10 Fascinating WWE Royal Rumble 2014 Facts
1. The Buyrate Dropped Greatly From The Previous Year
This was hardly a surprise. The 2013 Royal Rumble was propped up by the presence of The Rock in the WWE Championship match, and Dwayne Johnson is money no matter what he does - even The Tooth Fairy more than doubled its budget.
The 2013 Rumble was good for 579,000 buys, and 2014 wouldn't come close. Its 467,000 buys were a 19 percent drop from one year earlier, but up, at least, from the 443,000 in 2012. At least it wasn't a complete and utter free-fall.
The 2014 Rumble would be the last Big Four pay-per-view prior to the launch of WWE Network. After that time, buyrates would pretty much be rendered irrelevant. The fact that the 2015 show did 141,000 buys speaks to the sudden importance of Network subs.