WWE and Vince cannot always give fans what they want. Despite the fact that their mantra is 'putting smiles on faces' and giving their audience what they want, sometimes that's just not possible, for a number of different reasons. Still, if a sizeable portion of the fans are telling you that they believe in a guy and want to see him succeed, you should probably give him the opportunity to succeed. That's how it works, right? The most popular wrestlers are pushed at the behest of the fans? Well, not always. While the fans may have wanted Daniel Bryan to enter and win the 2014 Royal Rumble match, Vince and company had different ideas. To be fair to them, Bryan had wrestled earlier on the show and was never advertised for the Rumble itself. Still, Vince should have probably could have called an audible and changed things up while the Rumble match was in progress. The returning Batista was scheduled to win, against the will of the fans. Even though Batista was coming back as a babyface, fans refused to cheer him and saw his return as nothing more than a stopgap on his way to Hollywood superstardom. Fans famously turned on the match when they realised that Bryan wasn't entering or winning it. WWE topped themselves in 2015 when they had Roman Reigns win, despite doing nothing of note during the match. But it wasn't Reigns' win which was the biggest f*** you to fans, it was the way in which the totally past-it Kane and The Big Show eliminated crowd favourites Dolph Ziggler, Bryan and Dean Ambrose. That had to have been a deliberate shot at the hardcores. Want to see how much Vince and WWE actively ignores/antagonises their audience? Check out the 2014/15 Rumble matches. That's all the proof you'll need.
