riddle's face lol

E tossed out like nothing

This Rumble sucks

Bray :(

Orton gets eliminated like a punk :lol:

lol, what a shit Rumble

Shane McMahon in the final three :lol:

Possibly the worst Rumble match of all time.

lol shane couldn't get back over the rope and just wheezed/groaned

Brock eliminated 13 straight men, no gays in that one apparently.

Brah lesnar

What a garbage Rumble match :nono:

"the winner of the royal rumble match and the person who will main event wrestlemania"

Pile of shite

It's cool that this is on Saturday night... no work tomorrow, sweet

so predictable

Really bad rumble match

Actually watched the Men's Rumble. That was a lot of fun.

What's the other WM match prob gonna be? Lashley vs. who?

Garbage. Not the result. But the match. That lacked any drama and barely any fun parts.

They did the near impossible and made a Royal Rumble match suck.

I liked that they didn't do the prolonged ending that I hate.

8.5/10

That was worse than the 2015 Rumble.

I'm gonna claim an obscure Vince fact: Vince must have a deep seeded hatred of #26. That number still has yet to win a Rumble.

Someones gotta take the piss on this one, it might as well be God Emperor Gertner

There's a lot of numbers that haven't had a winner though. Maybe it's some kind of code.

The funny thing is the year Brock did eliminate 13 people was actually one of the best Rumbles...this year both the women's and men's rumbles were 'not great'

Edge?

Saw some new wrestlers that I haven't seen. Knoxville and Bad Bunny were great. Best Rumble I've seen in years

Brock must have this stuff written into his contract right?

This show fucking sucked. The women’s rumble half filled with “stars” of yesteryear. Becky versus deuce drop was boring as fuck. The intergender was ok. And the men’s rumble was boring. They had like maybe 3 guys not including Lesnar’s senseless entry who could convincingly be champion. Woof. Who the fuck enjoys this shit anymore?

Oh God don't speak that into the aether Slikhausen.

Predictable isn't bad. It's the execution that was painstakingly boring.

Still pretty good

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Oh my god it caught fire again. No joke <a href="https://t.co/pM7nTrh21o">https://t.co/pM7nTrh21o</a></p>&mdash; Will Washington  (@WilliamRBR) <a href="https://twitter.com/WilliamRBR/status/1487651148580413440?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 30, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Signed is being lowered again to put it out <a href="https://t.co/QvfnpbiXe8">pic.twitter.com/QvfnpbiXe8</a></p>&mdash; Will Washington  (@WilliamRBR) <a href="https://twitter.com/WilliamRBR/status/1487652374458081289?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 30, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Johnny Knoxville and Bad Bunny played their parts to perfection.

Two celebrities should NOT be the sole highlights of a Royal Rumble match. Fuck. What a sad indictment of the roster.

They also got the biggest pops

Just playing devil’s advocate here: Neither would be my choice, but someone has to be the first man out. Shinsuke has won before, he’s been pretty looked after as IC Champ — he’s a good cushion, although he’s better than that (and maybe he hasn’t signed his extension yet).

With Edge & Miz — this stuff is for the reality show. It doesn’t mean shit to us, and this might seem trivial, but the placement on the card and whatever — making it seem more important than trivial — could be part of the story.

It’s weak, I know. But those reality shows are an important part of the WWE’s exposure, whether we like them or not. Following big matches and going a long time could be part of what they’ve got planned for that drama. Maybe.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Lesnar had to be the winner here. I’m told they legitimately have no idea what the WWE Title match at Mania is going to be at this point. Avoid the ol pigeon hole.</p>&mdash; WrestleVotes (@WrestleVotes) <a href="https://twitter.com/WrestleVotes/status/1487655232712630276?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 30, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Barely anyone is Shawn or Taker.

They could easily shoehorn Brock into a Roman match. Big E could’ve won the rumble and challenged Lashley. Easy.

Big E has been drafted to SD tho, they announced that earlier this week, so he will no longer be in the main event picture, he's back to tag teaming with kofi

There have been Rumble Matches that suck or are forgettable. Haven’t seen this one, so can’t comment, but I trust Gerty.

Not every Rumble should be a masterclass in poetic symmetry either, btw. It’s part of the booking of it that makes it so beautiful when done right, or close to right. If every Rumble was the greatest match ever, then none of them are. Nothing should aim to be “bad,” don’t get me wrong, but sometimes guys should just get dumped on their head and lose, and it should be a bit ugly.

If I had to guess today, they will probably do another title change at the Chamber, and somehow get it to a Triple Threat of Lashley, Mcintyre, and Rollins. Don't see Edge or Big E getting into the mix.

He was not going to win. He’s a talented guy, they tried, but it wasn’t right in the spot right now. I’m not convinced he’s going to be teaming with Kofi for long though.

Noid. Shinsuke has not been looked after as IC Champion. He's been forgotten. The IC title hasn't been defended on PPV in like 8 months. He's only defended it a couple times maybe on TV (only one I remember for sure) and he's been in like 5 or 6 matches total on TV the entire time lol

Horrendous stuff. There couldn’t be many people left who enjoy this. No stars/no fun.

He’s been champion for quite a while and I don’t remember him dropping many falls, even in tags. He’s visible with a belt that signals to people he is important. That does make an impression on viewers. He just won a tag on SmackDown against Jinder & Shanky.

Meltzer reports Ronda is signed thru WM39 next year.

She is a member of the SD roster going forward per Big Dave and expected to heavily dominate that division and show.

That would make sense. You bring in her in Rumble to next year’s Mania with a plan and see where you go from there.

+ FOX always wanted her and were annoyed with WWE when the only 2 people they requested were Brock and Ronda and neither were initially on SD, so Ronda on SD keeps FOX happy

I can understand that from a promotion perspective, but there are ways around that. Brock basically appears on both shows anyway. I’m sure we’ll be seeing Ronda on Raw too.

I forgot he was even IC champion, so he's not that visible.

I don't think this was as bad as people are saying, but it wasn't very good either. It just kind of exists as a thing that happened.

They already announced Ronda for Raw tomorrow.

I feel like the Rumble needs to be 40 people going forward with 1 minute intervals. They had so many people they could have used and didn't. No one from NXT, no Ciampa or Dunne, no Finn, no Apollo, no Usos....so many other options.

Only reason Nakamura hasn’t dropped the belt yet is because he’s been injured and instead of coming up with some sort of plan, they probably thought it be easier to just forget about it. Lazy booking .

The show gets worse every year - Shane O Mac as a surprise entrant is shocking. You could guess the Lesnar win the second he dropped to Lashley cos of Reigns.

Camera work was horrendous- missed out on spots cos they cut away too early. Storytelling was limited - they could have built some of the mid card wrestlers more. Frustrate the crowd with limited Orton appearance.

Women’s rumble felt like a battle royal on Raw or something - Rousey still only has one expression. Sasha Banks I thought was the storyline then they crapped all over that for a random elimination to Zelina.

Lesnar is boring - gassed after three moves. Lashley is money at the moment. Reigns is gone after this title run I think.

Big rousey fan here. Yes her facial expressions and promos need work, but her in ring style is a breath of fresh air compared to most of the slow awkward, fake looking women's wrestling that makes up most of the roster.

Nooooooo! Not everybody needs to be in. None of those guys would have helped the match much, nor would the match have helped them.

Keep it at 30 and stop putting so many tag teams in the rumble.

I don't think Ronda is the hot commodity she was even a few years ago tbh. She fell off the grid of being talked about by media and the general public. I can't see her making a difference for ticket sales in 2022.

Watched the Rumble with some friends. We did our annual wagering with a trophy for the winners. These are my thoughts:

*Reigns and Rollins told an interesting story. The run-up was how Rolllins was always in his head and Reigns couldn't beat him in the big match. And the finish reflected that story where Reigns ultimately lost his cool, because Rollins was in his head. He ended up losing the big match, by disqualification. So there is more in that match. The annihilation with the chair was something else entirely. He was becoming an actual devil.

*Women's Rumble wasn't bad. Ronda winning was fine. Mickey James showing up and eliminating Michelle McCool was clever. Brie eliminating Nicki was a humorous juxtaposition of their first Rumble appearance together, where Nicki eliminated Brie. I don't even follow the main product, but I am done with Sonia vs Naomi. Amber won the trophy, which was promptly broken. Why? Because it's Pro Wrestlling. You see a trophy, it gets destroyed. You see a cake, it ends up in someone's face.

*Women's title match was pretty good. Doudrop looked like she belonged in the ring with Becky, and is a damned good monster. Lynch went over, and that was the right decision. I'm sure Doudrop will be back, though. She is too entertaining not to be.

*Ultimate Hoss Fight was next. I waited 20 years to see Lesnar vs Lashley. It was worth every second. And, you know what? I wouldn't mind seeing Lesnar vs. Lashley 2. The ending wasn't conclusive (double ref bump is new), which leaves the door open. Reigns screwing Lesnar was a thing of genius. I really like how Heyman didn't seem to comply out of a sense of duty to Reigns, but out of fear. Well played all the way around.

*Mixed tag match was exactly what it needed to be. Gave the fans a minute to come down in preparation for the Men's Rumble match. It went a little long, but had a satisfying ending.

*If you watched the Men's Rumble in a bubble, which various people want to do, I can see not liking it. But one thing was certain, the show was written around Lesnar winning, in preparation for his revenge at Wrestlemania. Austin Theory had a solid run. I was kind of disappointed that Omos didn't eliminate more, but it makes sense with what they were doing. He looked good, and it took everyone in the ring at that time to eliminate him. And I want to say he still landed on his feet. I think Omos is going to be money. Knoxville played his part decently. Felt bad that Kofi ate shit trying to do his annual save. It happens though. I liked that there were some actual mini-stories in this match. One of the better ones being McIntyre coming in, eliminating Corbin and Moss, then just murdering them on the outside. There was nothing funnier to me than seeing Riddle, an actual MMA guy, selling the Shittiest Punches in the World. Like I said, Lesnar would be back for revenge after what happened to him earlier in the night, so #30 was the perfect spot. And he just went on a rampage. The Riddle elimination was a thing of beauty, and you realized that he was a small child in comparison. The Lesnar and McIntyre final played off their last meeting. I was wanting Drew to win, but the story was told in the direction it was told. I was satisfied, and I can't wait to see what will likely be the blow-off between Lesnar and Reigns.

*I went with a slightly larger trophy for the Men's Rumble than the Women's Rumble. That made smashing it a LOT easier. It was an idea I had Monday, sold the host of the show on it without much difficulty, and the 2 trophies cost me less than $13. A friend had a birthday this week and drove in. I said next year, I'll get him a cake...

I always get amused looking at the Rumble times every year. For all the talk of it being an hour long match, most years they are announced as 90 second intervals. 90 seconds across 28 timed intervals means it should only take 42 minutes for everyone to enter.

Shayna Baszler entered at #30 nearly 53 minutes into the match, Brock Lesnar at 48 minutes. I think Bruce Prichard coined the phrase "Titan Time" to reflect the fluctuating intervals depending on what is happening in the match. Sometimes as a viewer it is glaringly obvious.

In this particular case, they have time constraints to worry about now they are on Peacock and presumably had to be off the air by midnight and therefore they needed to get to the finish quickly after #30 entered.

Lesnar coming in and cleaning house immediately was believable...anyone else does that and it would've been like "wait...that's it?"

Just really poorly booked rumble matches that showed the lack of depth/starpower WWE has created. That was always going to catch up to them.
Besides the general lack of drama in both matches and that neither Brock or Ronda needed a win to have big WM matches there's also so many things...

We didn't even really get any 'fun' spots this year. I remember when R-Truth ran down and pulled a ladder out from the under the ring and climbed it bc he thought he was in the MITB match during the Rumble, very funny/creative spot.

I think Omos will likely be released before the Rumble next year

It’s not a good thing that you were able to predict with such accuracy :lol:

Yes, predicable =/= bad, but it doesn’t equal good either. The “story” they’ve told was barely there.

Getting Brock back to Reigns is fine but do you know what might have been more interesting? Brock in the Chamber. He’s never been in a chamber match, imagine him suplexing dudes into/through plexiglass for 10 minutes.

Also have to throw out there, no one from NXT given a chance to shine this year. Why not put Bron Breaker or Walter/Gunther in there to give NXT some good exposure?

Don’t want to draw attention to the brand that got put into the ground by Big Tony’s Big Time Wrestling.

Ronda going to end up making Charlotte a face, from her interview with WWE dot com after the Rumble

This!

I was saying I did pretty good with my predictions.

Yeah I know.

And I’m saying that you shouldn’t have been able to predict it with that level of accuracy.

And then preempting that someone would say “just because it’s predictable doesn’t mean it’s bad”.

Has he though?

He’s still listed as a Raw star on wwe.com. It’s the type of thing that I would have thought would have had at least a small story on the website, or coverage on the “dirt sheets” (maybe it has, I don’t read them).

Good deal, just wanted to make sure!

Just had a quick look, seems Big E’s move has been reported. Not sure why they haven’t moved him on the roster pages, they’re usually quite quick at that I think.

dot com needs to update itself lol

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">It's official! <a href="https://twitter.com/WWEBigE?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@WWEBigE</a> is back on SmackDown!<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/SmackDown?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#SmackDown</a> <a href="https://t.co/iTrPLhDzkC">pic.twitter.com/iTrPLhDzkC</a></p>&mdash; WWE on BT Sport (@btsportwwe) <a href="https://twitter.com/btsportwwe/status/1487251937473052676?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 29, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

No offense, but that spot sounds horrible. I don’t want to see that in a Royal Rumble. I want to see serious dudes beating the shit out of each other trying to win.

Guys running in and hitting their routine high spots is one of the most nauseating things about modern Rumbles for a lot of fans.

I haven’t even seen the match, but I can already tell you that Kofi blowing his spot, Johnny Knoxville being in the match and Bad Bunny being in there are already pretty memorable. This is just your subjective take.

And they can always do that. He could defend his Rumble spot or just do it another time. Do we know for sure that there is even going to be a Chamber in Saudi Arabia?

Sorry to jump to hasty conclusions, but people would whine about Brock eliminating people in the Chamber.

You don’t want NXT guys out there every year. Then people expect NXT guys. And what would Gunther do? Eliminate one person and then get tossed by Omos? Cool. People would still be complaining.

Lol, people are whinging about the IC Title being buried. Do they really want the NXT Champion to come out and get tossed from a Rumble too?

I've believed lately that instead of having tag teams in, you have the team face each other heading into the rumble. For your makeshift teams, it allows to tease further dissension. For some of the teams that are built to be stronger, they have a storyline built in for when one turns on the other down the road. Could be 6 months from their match leading into the Rumble when one finally turns, citing "doubt that was caused from their Royal Rumble qualifying match because you didn't let me have the spot" or whatever.

I mean the show is called Elimintion Chamber so it’d be really weird if they didn’t do a chamber match.

You could do that sometimes. I wouldn’t make a tradition out of it. But having one member from a team there is fine, whether they get in by beating their partner or someone else.

Eh, the Rumble seems fine to me. I could have done without some of the lower card choices, but if you put Finn Balor and Cesaro in there, people are going to complain too. I absolutely would try and focus on a Tag Team Title program or programs away from the Rumble match for these cards though. Alpha Academy vs. Street Profits vs. Rey & Dominik ties up those guys. 6 places free.

You’re knowingly oversimplifying it. There’s a way to feature someone and still have them lose. That’s not what they did. With pretty much any of the guys in there.

It was great


<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Remember when R-Truth brought a ladder to last year's <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/RoyalRumble?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#RoyalRumble</a> ?! 😂😂 I died! <a href="https://t.co/48eUGjumCD">pic.twitter.com/48eUGjumCD</a></p>&mdash; Styles (@1Anstyles) <a href="https://twitter.com/1Anstyles/status/823546681010569216?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 23, 2017</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

I haven’t been checking the official calendar regularly.

Noid, go watch the match. It’s not the worst (some people need to go back and watch some of the truly terrible ones) by any means, it’s just…there. The Rumble for a lot of people is the one “can’t miss show” of the year, it’s an opportunity to get people hooked on the product. I mean, it might prove to do that, but for me it was a very “just there” show.

No, nor have I. Just took a 30 second trip to wwe.com :lol:

That’s so fucking stupid.

And even looking at the roster there: You’ve got AJ Styles and Kofi Kingston who were in this year’s match! Michael Cole let everyone know that it’s R-Truth’s 8th Rumble. That’s why I don’t lose sleep if someone isn’t thrust right into the sameness of it all.

And you’re right, they could still have Brock in the Chamber Match, and people would probably bitch about it. Which for me would be pretty justified. You can use the Rumble to but a spotlight on someone. A bigger spotlight than winning a Chamber match. Does Brock need the Rumble AND a Chamber win? At this point the whole story is leading to Brock dethroning Reigns at Mania. Man if they have Brock be the guy to dethrone Reigns :nono:

WWE 2022 PPV schedule


Day 1 - Saturday, Jan. 1 in Atlanta


Royal Rumble - Saturday, Jan. 29 in St. Louis


Elimination Chamber - Saturday, Feb. 19 in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia


WrestleMania 38 - Saturday, April 2 & Sunday, April 3 in Dallas


TBA - Sunday, May 8 in Providence, R.I.


TBA - Sunday, June 5 in Chicago


Money in the Bank - Saturday, July 2 in Las Vegas (Allegiant Stadium)


SummerSlam - Saturday, July 30 in Nashville (Nissan Stadium)


TBA - Saturday, Sept. 3 OR Sunday, Sept. 4, location TBD


TBA - October TBD, location TBD


Survivor Series - Saturday, Nov. 26 in Boston

Pretty sure that was just for that night.

Underestimating how much subtle storytelling there was.

We finally got an answer on why Sonya has an issue with Naomi. Sonya eliminated 2 people and it’s no coincidence who they were. Sonya clearly has an issue with people with a high concentration of melanin.

And wearing your hair braided gives you a performance boost in the Rumble match.

This one had me laughing. Pretty sure Cole realised what he said as there was a few moments of silence afterwards.

There was another weird call when Reigns hit the Drive By with Pat saying “taking a page out of the Undertaker’s playbook”. Do not remember Taker ever hitting that. :wtf:

20 pages for a WWE PPV!

R.I.P. AEW

Most of the pages are just people complaining how bad the show is where at an AEW PPV we are always like HOLY SHIT! and YES! and FINALLY!

WWE is dying like Christ on the Cross and you are sticking in the spear.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Shane McMahon Reportedly Has Major Heat Following The Royal Rumble <a href="https://t.co/gtgCwCbeQf">https://t.co/gtgCwCbeQf</a></p>&mdash; PWMania.com - Wrestling News (@PWMania) <a href="https://twitter.com/PWMania/status/1487938501962342405?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 30, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Bull, most of the AEW posts are just fanboys trying to defend everything :rofl:

lol WWE

:rofl: