The Royal Rumble should be a pretty easy show to book every year. You put on a WWE Title match, a divas match, two or three other matches with decent build and then have the Royal Rumble match (normally 30 men) take up the final hour of the show. During the Rumble match, you can have some legends return as surprises while also doing some other fun angles during the course of the match and the end it by putting over the right guy in the end. That's not what happened in 2014, though. At this year's Royal Rumble, it should have been Daniel Bryan as the guy that walked into the match and won it. Instead, he wasn't even in the match! It's ridiculous looking back on things. Bryan did have a great match with Bray Wyatt on the show, but he still should have been in the Rumble match and won it. Since Batista was coming back after four years away, WWE decided to put him over as the winner of the match. The crowd hated it as they booed this former champion in his 40s because they wanted Bryan. How did Batista react to that? He gave a fan the finger. What a professional! That night was also the last time CM Punk was in a WWE ring after being eliminated by Kane, who wasn't legally in the match at that point. There will be more on Punk later. As we know, WWE got things right with Bryan by putting him in the WrestleMania 30 main event the hard way, but they messed up the Rumble by doing it wrong. Let's hope that sort of thing never happens again.
John wrote at WhatCulture from December 2013 to December 2015. It was fun, but it's over for now. Follow him on Twitter @johnreport. You can also send an email to mrjohncanton@gmail.com with any questions or comments as well.
That night was also the last time CM Punk was in a WWE ring after being eliminated by Kane, who wasn't legally in the match at that point. There will be more on Punk later. As we know, WWE got things right with Bryan by putting him in the WrestleMania 30 main event the hard way, but they messed up the Rumble by doing it wrong. Let's hope that sort of thing never happens again.