Last Week in Wrestling History: January 18th to January 24th

The last week, in wrestling history, hosts no less than 15 Royal Rumbles, with just as many coming historically over the next seven days with so many memorable winners, eliminations, entrants and moments, spread throughout nearly 50 hours of action.

It would take me well into next week to detail everything that went on in this Rumble heavy week. Instead, I will selfishly take a look into my personal favorite Rumble moments, and also nit-pick some of my least.

1992

I will start with one of my favourite Rumbles ever, where the list of entrants reads like a Hall of Fame alumni list. If you were a fan of the 1980s you had Hulk Hogan, Ric Flair, Roddy Piper, Randy Savage and Ted DiBiase.
If you were a fan of the 1990s, The British Bulldog, Shawn Michaels, Sid and the Undertaker should keep you happy. Every major player from the 80s/90s crossover was present: Texas Tornado, Big Bossman, Jake the Snake, Hacksaw Jim Duggan, Jimmy Snuka, Sgt Slaughter. If you include the full card as well we can throw in the Road Warriors, Earthquake and Owen Hart into the mix too. The name value alone here is incredible, and the Rumble Match itself did that moniker justice too.

With a historically excellent performance by Bobby Heenan playing as a soundtrack to Ric Flair’s eventual win, Flair put a stop to Hulk Hogan winning three Rumble Matches in a row as he survived from the #3 spot to win the WWF title. As mentioned in previous editions of LWIW, the WWF title was made vacant at the end of 1991 as the Hulk Hogan vs Undertaker series of matches were surrounded by controversy and interference.

So the title was vacated and made available in the Rumble match so we somehow went from a Hulk Hogan champion to Ric Flair champion without the Hulkster taking a pinfall. Funny how that happens isn’t it? But you shouldn’t let Hogan or his ability to not even be eliminated from the Rumble cleanly ruin what is an excellent hour-long performance from Flair, and an equally excellent Rumble match.

Speaking of Hogan, his win in the 1990 Rumble can’t go without a mention here. The historic staredown between Hogan and the Ultimate Warrior happened here which laid the groundwork for their WrestleMania VI encounter. In that era, it was unheard of to have a face vs face match, let alone the two biggest stars in the company who were holding the top two titles. But for a brief moment mid-way through the Rumble match, the tides parted Warrior and Hogan were alone in the ring and the crowd could feel something special forming, they craved to see these two larger than life stars battle. They would have to wait a few more months until WrestleMania, but the atmosphere when these two faced off was a moment to remember. Royal Rumble 1990 is not usually mentioned with the best-ofs, but it is a good one I would recommend you watch.

1997

So all of Stone Cold Steve Austin’s Rumble wins (97, 98, and 2001) happened historically last week, and his fourth also should have happened if it wasn’t for a cruel twist in the road to Wrestlemania in 1999, when The Corporation helped Vince McMahon win the Rumble to try and keep Stone Cold out of the WWF title picture.

This was the middle of the Austin vs McMahon feud and after screwing Austin out of the title at Survivor Series 98, McMahon and the Corporation would stop at nothing to stop Austin from regaining the gold. He was entered into the Rumble as #1 to give him no chance (no chance in hell), but babyface commissioner Shawn Michaels would turn the tables and enter McMahon at #2.

The chairman however always has a plan up his sleeve and there was no exception for this match, after receiving a beating for a few minutes McMahon led Austin into a trap where he was jumped by the Corporation and supposedly taken out of the match. McMahon would later arrogantly return to the ringside commentary table, only to watch in horror as Austin returned to the building driving an ambulance and shockingly embark on an elimination rampage leaving only himself, and Mr McMahon.

After chucking McMahon around the ring ping-pong style for the second time in one night, Austin looked to have the match in the bag, that was until the Rock came to ringside, distracted Austin, and somehow someway McMahon was able to take advantage and bundle a distracted Austin over the top rope and win.

Austin would have his revenge and win a steel cage match against McMahon at St Valentine’s Day Massacre, winning back his deserved WrestleMania title shot in which he would come out victorious and win the title by defeating The Rock himself and finally get one over on his evil boss.

Fast forward 17 years and in yet another attempt to get Roman Reigns over, the WWE tried the same plan again, this time putting Triple H and the evil Authority faction up against the Big Dog. What had worked with Austin and Vince in 1999 failed in 2016 with Reigns and Triple H as the crowd saw through this latest attempt to get Roman over.

2000

To end on a high, as match cards go there are none better than Royal Rumble 2000. Starting off with the debuting Tazz in New York City, his best night in WWE as his home town crowd gave him a hero’s ovation as he choked out the undefeated Kurt Angle. Tazz’s booking from this point onwards would see him slide ever so slowly down the card and never be seen as a main event player again. The Dudleyz and The Hardyz had a very fun elimination tables match in which they used the rule of having to be foreseeably driven through a table to be eliminated to their advantage. Cactus Jack and Triple H had an amazing Street Fight for the WWF title before the Rock won a decent Royal Rumble match. There were a few miss-able midcard matches in-between but overall Royal Rumble 2000 is an easy and enjoyable watch.

Tune in next week as we continue into the last week of January with some more memorable (and unmemorable) Royal Rumble moments on Last Week in Wrestling.

Recommended matches:
Royal Rumble match 1990
Royal Rumble match 1992
Royal Rumble match 2001