Cody, knocking Cody off the apron. A dazed Goldust stumbles right into the Neutralizer from Cesaro, as The Real Americans become Tag Team champions for the first time in their history.
WWE Divas Championship: Nikki Bella vs. AJ Lee (C)
I really can’t even bring myself to care enough about this match or this trainwreck of a division. The divas division has basically just been Total Divas vs. Non Total Divas for months now, and I see that trend continuing. AJ has faced Brie and Natalya on PPVs recently, so let’s give Nikki a shot. It really doesn’t matter because I see AJ keeping the belt til WrestleMania. AJ wins by submission, Black Widow. Next.
WWE World Heavyweight Championship: John Cena vs. Randy Orton (C)
Based on the way the night after TLC ended, I could certainly see them doing a triple threat match with Daniel Bryan involved. However, I think Bryan being told “you’ve had enough chances” would make for a better Rumble build. Cena has a rematch clause he’d almost surely use, so we get another Cena/Orton match. Oh joy. Not even meant to be a knock on those two guys, as they can clearly put on great matches with other guys. But for whatever reason they don’t seem to have really good chemistry in the ring.
Anyway, this would probably be the typical Cena/Orton match we’ve seen several times before. I can’t see them switching the belt off of Orton right now, I figure he’ll keep the belt until at least Elimination Chamber if not longer. But Cena losing clean for the second show in a row doesn’t seem too likely, either. So we’ll go with Orton getting himself DQ’ed right when Cena appeared to have the match won. I don’t really like having 2 DQ endings on the show, but I didn’t want to book any outside interference in this match so I had to have Orton escape with the title somehow.
2014 Royal Rumble Match
As is the case with most Rumbles, even though there are 30 guys involved only a select few actually seem like viable options to win. The whole “authority figure forces beloved face to enter at #1” thing has been done many times before, but I can see it taking an extra twist this year with The Authority forcing both Daniel Bryan and CM Punk to start the match. It’s clear The Authority does not want either man in the main event of WrestleMania 30 and so they’re forcing the two friends to go the distance in the match. Along with that, you have Batista touted as a favorite upon his return, Bray Wyatt cutting creepy promos about the match, and of course a few other guys like Big Show, Mark Henry, etc. touted as favorites because of their size.
So yeah, Bryan and Punk shake hands to start it off and the match gets underway. The announcers can bring up Bryan and Punk’s history together and they can even mention that this is not even the first time they started the Rumble together (2011). The crowd is shit hot for the first couple of minutes of the match as they eagerly count down for the first time.
GOD SAVE OUR QUEEEEEEEN! Bad News Barrett is #3 and comes walking out with a microphone in hand. “Tonight, we’re at the Royal Rumble. But I’m afraid I have some bad news - neither of you two will be winning it.” Perhaps this was a bad idea, as Bryan and Punk kick the shit out of Barrett as soon as he gets into the ring. They whip him into the corner, taking turns hitting Barrett with running knees. Barrett stumbles out of the corner in a daze as Punk and Bryan clothesline him out for the first elimination of the night. Poor Barrett, that’s bad news indeed. The crowd loves it though and is in a frenzy as the clock winds down again.
Curtis Axel’s music hits and the crowd goes mild. The #4 entrant runs down to the ring and takes shots at both Bryan and Punk. Axel throws Bryan over the top and starts to celebrate, but of course Bryan hangs on. Axel turns around to get a springboard dropkick from Bryan. A stunned Axel turns right into Punk, who picks him up and hits his old foe with a GTS. Punk picks up the dazed Axel and eliminates him with ease. Punk and Bryan play to the crowd, Cole and Lawler love it while JBL complains that it should be every man for himself.
SIERRA HOTEL INDIA ECHO LIMA DELTA – SHIELD! Dean Ambrose is the #5 entrant. The camera pans throughout the arena and spots the United States champion coming down through the crowd. He takes his sweet time walking through the audience and doesn’t appear to be in any hurry. Ambrose gets over the barricade and starts walking up the steps. Ambrose points to his brain and starts walking back down the steps, refusing to enter as the countdown is on.
SIERRA HOTEL INDIA ECHO LIMA DELTA – SHIELD! Seth Rollins is #6, what are the odds??? Rollins comes down from the crowd and flips over the barricade to join Ambrose. The two Shield members finally get in the ring and the crowd is into it as we get some tornado tag team-esque action between the Shield and Punk/Bryan.
No eliminations in the next few intervals as the ring starts to fill up a bit. Dolph Ziggler is #7, Antonio Cesaro is #8, Sin Hunico Cara – is #9. Santino Marella power walks down at #10. He carefully picks his spots before putting on the Cobra. He hits a couple of guys with the Cobra Strike and, in a visual nobody expected, Santino is suddenly the only man left standing in the ring until the next entrant is…
JAKE THE SNAKE ROBERTS! The crowd and announcers mark out as Roberts comes out at #11 with his bag in tow. Santino readies the Cobra while Jake pulls out a real life snake. Santino shits his pants and leaps over the top rope to eliminate himself. Jake puts the snake away which draws some boos, but he gets the crowd back on his feet when he starts handing out some DDTs (helps that there are a bunch of guys in the ring right now that could sell the shit out of the DDT).
Jack Swagger is entrant #12 as he immediately teams up with Cesaro. The new tag team champions put a beatdown on Roberts and eliminate him to big heat. Damien Sandow is #13. Kofi Kingston is #14. 10 guys in the ring now and even though there is a lot of talent in there, that many guys in the ring during a Rumble can constitute deadwood.
WELLLLLLLLLLLLLLL IT’S THE BIG SHOW! This should clear things up a bit as Big Show rumbles down to the ring at #15. The first man to come at him is Ziggler, who Show throws over the top. Ziggler hangs on to the apron, but when he stands up he gets hit with a WMD which he sells like a champ as he crashes down to elimination. As Show surveys the damage, Swagger grabs his ankle and tries to put him in an ankle lock. Show reverses by tumbling over the ropes, sending Swagger out of the match (same spot as Kurt Angle in the 2004 Rumble). Cesaro grabs the downed Show’s legs and tries to pull him in, teasing a Giant Swing. Show throws his legs up which send Cesaro flying up and out. Show gets back to his feet and sees Kofi charging him. Show picks up Kofi in a gorilla press and tosses him onto the tag team champions. No fancy staving off of elimination from Kofi this year. 4 eliminations for Show in that fun sequence.
Cody Rhodes enters the fray at #16. Christian returns from his visit to the Springfield Mystery Spot as a surprise entrant at #17. He gets his shots in wherever. Meanwhile, as the countdown is going on Sandow dodges a WMD from Big Show, as Sin Cara takes the move instead. Alberto Del Rio is #18 and he quickly runs into the ring to take out Sin Cara, looking awfully proud for somebody who simply eliminated an unconscious man.
The Great Khali is #19. Writer’s note – before I start booking these things I list out all 30 participants I’ll use in the match and then I keep that for reference as I’m writing. I had one spot left and was debating between having Brodus Clay get a spot in the match with his heel character, or possibly do an NXT tournament at Axxess like last year and use it to debut a guy like Adrian Neville who could debut and do a cool spot. Instead I realized I left out Khali, who always seems to find his way into these things. Sigh. Anyway, Khali does what he does best – walk around and chop people. We’re left with Khali and Big Show as the only men left standing. They tease the giant battle for a few seconds. They wind up getting each other to the ropes, each man trying to shove the other over and out as the countdown goes.
SIERRA HOTEL INDIA ECHO LIMA DELTA – SHIELD! #20 entrant Roman Reigns makes a beeline down to the ring and he dumps out the oblivious Big Show and Khali on his own, making the big elimination we all expect him to. The announcers rave about the elimination and speculate what might happen now that the entire Shield are now together in the Rumble match.
Mark Henry is #21 and Ryback is #22, getting us back to our hoss quota. Sandow gets eliminated by Bryan at this point just to thin things out a bit, but The Miz enters at #23 to plug the gap with another heel straight away. The Shield start putting their focus on actually eliminating people. They team up on Christian, the man they put on the shelf – and end his night. They go after Henry, who puts up more of a fight but still falls to the numbers game and is eliminated.
The Shield start to turn their attention to Cody Rhodes, but in another example of well-timed entrants, Goldust is out at #24 to try and help his brother. The brothers actually have the Shield reeling a bit. Cody leaps off the ropes for a Disaster Kick on a stunned Rollins, but Ambrose shoves Goldust in the way. Goldust takes the kick and is easy prey for elimination while Cody follows him soon after. That’s the second miscommunication of the night for the Rhodes boys while the Shield are cleaning house.
Big E Langston is out at #25 and has some unfinished business to take care of from earlier. He throws caution to the wind, thrusting haymakers at all three Shield members. Langston hurls Rollins over the top and out which gets a big reaction. Ambrose is thrown over but hangs on to the apron. Reigns goes for a Spear but Langston sidesteps and Reigns winds up Spearing Ambrose right off the apron and out of the Rumble. Langston then takes out the surprised Reigns as well. The Shield’s breakup continues to be teased while Langston looks a gangbuster for being able to take the Hounds of Justice out of the Rumble.
“The Animal” Batista is in at #26 for his official first match back in WWE. Clotheslines for everybody! Spinebuster on The Miz and he’s out. Ryback gets in Batista’s face, which earns him a Spinebuster and an elimination as well. Fandango dances his way to the ring at #27 as the announcers do the obligatory mention that he drew the winningest number in Rumble history. Sadly for him he doesn’t last much more than an interval as #28 entrant Rey Mysterio hurricanranas him out in short order.
The lights go out signaling the entrance of #29 Bray Wyatt. He comes out flanked by Luke Harper and Erick Rowan, and Wyatt sits on his rocking chair, in no hurry to get in the ring. Perhaps he should have taken into consideration that there is another entrant coming, as #30 signals the surprise return of Sheamus! Sheamus knocks down Harper and Rowan and grabs Wyatt out of his chair before throwing him into the ring and heading in himself.
So after all entrants have come out, our final suspects are: Daniel Bryan, CM Punk, Alberto Del Rio, Big E Langston, Batista, Rey Mysterio, Bray Wyatt, Sheamus
Now to work through the final eliminations. Mysterio is the first casualty, as Wyatt takes him out. Langston and Batista get into a bit of slugfest which Batista gets the better of, as he dumps Langston out. Del Rio eats a Brogue Kick and is eliminated by Sheamus, but Wyatt takes out Sheamus immediately thereafter.
THE FINAL FOUR: Daniel Bryan, CM Punk, Batista, Bray Wyatt
So the four guys I specifically mentioned in the build wind up being my final four? Who’d have thought? The announcers mention that Bryan and Punk have both been in the match for nearly 50 minutes. Each man takes a corner and Wyatt attempts to intimidate the others by being all creepy and doing the crab walk thing. The other three stare him down and once it becomes apparent it’s going to be a 3 on 1, Rowan and Harper jump in and we have a 3 on 3 staredown.
Pier six brawl breaks out which the crowd likes. Batista manages to hand out a few Spinebusters to take Rowan and Harper out of the ring while Bryan and Punk exorcise some demons by eliminating Bray Wyatt, and we’re at the final three. Bryan and Punk continue to work as a team, getting Batista into the corner. Batista manages to shove them back and quickly gets Bryan up for a Batista Bomb. Batista hits it, but while this is happening Triple H comes in and plants a Pedigree on CM Punk. Triple H throws Punk over the top and out (which, of course, is a perfectly legal elimination as the Rumble rules always change to meet the storylines).
Batista backs Triple H into a corner and is all like “what the fuck? I don’t need your help, etc.” while Triple H tries to tell him it’s best for business. Meanwhile, while Batista’s back is turned, Bryan stumbles back to his feet only for Shawn Michaels to come in for the crowd and connect with a huge Sweet Chin Music. Michaels scurries out of the ring and back through the crowd. Triple H finally leaves as Batista turns and sees Bryan still laid out, presumably from the Batista Bomb. Batista throws Bryan out to finish off a chaotic end to the Royal Rumble.
WINNER: Batista
I know Bryan is who most want to win the Rumble (myself included, admittedly), but I’m really starting to feel like a Bryan/Michaels match could be a reality. Having Bryan and Punk go through the entire grueling match only to be screwed in the end anyway would be a nice way to officially set the Bryan/Michaels and Punk/Triple H programs in stone for Mania.
I think the WWE World Heavyweight Title absolutely should be the main event of WrestleMania 30, but at the same time I can’t see Cena not being there. I think the most likely direction from this Rumble would be to do an Orton/Batista/Cena triple threat somehow. There’s a lot of ways they could go with it, bringing up Orton/Batista/Triple H’s former Evolution connections and possibly implying that Batista may have known about the Rumble screwjob all along. Maybe Batista can be a tweener going into Mania or something.
This Rumble also allowed more tension to build between the Shield and also Rhodes/Goldust, so there’s two more potential Mania programs right there. Big E Langston also gets to look like a huge deal which could allow him to step up to a bigger program. Sheamus/Wyatt could be a possible program as well, and maybe Big Show/Mysterio can be the next contenders for The Real Americans' tag team titles. Should be a really fun PPV with a lot of layers and “something for everybody” I guess.
Well…that was fun.</font>
The Rumble is still 4 weeks away, and not much is known about the card other than the event’s namesake. So since I’m bored and have the creative juices flowing, I think it would be cool to try my hand at writing the event once again. I fully expect that whatever WWE does will be different than this, and I will try to be realistic with my show. But I’d rather write this now while the PPV has a clean slate rather than having to constrain myself to matches that actually wind up getting booked.
Without further ado, the 27th ever Royal Rumble.
WWE Intercontinental Championship: Roman Reigns vs. Big E Langston (C)
Big E has gotten involved with the Shield in the past few shows, and I can see that interaction continuing over the next month. While they’ve hinted at a unification match with Dean Ambrose on WWE.com and they could feasibly do title-for-title, I don’t think they’d jump to merge two more belts right away. They go with Reigns/Langston and hype the prospect of the two big guys going at it along with a chance for the Shield to get more gold.
I’d actually be intrigued by this big man match. Both guys are really strong yet pretty agile for their size. I’d imagine most of the match goes pretty evenly, with Reigns collecting several near falls. Big E begins to get back some of the momentum and he finally gets Reigns up for the Big Ending, only to be blasted in the skull by Ambrose and the United States title. Langston retains by DQ. Ambrose and Rollins put a stomping on Langston. Reigns doesn’t participate but kind of looks at the other two with a confused expression that says Reigns wasn’t expecting any help. They don’t outright argue but the tension between the Shield is still very much teased.
WWE Tag Team Championships: The Real Americans vs. Cody Rhodes & Goldust (C)
While the tag division is booming right now, there does still appear to be a shortage of heel teams that can be valid contenders. The Shield are tied up in other business and 3MB are a comedy team. That leaves you with The Real Americans or Ryback/Curtis Axel. The Real Americans are way more interesting, deserve a title run at some point, and supposedly were booked to win the belts at TLC up until the last minute.
Based on what I said in the previous paragraph, the result in this match shouldn’t be much of a shock. After a good back and forth tag match, Antonio Cesaro and Cody Rhodes are the legal men. They have some sort of spot that sees Goldust get slingshotted right into Cody, knocking Cody off the apron. A dazed Goldust stumbles right into the Neutralizer from Cesaro, as The Real Americans become Tag Team champions for the first time in their history.
WWE Divas Championship: Nikki Bella vs. AJ Lee (C)
I really can’t even bring myself to care enough about this match or this trainwreck of a division. The divas division has basically just been Total Divas vs. Non Total Divas for months now, and I see that trend continuing. AJ has faced Brie and Natalya on PPVs recently, so let’s give Nikki a shot. It really doesn’t matter because I see AJ keeping the belt til WrestleMania. AJ wins by submission, Black Widow. Next.
WWE World Heavyweight Championship: John Cena vs. Randy Orton (C)
Based on the way the night after TLC ended, I could certainly see them doing a triple threat match with Daniel Bryan involved. However, I think Bryan being told “you’ve had enough chances” would make for a better Rumble build. Cena has a rematch clause he’d almost surely use, so we get another Cena/Orton match. Oh joy. Not even meant to be a knock on those two guys, as they can clearly put on great matches with other guys. But for whatever reason they don’t seem to have really good chemistry in the ring.
Anyway, this would probably be the typical Cena/Orton match we’ve seen several times before. I can’t see them switching the belt off of Orton right now, I figure he’ll keep the belt until at least Elimination Chamber if not longer. But Cena losing clean for the second show in a row doesn’t seem too likely, either. So we’ll go with Orton getting himself DQ’ed right when Cena appeared to have the match won. I don’t really like having 2 DQ endings on the show, but I didn’t want to book any outside interference in this match so I had to have Orton escape with the title somehow.
2014 Royal Rumble Match
As is the case with most Rumbles, even though there are 30 guys involved only a select few actually seem like viable options to win. The whole “authority figure forces beloved face to enter at #1” thing has been done many times before, but I can see it taking an extra twist this year with The Authority forcing both Daniel Bryan and CM Punk to start the match. It’s clear The Authority does not want either man in the main event of WrestleMania 30 and so they’re forcing the two friends to go the distance in the match. Along with that, you have Batista touted as a favorite upon his return, Bray Wyatt cutting creepy promos about the match, and of course a few other guys like Big Show, Mark Henry, etc. touted as favorites because of their size.
So yeah, Bryan and Punk shake hands to start it off and the match gets underway. The announcers can bring up Bryan and Punk’s history together and they can even mention that this is not even the first time they started the Rumble together (2011). The crowd is shit hot for the first couple of minutes of the match as they eagerly count down for the first time.
GOD SAVE OUR QUEEEEEEEN! Bad News Barrett is #3 and comes walking out with a microphone in hand. “Tonight, we’re at the Royal Rumble. But I’m afraid I have some bad news - neither of you two will be winning it.” Perhaps this was a bad idea, as Bryan and Punk kick the shit out of Barrett as soon as he gets into the ring. They whip him into the corner, taking turns hitting Barrett with running knees. Barrett stumbles out of the corner in a daze as Punk and Bryan clothesline him out for the first elimination of the night. Poor Barrett, that’s bad news indeed. The crowd loves it though and is in a frenzy as the clock winds down again.
Curtis Axel’s music hits and the crowd goes mild. The #4 entrant runs down to the ring and takes shots at both Bryan and Punk. Axel throws Bryan over the top and starts to celebrate, but of course Bryan hangs on. Axel turns around to get a springboard dropkick from Bryan. A stunned Axel turns right into Punk, who picks him up and hits his old foe with a GTS. Punk picks up the dazed Axel and eliminates him with ease. Punk and Bryan play to the crowd, Cole and Lawler love it while JBL complains that it should be every man for himself.
SIERRA HOTEL INDIA ECHO LIMA DELTA – SHIELD! Dean Ambrose is the #5 entrant. The camera pans throughout the arena and spots the United States champion coming down through the crowd. He takes his sweet time walking through the audience and doesn’t appear to be in any hurry. Ambrose gets over the barricade and starts walking up the steps. Ambrose points to his brain and starts walking back down the steps, refusing to enter as the countdown is on.
SIERRA HOTEL INDIA ECHO LIMA DELTA – SHIELD! Seth Rollins is #6, what are the odds??? Rollins comes down from the crowd and flips over the barricade to join Ambrose. The two Shield members finally get in the ring and the crowd is into it as we get some tornado tag team-esque action between the Shield and Punk/Bryan.
No eliminations in the next few intervals as the ring starts to fill up a bit. Dolph Ziggler is #7, Antonio Cesaro is #8, Sin Hunico Cara – is #9. Santino Marella power walks down at #10. He carefully picks his spots before putting on the Cobra. He hits a couple of guys with the Cobra Strike and, in a visual nobody expected, Santino is suddenly the only man left standing in the ring until the next entrant is…
JAKE THE SNAKE ROBERTS! The crowd and announcers mark out as Roberts comes out at #11 with his bag in tow. Santino readies the Cobra while Jake pulls out a real life snake. Santino shits his pants and leaps over the top rope to eliminate himself. Jake puts the snake away which draws some boos, but he gets the crowd back on his feet when he starts handing out some DDTs (helps that there are a bunch of guys in the ring right now that could sell the shit out of the DDT).
Jack Swagger is entrant #12 as he immediately teams up with Cesaro. The new tag team champions put a beatdown on Roberts and eliminate him to big heat. Damien Sandow is #13. Kofi Kingston is #14. 10 guys in the ring now and even though there is a lot of talent in there, that many guys in the ring during a Rumble can constitute deadwood.
WELLLLLLLLLLLLLLL IT’S THE BIG SHOW! This should clear things up a bit as Big Show rumbles down to the ring at #15. The first man to come at him is Ziggler, who Show throws over the top. Ziggler hangs on to the apron, but when he stands up he gets hit with a WMD which he sells like a champ as he crashes down to elimination. As Show surveys the damage, Swagger grabs his ankle and tries to put him in an ankle lock. Show reverses by tumbling over the ropes, sending Swagger out of the match (same spot as Kurt Angle in the 2004 Rumble). Cesaro grabs the downed Show’s legs and tries to pull him in, teasing a Giant Swing. Show throws his legs up which send Cesaro flying up and out. Show gets back to his feet and sees Kofi charging him. Show picks up Kofi in a gorilla press and tosses him onto the tag team champions. No fancy staving off of elimination from Kofi this year. 4 eliminations for Show in that fun sequence.
Cody Rhodes enters the fray at #16. Christian returns from his visit to the Springfield Mystery Spot as a surprise entrant at #17. He gets his shots in wherever. Meanwhile, as the countdown is going on Sandow dodges a WMD from Big Show, as Sin Cara takes the move instead. Alberto Del Rio is #18 and he quickly runs into the ring to take out Sin Cara, looking awfully proud for somebody who simply eliminated an unconscious man.
The Great Khali is #19. Writer’s note – before I start booking these things I list out all 30 participants I’ll use in the match and then I keep that for reference as I’m writing. I had one spot left and was debating between having Brodus Clay get a spot in the match with his heel character, or possibly do an NXT tournament at Axxess like last year and use it to debut a guy like Adrian Neville who could debut and do a cool spot. Instead I realized I left out Khali, who always seems to find his way into these things. Sigh. Anyway, Khali does what he does best – walk around and chop people. We’re left with Khali and Big Show as the only men left standing. They tease the giant battle for a few seconds. They wind up getting each other to the ropes, each man trying to shove the other over and out as the countdown goes.
SIERRA HOTEL INDIA ECHO LIMA DELTA – SHIELD! #20 entrant Roman Reigns makes a beeline down to the ring and he dumps out the oblivious Big Show and Khali on his own, making the big elimination we all expect him to. The announcers rave about the elimination and speculate what might happen now that the entire Shield are now together in the Rumble match.
Mark Henry is #21 and Ryback is #22, getting us back to our hoss quota. Sandow gets eliminated by Bryan at this point just to thin things out a bit, but The Miz enters at #23 to plug the gap with another heel straight away. The Shield start putting their focus on actually eliminating people. They team up on Christian, the man they put on the shelf – and end his night. They go after Henry, who puts up more of a fight but still falls to the numbers game and is eliminated.
The Shield start to turn their attention to Cody Rhodes, but in another example of well-timed entrants, Goldust is out at #24 to try and help his brother. The brothers actually have the Shield reeling a bit. Cody leaps off the ropes for a Disaster Kick on a stunned Rollins, but Ambrose shoves Goldust in the way. Goldust takes the kick and is easy prey for elimination while Cody follows him soon after. That’s the second miscommunication of the night for the Rhodes boys while the Shield are cleaning house.
Big E Langston is out at #25 and has some unfinished business to take care of from earlier. He throws caution to the wind, thrusting haymakers at all three Shield members. Langston hurls Rollins over the top and out which gets a big reaction. Ambrose is thrown over but hangs on to the apron. Reigns goes for a Spear but Langston sidesteps and Reigns winds up Spearing Ambrose right off the apron and out of the Rumble. Langston then takes out the surprised Reigns as well. The Shield’s breakup continues to be teased while Langston looks a gangbuster for being able to take the Hounds of Justice out of the Rumble.
“The Animal” Batista is in at #26 for his official first match back in WWE. Clotheslines for everybody! Spinebuster on The Miz and he’s out. Ryback gets in Batista’s face, which earns him a Spinebuster and an elimination as well. Fandango dances his way to the ring at #27 as the announcers do the obligatory mention that he drew the winningest number in Rumble history. Sadly for him he doesn’t last much more than an interval as #28 entrant Rey Mysterio hurricanranas him out in short order.
The lights go out signaling the entrance of #29 Bray Wyatt. He comes out flanked by Luke Harper and Erick Rowan, and Wyatt sits on his rocking chair, in no hurry to get in the ring. Perhaps he should have taken into consideration that there is another entrant coming, as #30 signals the surprise return of Sheamus! Sheamus knocks down Harper and Rowan and grabs Wyatt out of his chair before throwing him into the ring and heading in himself.
So after all entrants have come out, our final suspects are: Daniel Bryan, CM Punk, Alberto Del Rio, Big E Langston, Batista, Rey Mysterio, Bray Wyatt, Sheamus
Now to work through the final eliminations. Mysterio is the first casualty, as Wyatt takes him out. Langston and Batista get into a bit of slugfest which Batista gets the better of, as he dumps Langston out. Del Rio eats a Brogue Kick and is eliminated by Sheamus, but Wyatt takes out Sheamus immediately thereafter.
THE FINAL FOUR: Daniel Bryan, CM Punk, Batista, Bray Wyatt
So the four guys I specifically mentioned in the build wind up being my final four? Who’d have thought? The announcers mention that Bryan and Punk have both been in the match for nearly 50 minutes. Each man takes a corner and Wyatt attempts to intimidate the others by being all creepy and doing the crab walk thing. The other three stare him down and once it becomes apparent it’s going to be a 3 on 1, Rowan and Harper jump in and we have a 3 on 3 staredown.
Pier six brawl breaks out which the crowd likes. Batista manages to hand out a few Spinebusters to take Rowan and Harper out of the ring while Bryan and Punk exorcise some demons by eliminating Bray Wyatt, and we’re at the final three. Bryan and Punk continue to work as a team, getting Batista into the corner. Batista manages to shove them back and quickly gets Bryan up for a Batista Bomb. Batista hits it, but while this is happening Triple H comes in and plants a Pedigree on CM Punk. Triple H throws Punk over the top and out (which, of course, is a perfectly legal elimination as the Rumble rules always change to meet the storylines).
Batista backs Triple H into a corner and is all like “what the fuck? I don’t need your help, etc.” while Triple H tries to tell him it’s best for business. Meanwhile, while Batista’s back is turned, Bryan stumbles back to his feet only for Shawn Michaels to come in for the crowd and connect with a huge Sweet Chin Music. Michaels scurries out of the ring and back through the crowd. Triple H finally leaves as Batista turns and sees Bryan still laid out, presumably from the Batista Bomb. Batista throws Bryan out to finish off a chaotic end to the Royal Rumble.
WINNER: Batista
I know Bryan is who most want to win the Rumble (myself included, admittedly), but I’m really starting to feel like a Bryan/Michaels match could be a reality. Having Bryan and Punk go through the entire grueling match only to be screwed in the end anyway would be a nice way to officially set the Bryan/Michaels and Punk/Triple H programs in stone for Mania.
I think the WWE World Heavyweight Title absolutely should be the main event of WrestleMania 30, but at the same time I can’t see Cena not being there. I think the most likely direction from this Rumble would be to do an Orton/Batista/Cena triple threat somehow. There’s a lot of ways they could go with it, bringing up Orton/Batista/Triple H’s former Evolution connections and possibly implying that Batista may have known about the Rumble screwjob all along. Maybe Batista can be a tweener going into Mania or something.
This Rumble also allowed more tension to build between the Shield and also Rhodes/Goldust, so there’s two more potential Mania programs right there. Big E Langston also gets to look like a huge deal which could allow him to step up to a bigger program. Sheamus/Wyatt could be a possible program as well, and maybe Big Show/Mysterio can be the next contenders for The Real Americans' tag team titles. Should be a really fun PPV with a lot of layers and “something for everybody” I guess.
Well…that was fun.</font>