10 Obscure WWE Royal Rumble Records

3. Most Years Between Rumble Appearances

Jeff Jarrett Royal Rumble 1999 Royal Rumble 2019
WWE

Record-holder: Jeff Jarrett, 20 years

One of the best parts of the Royal Rumble is seeing a surprise entrant who completely blows your mind, a person who no one was expecting. It typically blows the roof off the place and sends fans into a frenzy.

This can happen when a superstar returns from injury, but it also can occur when a long-lost wrestler comes back into the fold, if only for one night. This is how our winner, Jeff Jarrett, came to top this list. Jarrett competed in the 1999 Rumble before becoming persona non grata later in the year, famously being derided by Vince McMahon when he bought WCW in 2001. It appeared like J-E-Double-F would never return to Stamford.

But time really does heal most wounds, as Jarrett found his way back into WWE’s good graces, earning a spot in the Hall of Fame in 2018, and the #2 entrant in the 2019 Rumble, making it a good 20 years between appearances.

Before this miraculous comeback, initial Rumble winner Hacksaw Jim Duggan held the record, with a 17-year gap between Rumble appearances in 1992 and 2009. Perhaps we’ll see some long-lost superstar from the Attitude Era show up later this month to break Jarrett’s record in turn.

Contributor
Contributor

Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.