Worst Royal Rumble match

[King Kamala 0]

I'm sure this has been done before but it was probably done a long time ago.

 

 

I think the obvious pick is '95 with the shortened times and WrestleCrap filled field of combatants. The Russorific and utterkly predictable '99 is a close second. Every other one I've managed to get some enjoyment out of ('98 had the Three Faces of Foley in it, '88 was the first one, '96 had some weird one shot appearences in it)

[Mecha Mummy 0]

1995, definitely. It felt as if they just made it really really short as to put as little strain on Michaels as believably as they could whilst still selling the not-as-impressive-as-one-may-think accomplishment of drawing #1 and winning the whole thing.

[Guest]

I think 1999 was the worst. Based on the ending alone, but even further, there was NOBODY in the Rumble. The Rumble match really exposed the company's lack of depth, even though they were putting on cards worth paying for.

 

I'll say this though, that stuff where Taker, the Acolytes and Mideon kidnapped Mabel was hilarious. 1999 and 1995 are about even, but '95 had good surprise entrants, those being Rick Martel and Dick Murdoch. So I like it better.

[King Kamala 0]

I kind of regret putting '98 as an option. It wasn't so much a bad Rumble as it was a horribly predictable Rumble. I mean who else had a shot besides Austin?

 

 

Maybe I should have put '93 as an option instead but I have too much nostalgia for that show as it was the first tape I owned. But nostalgia aside, it has arguably the worst Rumble finish of all time and is really dull at times. It has enough good moments to keep it away from being the worst but not enough to keep it from being one of the worst IMHO.

 

 

But yeah, there's no question in my mind that '95 and '99 are by far the two worst ones.

[CanadianGuitarist 0]

We're too hot for TSM, and I said 95.

[EVIL~! alkeiper 0]

1999 easily for me. The Russo booking was horrid. Not only was it stupid, but the match stopped on several occasions to suit the storylines.

 

Among non-listed Rumbles, here's a vote for 2006. Often it seemed HHH and Rey would lay there and wait for their spots. The entire Rumble was just set-up spot after repeated spot, no flow whatsoever.

[Ravenbomb 0]

1999. I mean, having some midcarders or upper midcarders who MIGHT, in kayfabe, pull an upset win is good. But it was down to Austin, Vince, D'lo Brown, and the Big Bossman. And the stalling was awful.

[Black Lushus 0]

1999 for reasons already mentioned.

 

1993 was boring as shit. UT, Ric Flair and Mr. Perfect were all out by the halfway point. The only big names left were Macho Man and Yokozuna. Macho Man was a shell of his former shelf at this point. It was fun seeing Backlund go so long, but really it was a rather crappy installment.

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

1999. When Russo has to write around an actual wrestling match, he's totally and completely lost. Easily the worst Rumble of the last few years. As uninspiring as 1995 was, at least it was shorter than the usual Rumble match.

[cabbageboy 0]

1995 is going to take this vote from me and like it. The 1999 Rumble is certainly not good exactly, but it's such a crazy Russo car wreck that it's a bit of a guilty pleasure. Vince winning was lame, but at least he got his ass kicked over it.

 

But 95? Fuck that. It had a lame overall field anyway, the bogus 1 minute intervals, and the single worst finish in the history of the Rumble. Amazingly it gets shown every year, but the Bulldog got blatantly ripped off there (they even played his music like he won). It was half him being screwed and half him being a moron to not make sure HBK was out.

 

The 1993 Rumble was pretty decent for about half of it, but once that Gonzalez run in happened that match started sucking and never looked back.

[PILLS! PILLS! PILLS! 0]

The 1995 Rumble is the only one that I consider to be bad.

 

I love the '93 Rumble for Backlund's performance, and the 1999 Rumble match... well, I guess I love the Attitude Era too much to not enjoy it, regardless of how stupid/meaningless the outcome was.

[King Kamala 0]

I was just about to say the same thing Cabbageboy said about '93. The first half of the Rumble was pretty good but once Gonzalez came in, it totally went downhill. He took so much time out of that match with everybody being scared of him and refusing to get in the ring. It totally disrupted whatever momentum the match had and it never recovered. Though I did like the moment towards the end after Backlund eliminated Rick Martel and had a great look of disbelief on his face after he realized he was one of the Final 3.

[spman 0]

It has only been a year, but last years Rumble was really bad as well. There was a decent enough talent pool in the match, but it just totally lacked any and all interesting action. At one point wasn't there like 12 or 13 guys in the ring at once? It just wasn't memorable at all.

[Ravenbomb 0]

I liked last year's Rumble, actually. But I just like the Royal Rumble match in general, so one would have to be really bad in some way for me to not like it.

[King Kamala 0]

I rented the '95 Rumble somewhat recently (2-3 years back, when video stores were still split 50/50 between VHS and DVD) and the thing that struck me was how flat the whole show was. There were a couple matches in the three star match range on that undercard (Bret-Diesel, Razor-Jarrett, The Tag Team title match) but I don't remember the audience reacting to anything. Even the "wild" finish didn't get much of a reaction. I don't care what anybody says, those '95 WWF PPV audiences were the worst.

[King Cucaracha 0]

No option for 1991? Just as berefit of genuine potential winners as '99 and '95, dull, the ring got filled up too quick so nobody had a chance to do anything. At least '93 and '99 had a few memorable moments (Gonzalez, Perfect/Flair interaction, Yoko's win, the match-long storyline of '99, Viscera's abduction, Vince on commentary). '91 had Martel/Jake interaction and... uh, nothing. One of my worst.

 

Has to be 1995 for me. I've got a soft spot for 1999, I'll admit it. Some of it was a bit much (the Austin/Vince storyline itself could have carried the Rumble, you didn't need it becoming a second thought to Vis's abduction AND Kane eliminating himself to chase off guys from the looney bin) but Austin/Vince was the hot thing in wrestling at the time and it had that. I didn't even mind Vince winning it so much. Maybe it's just Attitude nostalgia, I don't know.

 

At least it was building to something though. 1995 was absolute filler. It was so blatantly obvious that year that nobody gave a crap about the Rumble and it was just a case of getting to the ending as soon as possible. The crowd didn't care. Nobody of any importance was involved. Nothing of any future importance happened. It was about two men and one spot, period. A total waste of time. The lack of effort was, to me, more offensive than the maybe misguided effort of 1999.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

I don't hate 95 - it has a weak entry list and that stupid 1 minute entrance thing going on, but at least stuff is always happening. Having just re-watched every Rumble, 1999 is an easy vote. 1993 is boring as hell and 1996 isn't that much more exciting, but both are inoffensive with some good entrants (plus 96 gets a free pass from me for introducing the "every entrant gets music" rule, which was a great addition). 99 is just plain bad - nothing of note happens in the match, there are at least TWO spots where an entrant comes out, then has to stand around and do nothing for 90 seconds until ANOTHER entrant comes out - just ONE spot like this is pretty bad. I have a soft spot for it because of the attitude era roster of characters but it's just so bad.

[MillenniumMan831 0]

I voted for 1988. No, I didn't give it a free pass because it was the 1st one. It took me 3 tries to watch it since I fell asleep the 1st two go arounds. Does anyone remember anything from it? Nikolai Volkoff jumping the gun? Warrior lasting a few minutes? Just really really blah.

 

1991 was very mundane but I'm a Rick The Model Martel mark so I give it an unfair pass.

 

1993 was already recapped better than I can.

 

1995 sucked but at least it was quick. Plus, I found the symmetry cute. 1, 2, and 30 finishing it. A Blu Twin coming in to interrupt both HBK/DBS confrontations, Bushwhackers each lasting about 10 seconds. I'm sure there are others but I haven't seen it in a while.

 

1999 had enough chaos to keep it from the worst but it was definitely garbage.

 

I'd have voted for 2002 if it wasn't for the returns of Goldust/Perfect and the Hurricane's cameo.

 

2006-07 did nothing for me at all. Just a bunch of rasslin and stallin w/ no markout moments or surprises I can remember. And yeah, Sandman lasting 20 seconds last year pissed me off.

[Prophet of Mike Zagurski 0]

I've watched the 99 Royal Rumble recently. I don't think McMahon should have won it. Plus Austin and McMahon didn't participate enough in it.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

2002, upon re-watching the Anthology version where it's easy to keep track of the intervals because each entrant is it's own chapter, has some really bizarre THREE minute intervals and some 2:20-2:30 intervals as well. No wonder it's the longest Rumble, but I like it.

[CanadianChris 0]

1999, and it wasn't really close for me, with the Russo booking and complete lack of star power. It badly exposed how thin the roster was under the very top guys. Plus, it looked like the crowd was just totally flat after the I Quit match.

[Lt. Al Giardello 0]

I liked the 1993 Rumble, mainly because of Backlund. I still think he had the best Rumble performance of all time.

[bob_barron 0]

How? He got to lie out of the ring for a while to get the record.

 

As uninspiring as 1995 was, at least it was shorter than the usual Rumble match.

 

That's another reason why it's so bad

[Epic Reine 0]

I'm going with '98 mostly because it was filled with the Gang War stables like NOD and DOA and I felt there were way too many jobbers in there (Tom Brandi says hi) and a lot of people who should have been pushed in the match were leiminated too early (Owen Hart).

 

'95 was fun to watch despite being so short and I actually think '99 was entertaining as well because the crowd was hot.

[Lt. Al Giardello 0]

98 was good only because because it was The Rock/Steve Austin in the final 2... Both early in their careers.

[Mecha Mummy 0]

It has only been a year, but last years Rumble was really bad as well. There was a decent enough talent pool in the match, but it just totally lacked any and all interesting action. At one point wasn't there like 12 or 13 guys in the ring at once? It just wasn't memorable at all.

 

The end with Michaels and Undertaker squaring off alone was more memorable than the entirety of the 1995 or '99 Rumbles, in my opinion.

[SteakGrowsOnUecker 0]

1999. On top of all the reasons mentioned in this thread, Michael Cole announcing makes it harder for me to watch this one again. Just terrible.

[Guest Smues]

99 hands down.

 

When I first read the title of this thread I was thinking it meant worst match on a Rumble PPV, and I'm not sure if I'd vote for Undertaker vs Yokuzuna or HHH vs. Scott Steiner.

[J.T. 0]

HBK was far too entertaning for it too be 95. 99 was pure shit.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

1999. On top of all the reasons mentioned in this thread, Michael Cole announcing makes it harder for me to watch this one again. Just terrible.

 

"Austin is watching this match from a [pause, as if he's going to say hospital but is not allowed for some reason] Medical Facility Bed". What the hell is that crap?