The 2023 Royal Rumble was a show that starts off the road to WrestleMania. Presiding from the Alamodome in San Antonio, this year's edition was hailed as the most important Royal Rumble event in the company's history due to the return of Vince McMahon and the rumors of a sale happening. In my opinion, this PLE (Premium Live Event) was a mixed bag. Here are some gripes and some high points about this event.
THE MEN'S ROYAL RUMBLE MATCH WAS PREDICTABLE
Many griped that last year's Royal Rumble match was one of the worst in recent memory, because Shane McMahon and Bad Bunny were in the final four. This year's match wasn't any better. It was bland and wasn't very intriguing to say the least. There was a moment where Gunther and Brock Lesnar were face-to-face, then Lashley comes out. When Edge had handled the Judgement Day, Damien Priest comes out. I predicted correctly on both situations. Also, Edge, Booker T and Logan Paul were the only surprised entries. No Rock, no Matt Cardona, and no Nick Aldis. Just a battle royal match put together by duct tape.
CODY AND RHEA WERE THE OBVIOUS CHOICES AS THE WINNERS OF THEIR RESPECTED ROYAL RUMBLE MATCHES
During the kickoff show, one of the backstage reporters asked two kids outside of the Alamodome their opinion on who would win the Men's and Women's Royal Rumble and both answered, Cody Rhodes and Rhea Ripley. Either these 7-year old kids read the dirt sheets or listen to Bryan Alvarez or they knew this was the outcome.
Other than Bianca Belair, Becky Lynch, Bayley and maybe Charlotte, who was going to be the one to go to WrestleMania for a headline championship? It was Rhea. Putting her in the Judgement Day stable has paid dividends for Rhea. Also, having her start at #1 and win the whole thing makes her a legit threat to take the title at Mania. She set the record for longest time in a Women's Royal Rumble match at 1 hour and 1 minute and becoming the fourth individual to start at #1 and go the distance (Shawn Michaels, Chris Benoit, Rey Mysterio). I hope she wins the championship at WrestleMania.
WWE did everything in its power to have Cody Rhodes headline WrestleMania. They put him at #30, they did video packages on his return from injury, they had the internet community hype him to no end. I'm not complaining, it was just obvious. As much as the company will lie and say that they do not watch other wrestling companies, you know that they kept their eye on Cody when he was in the indies and AEW. He became a main-eventer during that time and despite the fact that I stated that he would never be a headliner in AEW, it could work in WWE as the man who dethroned Roman Reigns.
Speaking of Rey Mysterio, he never came out at #17. His son, Dominik, came out at #18 and was holding his father's mask with the implication that Dominik attacked him backstage. So, technically, Rey is still in the Royal Rumble match. Oh, and Rey's record for longest time in a RR match was broken.
The competitor who broke the record, Gunther, became a legit star in this match. As the Intercontinental Champion, he is bringing respectability to the title and hopefully, it will add to matches at WrestleMania. I said to Tony Khan in a blog last year that if MJF didn't win the AEW World Championship by the end of the year, then they would have no clue what they were doing. Apparently, Tony listened. Now, WWE has to put a world title around Gunther when the year ends.
MOUNTAIN DEW SHOULD ASK FOR A REFUND
The Pitch Black match was an absolute dud. A months-long buildup was wasted away in five minutes. The glow-in-the-dark ring ropes, ring gear and face paint was pretty cool. However, Bray Wyatt and Eli Drake (Yes, I'm calling him that) were bamboozled into a hype machine that failed. Not even Uncle Howdy doing a high jump onto Drake could save this. Why does WWE continue to do this to Wyndham Rotunda? And now, they decided to bring Eli Drake into this.
I'm not going to say much about the Belair/Alexa title match. It was eight minutes long and Bianca gets a victory as they tease Alexa joining Wyatt and Uncle Howdy. The match didn't get out of first gear.
Pat McAfee made a surprising return at the beginning of the show, surprising Cole and Graves in the process. Commentary was garbage in this event and Graves seemed legitimately pissed off throughout the whole show.
They had this band named Hardy play at the event. I'm not sure what genre of music that they conduct, but the crowd at the Alamodome wasn't thrilled. There was a shot of Michael Cole dancing, because I guess the tool needs to dance sometimes.
The championship match between Reigns and Owens was solid. We knew that Roman was going to be victorious in this contest, but Kevin Owens put up a valiant effort. Reigns slammed Owens' backside of his head onto the steel steps. This looked painful to watch. Kevin slapped Roman, but Reigns answered with a spear and a three count. If this was the end of their rivalry, it concluded on a good note. Or this is concluded?
After the match, Reigns and the rest of the Bloodline continued to attack Owens and eventually, took out handcuffs to....well, cuff Kevin to the ring ropes. While cuffed, the Usos begin to overuse the super kick on Owens. Roman grabbed a chair and was going to pummel Kevin with it, but Sami Zayn convinced him not to do it. Roman told Sami to do the honors. As Zayn would hesitate, Roman would berate him and tell that Owens was nothing and would slap Sami several times. The crowd is chanting for Sami. Roman turns and faces Owens as Zayn has the chair ready to swing.
Then,.........Sami connects the chair to Roman's back, causing him to fall forward. It was reminiscent of Seth Rollins betraying the Shield nine years ago, when he hit Roman with a chair. Roman fell the same exact way. The crowd erupts! Then you realize that Sami is about to get ambushed by the Bloodline. That few second wait reminded me of another great end to a storyline. (When Chris Jericho opened the gift that Kevin Owens gave him during the Festival of Friendship in 2017 and saw it was a new list. Chris would say "Wait, how come my name is on it?" and lifts the list up to say the KO list. The crowd and viewer were stunned and realized that Owens just betrayed Jericho.) Jimmy Uso superkicked Sami and he sold it like a million bucks. The Bloodline continued to destroy Zayn as Jey Uso was distraught and stormed out of the ring and to the locker room. Roman would pummel Sami with chair shots to his back. The Bloodline would head back to the locker room, celebrating Roman's conquest as Zayn and Owens were motionless in the ring to the disbelief of the San Antonio crowd.
This is what happens when you carefully craft a storyline to get the fans' attention and the payoff is done to their liking. This arc with Sami Zayn has saved his career. Last year at WrestleMania, Zayn was in a comedy match with Johnny Knoxville. When he entered the Bloodline's lives, many thought he was going to be the butt of their jokes. He was the comic relief, sort of. As the storyline progressed, he became the sympathetic figure in the group. This had fans invested in Zayn and made him a legit face despite being on a heel stable. Character development, got to love it. The chair shot propelled Zayn into a threat for Reigns and his titles.
Well, that's all for the 2023 Royal Rumble review.
(For more content, check out our Facebook page, our website @www.realsportsaz.com and the Wix mobile app)
Comments