- 5 minutes ago
The Royal Rumble is meant to create legends, but sometimes it produces baffling moments. Join WhatCulture as we count down the 12 wrestlers who had no right stepping into the iconic battle royal.
Category
🎥
Short filmTranscript
00:00The Royal Rumble is supposed to make legends, so why did WWE let these people anywhere near it?
00:06There are some entries that scream more HR meeting than Rumble-sized surprise,
00:11and those poor souls are who will be counting down today.
00:15I'm Andy from WhatCulture, and here are 12 wrestlers who had absolutely no business being
00:20in the Royal Rumble. Number 12, Shane McMahon in 2022. Shane McMahon got a nice pop in the 2022
00:26Royal Rumble, but the more he tried and failed to do while in the ring, the more it became clear
00:31that
00:32having no business in the Rumble was an understatement in this case. It looked for all intents and
00:37purposes like Shane was booking his own run, which included going blow for blow with former MMA fighter
00:43Matt Riddle and the physical domination of just about everybody in the latter stage of the match
00:48that wasn't named Brock Lesnar. And when he did bump for Lesnar, he made a mess of getting himself
00:52over the top rope to be eliminated. It was a performance so self-indulgent that he irritated
00:57his own insane dad, who ended up sacking his flesh and blood a couple of days later.
01:03Inadvertently, this ended up being part of a legendary late career flubfest for Shane.
01:08His final WWE match as of this recording was his WrestleMania 39 cameo against The Miz that
01:13resulted in him tearing his quad on a leapfrog seconds after the fans had finished chanting
01:19you've still got it. Turns out, no, no, he did not. Wrestling-wise, McMahon was last seen
01:25in a meeting with Tony Khan for a business arrangement that went nowhere after he allegedly asked for
01:31equity and to run things in AEW. Evidently, his Rumble stinker was a sign of things to come
01:37rather than an outlier.
01:3911. Drew Carey in 2001
01:42It was often said that Vince McMahon was always happier trying an idea that had worked in the
01:46past rather than taking gambles on things with higher risk-reward ratios. He blew a small
01:52fortune on trying to make Lex Luger a new Hulk Hogan, rebooted his own rivalry with Steve Austin
01:57across countless feuds involving other people, and almost destroyed Roman Reigns while hellbent
02:02on making him the next John Cena, right down to the fact that loads of his paying customers
02:07absolutely hated him. With the original WrestleMania being a success story partly due to the involvement
02:12of Cyndi Lauper and Mr. T, celebrities stepping between the ropes was something that McMahon was
02:18always happy to take a punt on, often at the expense of his regular wrestlers and often at the expense
02:23of the match in question. This was doubly the case with Drew Carey at Royal Rumble 2001.
02:29Carey was an unannounced special guest on the show and was in a backstage segment with Vince McMahon when
02:34the former chairman inserted him into the match. When Carey managed to survive the luck of the draw and
02:40enter as both Hardy boys eliminated each other, only to bail at the sight of Kane, it left a strange
02:46sensation of something that should've been a bigger deal rather than a total non-event. And in a bizarre
02:52coda to the tail, he ended up in the 2011 Hall of Fame class in celebration of the cameo.
02:5810. Hiroki Sumi in the Greatest Royal Rumble
03:01At 2018's Greatest Royal Rumble, the first Rumble to take place in Saudi Arabia, Hiroki Sumi entered at
03:07number 7 and Michael Cole and Corey Graves talked him up as one of the most dangerous men in the
03:13entire match. Presumably they hadn't got their information from WWE.com because the company's
03:18official website infamously couldn't offer any backstory on the guy due to him being virtually
03:22unknown in pro wrestling circles. Sumi was a mystery wrapped in an enigma to such an extent that
03:28Google itself barely brought up anything on its life or certainly not the type of intel that could
03:34explain how he suddenly found himself going toe to toe with Mark Henry. So just how did he end up
03:40involved in the 50 man Royal Rumble exactly? It's a ludicrous question with a ludicrous answer. It was
03:46revealed subsequently that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman wanted Yokozuna in the maiden spectacle.
03:52The trouble with that was that Yokozuna was a little bit not alive. Unaware that Yoko had tragically
03:58passed away 18 years prior, the Saudi Royal requested him anyway and the company duly obliged with a
04:04sumo wrestler alternative. It at least fit the bill of fulfilling the gimmick even if Hiroki Sumi
04:09wasn't exactly Rodney Anuahi. 9. Carlos Colon in 1993
04:14Infamously called a youngster by Gorilla Monsoon in what might have been a misspeak but could very
04:20well be a case of Monsoon and other people within the WWE bubble not wanting to put an unfamiliar face
04:25over,
04:25Carlos Colon looked older than his 44 years when locking up with a crop of newcomers in the 1993
04:31Royal Rumble. A truly bizarre sight as he hit the ring, Colon worked his one and only WWF match at
04:38the pay-per-view, getting in there with the likes of Bob Backlund, Tatanka, Fatu and Earthquake.
04:43A lot of fire was the weapon that Monsoon said Carlos brought to the table for the match and at
04:48least
04:48he wasn't misinformed there. Colon was working violent and bloody brawls with the likes of Abdullah
04:53the Butcher in his native Puerto Rico around the time, so the Rumble was a cakewalk for the veteran.
04:59It speaks to the mentality of the era as well. Increasingly in the 2020s, 40s is considered
05:04the wrestler prime and the age of more and more world champions across the major promotions.
05:10Undeniably a great wrestler at his peak, Carlos just looked so old in the Rumble and was so at odds
05:16with WWE's presentation at the time that he felt like an anachronism.
05:208. Fake Diesel and Razor Ramon in 1997
05:23The imposter Razor Ramon and Diesel characters had no business being in a Rumble, no business
05:28still appearing on pay-per-view and no business still in WWE some four months after their ill-fated
05:34launch. Misunderstood by many, the point of the imposters wasn't just a total head loss by Vince
05:40McMahon who couldn't stand seeing Scott Hall and Kevin Nash successful with the New World Order. That head loss
05:45absolutely informed the idea, but the idea might actually have worked had disgruntled heel Jim
05:51Ross simply used them to embarrass the company he was enraged with and then moved on to bigger and
05:56better things with the damage done. The term disgruntled heel Jim Ross might sound a bit mental
06:02in 2026, but watch the promo and believe the hype. A bad ol' JR character could have serviceably gotten
06:08over something even more significant than this one-night ratings ploy. As it was, the Razor
06:13and Diesel knockoffs simply became part of the roster and part of the furniture, as if this was
06:18the most normal thing in the world. This pushed the idea miles beyond its limits, particularly when
06:24the two fought Davey Boy Smith and Owen Hart for the tag team championships and when both entered the
06:2997 Royal Rumble as potential WrestleMania main eventers, which, lest we forget, is the whole point of
06:35the bloomin' match. Diesel quote-unquote even made it to the Final Four, although he was tactically
06:41ousted from the In Your House pay-per-view with the same name thanks to his elimination by Bret Hart
06:45being considered legal. Number 7, JBL in 2014. Over a decade on from his last appearance in the match
06:52and a long time removed from his full in-ring retirement, JBL's cameo in the 2014 Royal Rumble
06:58would have been substantially more annoying had it not taken place on a night that went down in infamy
07:03for entirely different reasons. That year's Rumble is less than fondly remembered for the
07:07omission of Daniel Bryan and the subsequent hatred towards the likes of Batista and Rey Mysterio for
07:12the crime of not being Daniel Bryan. The eventual WrestleMania main event victor wasn't announced
07:18for the Rumble, but enough people had made enough assumptions that the most over-wrestler in the
07:22company might enter a match that placed him in a prime spot for the biggest show of the year, so
07:27anticipation was high. They were ultimately wrong and they were ultimately infuriated. So much so
07:33that when Kane eliminated Iron Man CM Punk in a spot preceding the argument that chased Phil Brooks
07:38out of wrestling, the audience were too caught up raging about other things that it barely registered.
07:43All of this is to say that if ever there was a year for JBL to enter the Rumble, do
07:48nothing,
07:48get chucked up by Roman Reigns and go back to work like nothing happened while avoiding a backlash,
07:53it was this one. Number 6, AAA Roster Members in 97
07:57Not exactly known for his wisdom on commentary, Vince McMahon wasn't fooling anybody as he
08:02pretended to give a toss about the various AAA wrestlers padding out the field in 1997. Listen
08:08out for his calls or lack thereof, as the likes of Pieroff, Latin Lover and Cibernetico run out for
08:14indistinct spells in the Rumble, joining more than 60,000 fans and the likes of Stone Cold Steve Austin
08:20and Bret Hart in one of the most prominent cases of mixed messaging the company still in a state of
08:25flugs could possibly offer. Perception was not the reality at the time, despite the massive stadium.
08:31Reality was reality, and reality called for WWE to require yet more outside help to find 30 stars to
08:38fill the Rumble and work alongside other organisations to try and keep pace with the rampaging phenom that
08:44was the NWO driven WCW at the time. If Hart, Austin and the likes of The Undertaker and Mankind were
08:51splashes of cold water to the face, every Lucha name in the match was simply freezing. The legendary
08:57Mil Mascaris was a different proposition, but he was only too aware of it. Beloved and not preparing to
09:03sever his relationship with this and every possible crowd watching, Mascaris politicked his way out of
09:08even doing an elimination simply by jumping off the top rope to oust himself from the match. It being
09:15pro wrestling, he kind of looked more like an idiot loser for ostensibly not following the rules and
09:20he never guessed it for WWE again. 5. Dan Mappa in the Greatest Royal Rumble
09:26Dan Mappa, and this is a compliment, was one of the best joke wrestlers ever when he first appeared on
09:31NXT back in 2015. Built up as a massive killer monster of the old school variety, aka he had a
09:38good look and he was freaking massive, on a show that was presenting new, fresh wrestlers as the
09:43future, there was almost a scent of dread around a John Laurinaitis-era greenhorn arriving on the
09:48beloved black and gold and, to be fair, physically, he did look a little bit like Nathan Jones.
09:53Byron Corbin had made a gimmick out of wrecking the vibe on NXT and trying to beat everyone's
09:58favorite, but even he was developing cult status thanks to feeling like what a contemporary performance
10:04center prospect should be rather than another OVW-era ripoff. For several weeks Big Dan's debut
10:10was plugged and pushed until finally he arrived and was immediately choked out by Samoa Joe to
10:15further his heel turn and feud with Shinsuke Nakamura. From there, Big Dan went nowhere. Mappa didn't even
10:22appear on television again until the Greatest Royal Rumble three years later, with the lone rationale for his
10:27inclusion in the match being his imposing size. A host of larger frames made up the numbers in
10:32the 50-man contest and Mappa got the nod for the number 40 spot. His run wasn't memorable and it
10:38stood very little chance of even being noticed if it had been interesting because of the small matter
10:44of Titus O'Neil entering at number 39 and infamously hitting the deck face first, sliding under the ring
10:50before he even entered. People were still pissing themselves laughing at the replays, Corey Graves included,
10:56as Mappa walked the aisle. 4. Dick Murdoch in 1995
11:00Dick Murdoch was a hugely well-known wrestler, if not a hugely well-known WWE superstar, when he
11:06appeared as an out-of-time outlier in the most new generation heavy Royal Rumble of all time in 1995.
11:13WWE could barely lay claim to leading the market at the time and, if it did, the victory was pyrrhic
11:19thanks to the commercial state of North American wrestling. With a lack of funds and interest came a
11:24profound lack of full timers for the annual Battle Royal. Vince McMahon's solution was to shave the
11:29entry intervals down to a minute and put Shawn Michaels and Davey Boy Smith out there for the
11:34duration. With only select exceptions, this allowed for nearly all of the remaining 28 entrants to
11:40not really matter all that much, instead filling time battling with the two Iron Men and each other
11:45before taking tumbles in short order. For that purpose, Murdoch was as available as anybody else,
11:51but men of his ilk weren't too far away from getting fewer and fewer bookings as pro wrestling
11:56finally caught up with pop culture in the 1990s. His ilk, in this case, was being hate-filled and racist,
12:03and, per multiple accounts, a member of the Ku Klux Klan. Alas, wrestling was still mostly just
12:09wrestling in more barren periods like this, and Murdoch took a break from his spots in NWA Dallas
12:14and WAR in Japan to work a select few TV taping spots in Stamford.
12:203. Michael Cole in 2012 Michael Cole was a symptom of the problem
12:24rather than the problem himself, in that he was technically the worst of free entrants in 2012.
12:30If you're not quite able to put your finger on it and are wondering why Jerry Lawler and Booker T
12:35looked like video game versions of themselves when Cole entered, it's because both of them were also in
12:40the Rumble that year, alongside Big Mike. Flippant comedy was the theme of the match,
12:45and with a field absolutely stacked with unserious entrants as opposed to the eventual winner Sheamus
12:50and a shocking returnee in Chris Jericho, Ricardo Rodriguez entered only so they could make a joke
12:55about him having a crappy car. The Great Khali entered years after his divisive prime, Santino and
13:01Mick Foley meanwhile had a sock puppet fight in the latter's final ever WWE match. And hey,
13:07Road Dogg was there too. Ultimately, Cole's short run was just that little bit more time wasted during
13:12a period where the company thought it had time to burn. Sheamus winning resulted in the Daniel Bryan
13:18Wrestlemania squash, which resulted in the YES movement, which resulted in two years of the Rumble
13:23being reflective of WWE's relationship with its audience. But years before the Fraction, the market
13:29leader was too arrogant or ignorant to see the problem. 2. Dory Funk Jr in 1996
13:35Just shy of 55 years old when he entered the Rumble in 1996, Dory Funk Jr didn't look anywhere near
13:42out
13:43of place as he probably should have done, thanks to fellow men of a certain time, Jake Roberts and
13:48Bob Backlund sharing the ring with him. But really, what exactly were these three geezers doing in the
13:54Rumble? This was supposed to be the new generation after all, and nothing screams new generation like
13:59Dory Funk Jr, a man who, with all due respect, looked 50 when he was 25. Bit like me, in
14:06a lot of ways.
14:06To rattle off a familiar refrain, WWE did not have much choice. The company wasn't rich in talent from
14:12a quantity point of view, but Funk had a rich enough history to more than justify a spot.
14:18Per Vince McMahon on commentary, Terry Funk would have joined him had he not been filming a movie in
14:22Germany with Bruce Willis. Dory didn't stay on WWE's books beyond the cameo, but his Stranger in a
14:28Strangeland appearance oddly foreshadowed much of the year to come. McMahon had no clue that Eric
14:33Bischoff was about to steal a march in the brand new Monday Night Wars by completely reshaping what
14:38it meant for wrestlers to jump ship. With the signings of Kevin Nash and Scott Hall as well as
14:43many others, Bischoff highlighted exactly how to find new qualities in many wrestlers. Vince
14:48presumably thought that any legends were fair game for WWE compared to down in Atlanta, but it would
14:54take another year before he'd review his business and finally start rebuilding from scratch.
14:59And at number one, Becky Lynch in 2019. Based on just how over she was by 2019,
15:05Becky Lynch had every business being in that year's Royal Rumble ahead of a Wrestlemania that looked
15:10sure to feature the show's first ever women's main event. But a WWE obsessed with trolling its
15:16audience to the last insisted on creating a scenario that didn't just tease the fact that she might not
15:21enter at all, but also risked healing their top babyface star. Having lost a singles match to Asuka
15:27on the show's undercard, Lynch was in Rumble Limbo. She was not in the match definitively. Plenty of
15:33wrestlers have worked the undercard and gone on to feature in the Battle Royal, but Daniel Bryan's 2014
15:38omission was fresh in the memory five years later, not least considering how similarly organic the
15:44man's rise felt. Bryan was still the comparison point for everything and fans were afraid it was
15:49going to happen again. And going back to Bryan, he was proof that WWE could actively squash a push or
15:54see one through in equal measure with his real-life trials resonating more than their spun narrative
15:59about it being one big glorious storyline. Subsequently, when Lynch got in the match via desperate
16:05politicking over the injured Lana's body, hopes weren't exactly high. As they so often did at
16:10the time, WWE got lucky with the outcome. Lynch was too over, the fans were too browbeaten,
16:16and the combination was catnip for lazy creative. The man came around, navigated the emotional assault
16:22course of a mostly wrought into Road to WrestleMania, and ended up winning both belts at Mania to just
16:27about pay off all of her promise. Shame about the finish, though.