Royal Rumble ‘24 (Bossman’s Year)

[SpykeDudlei1]

7 hours ago, Loki said:

Also disappointing to see boring Andrade turn up - off the back of a forgettable AEW run he has nothing to offer imo

THANK YOU! I was beginning to think I was sailing that ship alone. Never have, never will (I’d imagine) understood the fuss.

[RIDDUM_N_STYLE]

Genuinely surprised that Jordynne Grace was an entrant in the women’s match and loved that she got a decent run (just under 20 minutes) and the collar and elbow punch up with Naomi coming off the back of their two KO title matches over the past two weeks

I wish that they’d replaced someone from the men’s match with Moose or Chris Sabin so TNA could be repped in both matches but beggars can’t be choosers

R Truth needs to be protected at all cost, if you haven’t seen it, watch his bit with Rosenberg on the pre show in a batting cage. Think Valhalla will set Ivar on him on Raw for what happened in the women’s match and him going for a hot tag in the men’s completely had the crowd eating out his hand

[Fatty Facesitter]

5 hours ago, Lorne Malvo said:

The best surprise return of Rumble season - @Fatty Facesitter thumbs up/thumbs down reviews! God I've missed them.

Chelsea Green reminds a little of Billie Kay's run a few years back - just utterly commited to the role and not afraid to show arse at all. She's great.

PPVs only this year - I genuinely thought switching to a remote job would allow me to watch even more wrestling, alas no 😁

Echo the Chelsea love in. I do miss the IIconics  - they were incredibly annoying in the best possible way. 

[I Bent My Wookie]

5 hours ago, The Dart said:

You seem completely unwilling to accept that they might have changed who Brock was going to be eliminated by when they replaced him with Bron (reported a good day before the Rumble by the sheets).   So by your logic you think Brock was going to come in, piss his pants at the sight of Bron & Omos and throw himself out, because it’s entirely impossible they changed anything…just replaced Brock with Pat.

Christ you're so boring. I read this, had an unmandatory nap, woke up and read it again and I need a proper sleep the second time round 

[air_raid]

6 hours ago, Fatty Facesitter said:

I do miss the IIconics  - they were incredibly annoying in the best possible way. 

I thought they were a fabulous act. At the time I thought the creation of the women’s tag belts was to give them a vehicle, so they could have a nice wrong run before someone eventually got a good pop for finally putting them away and shutting them up. I was wrong.

[d-d-d-dAz]

I thought Chelsea Green stood out in the Rumble. To the point where even if you strip away the (superb) physical comedy, during her entrance I thought 'wow, she's a star'.

And, for as fun as the women's Rumble was, I thought it was telling how few had that instant star aura and the ones that did typically had significant experience outside the WWE. Grace, Cargill and Green were the ones that really stood out in that regard from memory.

[DavidB6937]

Makes more sense in context.

 

[RedRooster]

12 hours ago, DavidB6937 said:

I like to think the current regime might be a little kinder to someone like Chelsea Green. Didn't someone just not "get" Billie?

I think she's one of the biggest success stories from the resignings, but she's also one of the biggest misses in the sense that they're not giving her any sort of sustained push. She has one of the best characters in the women's division; and if you were to give her a top level push, people would absolutely want to see her get her comeuppance from some of the top babyfaces. They've clearly identified that there's entertainment in her having her comeuppance, but she seems to get that every week as opposed to on the back of successes that rile up the audience. They're sleeping on a top level heel, in my opinion. She's really good. 

[d-d-d-dAz]

37 minutes ago, DavidB6937 said:

Makes more sense in context.

 

I mean, anythings possible but it makes perfect sense to me that the Lesnar spot was switched for the McAfee one. Lesnar comes out, dominates Omos and Bron to show how hard he is, stands by the ropes laughing at the two big lumps and someone comes up behind and chucks Lesnar out (I'd assumed Gunther, but Mysterio makes sense).

Bron's spot seemed perfectly written to showcase him, that i'd be a bit more surprised if he was a last minute addition.

[air_raid]

Chelsea’s come a long way since that Rumble before her first release where she had the dreaded “zero crowd reaction while the commentators fail to drum up fake enthusiasm” energy that happens in many Rumbles.

This year it was “It’s Ricochet!” who I forgot was still employed there.

[Supremo]

R-Truth stole the whole show. Running in during the women’s match. Doing the first ever hot tag in a Royal Rumble. I can’t really articulate it, but when someone does something daft in pro-wrestling and then some joins in with a straight face, that’s my sweet spot. When Jeff Jarrett felt the need to show Danhausen his tickets because Danhausen was dressed as an usher. Same thing here. Dom Mysterio diving for the hot tag. I lost it.  Worth his weight in gold, R-Truth.

Everything else was just okay. Nothing bad, but given the hype, and my presumption that the roster would want to change what everyone was talking about, I expected more and felt a bit flat. Well; until Cody and Roman started jaw-jacking from about six miles apart in that final minute. That was magic. I got goosebumps. We’re back!

Women’s Rumble was way better than the Men’s. Think that’s the first time that’s happened.

Great to see Naomi back. Even greater to see how much it meant to her. I hope Michael Cole apologised backstage for all that bullshit burying her. Especially given recent revelations. Frankly, he should’ve said something on air about how she never let a single fan down.

Chelsea Green playing the role of a crash test dummy was absolutely brilliant. She reminded me of those videos you see online of people on Sling Shot fairground rides, falling in and out of consciousness, flailing about like a rag doll. Great fun.

Jade Cargill looked the absolute business. Superstar. For what it’s worth though, I saw almost no difference in either work or presentation with how she was in AEW. I think it’s the grand stage and actually mixing it up with the top stars rather than existing in your own Baddie-verse on Rampage for fucking years and years. Bianca vs. Jade for Wrestlemania? Works for me.

For someone presumably facing Rhea at Mania, Becky Lynch was a whole lot of nothing, wasn’t she? Wonder if they’ll continue that self-doubt story. Very little confidence WWE can tell that type of story, though. Losers lose and winners win, goddamnit! It’s why I’ll always love AEW and Hangman’s Tale. Imagine WWE attempting that. He’d have just been buried and then ended up dancing in talk show segments. There’d have been no comeback, redemption arc.

Jordynne Grace had a great showing. Didn’t look out of place at all. TNA are probably made up to get a name check, but conversely they must know WWE will now be offering her a contract as soon as they’re legally allowed to.

No Tamina? Is the streak over? Why is she even employed if it’s not to boost numbers every January? She’s never ever provided value anywhere else.

Great see Bayley win. There’s real money in this inevitable babyface turn. They better have already started construction of the biggest Bayley Buddies of all time at Wrestlemania. Imagine when that old music hits! Whew! That spot they keep doing where the rest of Damage Control won’t give her the high tens is inspired. Mean girls! I normally hate the heel-turns-babyface-because-their-heel-mates-bin-them-off, but this might actually work here!

I didn’t bother with the Fatal Four Way. We had a super busy weekend with the kids and life’s too short. Everyone knew the beats ahead of time, anyway. LA Knight will be far more over than he has any right to be. Roman will take about six months to get to the ring (maybe eight considering the length of the aisle). They’ll have a respectable three-star knockabout that ends with a Solo Sikoa run-in, inexplicably hiding his face with his hoodie when it’s always, always him. Roman retains. Actually, yeah; I wonder if that’s the big finish at Wrestlemania. Cody finally overcomes the odds and finishes his story by chucking Solo’s hoodie in the wash on a long cycle just before the main event. Check mate, Bloodline.

Men’s Rumble was fine. Not a patch on last year’s. I’d like to blame the crowd but each countdown proved they could make the noise. The problem - and this happened in both the Men’s and Women’s - is that there’s nothing quite as depressing as it reaching a fever pitcher with a five…four….three…TWO…ONE….**BUZZER** And then deafening silence when nobody recognises the music. Say what you want about how things have improved the last year or two but they’ve still got a lot of work to do on everyone’s music. You could tell me their music library failed Saturday Night, so ten guys and ten girls had to share the same  generic theme, and I’d one-hundred-perfect believe you.

Bron looked great. Probably the best I’ve ever seen him. Bringing him up as Goldberg gets a thumbs up from me.

The idea that Brock was originally booked to be eliminated by Dirty Dom is amazing. Great call. Pass the torch. There’s a new top heel.

Andrade arrived, did very little for half an hour, and then left. Brilliant. Back in the promised land. Enjoy yourself, mate. Ask Nakamura if he’s got a spare board.

No Big E. They dared to be sour! Maybe that’s it for him. I wouldn’t blame him if he jacked it in. It’s not like he isn’t ridiculously charismatic and talented enough to do whatever he wants without risking breaking his neck again.

I don’t know if people are ready to hear this, but Punk did not look good. It didn’t help that he was in there with guys so much younger and faster than him for most of the match. We’re not talking Kota Ibushi or anything but this was definitely Collision CM Punk rather than Dynamite CM Punk. You hope he just needs to get more reps and wash off some rust, but it is starting to feel like we’ve seen the best that he has for a comeback both on the mic and in the ring. It doesn’t help that every bump looks like it’s injured him too. Clever if it’s all a work playing on my knobhead, know-it-all mentalities, but I think he’s just old and broken down. Would anyone expect him to still be wrestling next year, for example? It’s a race between him and Rollins on who’s gonna actually make it to main event night four of the buy one get one free extravaganza. Maybe neither will!

Genuinely annoyed me to see Sami Zayn get sent out there as Number 30. This was the hottest man on the planet a year ago. Telling stories they’d never came close to telling before, building a character unlike anything they’d ever tried before, making people feel real, proper emotion. Twelve months later and they’re just using the crowd’s inherent love for him to stop them booing when The Rock’s music doesn’t hit. If you actually capitalised on what you had and continued to push him people would have been more happy to see him than The Rock anyway! He was on the cusp of something so big and they cooled it down to prove it was always going to cool down. Unforgivable then. Even more so now.

Happy for Cody, definitely the right winner, and as I said earlier there’s still magic there.  But yet again, is there more magic than there was last year? I don’t think so. Hopefully I’m wrong and they heat this up massively, but any heat, joy or catharsis will likely feel hugely inferior to if they’d just pulled the trigger last year. The rubber chicken’s out of the bottle.

We’re nearly at the point where we can look back, take stock of everything, and judge if it was really worth stretching it out another twelve months. I can’t think of almost anything that’s made it worth it, unless you’re a pervert for breaking records. Kris Akabusi likely campaigning for Roman to hold it another few years.

Tell you what though. Now all the dust has settled, why did they even send Rock out there to tease The Roman match this close to Wrestlemania? What the fuck has that achieved that wouldn’t have been achieved with him doing it on the Raw after Wrestlemania? Just feels like it massively muddied the waters, undercut the story they’ve been telling for years and made Cody look like a bit of a loser. Did Cody even acknowledge it on TV? They could have at least had him use it as motivation going into the Rumble, saying he doesn’t care what The Rock wants, this is about what Cody is going to earn. As it was, you’d think Rock was just trying to undermine him on purpose. Whole thing’s a mess.

But yeah. Never forget. Never let them forget. The best thing they ever did. He should have had the whole company built around him for years to come.

 

Edited January 29 by Supremo

[Snitsky's back acne]

Okay, a moan..

I used to love the Rumble match. It was a guaranteed hour(ish) of non stop action.

Over the past God knows how many years it has just felt so lifeless and formulaic. If someone was in the match for twenty minutes they were fighting the entire time. Now it's come in, do one or two spots, lay down for ten minutes, maybe have a staredown with someone, lay down again, wash rinse repeat.

It feels very 'Going through the motions' rather than an actual struggle or fight.

Maybe I've just not watched enough modern mainstream wrestling lately and everything is like this now but the whole event felt a bit like everyone was just cruising. 

 

[mim731]

I know there's far more important stuff to discuss, but humour me for a moment. It dawned on me during the Rumble, that CM Punk seems to be slowly morphing into Jon Hamm. I couldn't find a good photo of Punk from the Rumble itself to illustrate this, but I think this will do. 

 

Edited January 29 by mim731

[BomberPat]

10 hours ago, The Dart said:

You seem completely unwilling to accept that they might have changed who Brock was going to be eliminated by when they replaced him with Bron (reported a good day before the Rumble by the sheets).   So by your logic you think Brock was going to come in, piss his pants at the sight of Bron & Omos and throw himself out, because it’s entirely impossible they changed anything…just replaced Brock with Pat.

No, the point isn't that they would have replaced Brock's spots like-for-like and he'd have done what Pat did, but that given they had probably less than 24 hours to make the call of whether or not Lesnar was going to be in the match - Fightful reported his travel was cancelled the day of the show - it's unlikely that they would have had everyone who was due to interact with Brock learn a ton of new spots with new people, particularly in a match as tightly booked and produced as the Rumble. Bron may have been given some of Lesnar's eliminations, but I find it really unlikely that he was just given a run of his spots, particularly when somebody entering and doing nothing is always a reliable indicator that they were a late-in-the-day addition to the Rumble match.

It could be a middle ground - Bron was always due to enter the match, and Pat took Lesnar's entry number, and Bron was given some of the eliminations that would have gone to Lesnar while still doing the showcase spots originally planned for him specifically. It's also possible that Pat McAfee didn't get physical with anybody because he hadn't been cleared, or that he was so late an addition that he didn't have the training and prep time he presumably needs before he has a match, as he's not someone they'd trust to run spots on the fly.

Now, obviously, if everything Meltzer is reporting about Bron getting Brock's spots and Brock being planned to face Dominik at Elimination Chamber is true, then I'd hold my hands up and admit I'm mistaken, but I don't really buy it. Fightful haven't been able to confirm it, for one.

[SuperBacon]

33 minutes ago, mim731 said:

I know there's far more important stuff to discuss, but humour me for a moment. It dawned on me during the Rumble, that CM Punk seems to be slowly morphing into Jon Hamm. I couldn't find a good photo of Punk from the Rumble itself to illustrate this, but I think this will do. 

 

Mad Men indeed.