10 Times Great Wrestling Was Ruined By Bad Writing
6. The 2016 Royal Rumble Match
It’s easy to criticise the past few Royal Rumbles, particularly given the recent string of uninspiring winners, but they aren’t all as terrible as some would make out. The 2016 Rumble match stands out in particular, but its positive qualities are rarely talked about. Why? Because WWE absolutely slaughtered its intrigue with bad writing up to and at the event itself.
The match featured AJ Styles’ electric debut, a great Kevin Owens/Sami Zayn sequence, and R-Truth and his ladder producing the best comedy spot of the year. The Bray Wyatt/Brock Lesnar showdown was bags of fun too, and there was some great action peppered throughout. Sadly, building the contest entirely around Roman Reigns vs. Triple H completely killed the match, and made it impossible to focus on the other action at times.
Reigns taking a beating from the League of Nations, then returning to the match Superman style, was bad enough - but WWE made it blatantly obvious beforehand that Triple H was going to win. As predicted, The Game came out at number 30, “screwed” Roman by eliminating him from the match, and went home with the WWE Championship.
It was acceptable only from an “anyone but Roman” standpoint, doomed viewers to months of bad programming on the Road to WrestleMania, and clouded fans’ perception of what was a very strong Royal Rumble.