10 Wrestlers Who Hated WWE Royal Rumble Spots

5. Mil Mascaras Refused An Elimination Spot - 1997

WWE Royal Rumble 2005 Vince McMahon
WWE

Ain’t nobody throwing the great Mil Mascaras over the top rope.

Revisionist history might say otherwise, but the then-WWF was in the pits at the beginning of 1997. Yes, Stone Cold Steve Austin was slowly becoming a big star for the company, but the idea that he gave the fabled Austin 3:16 promo and instantly became a megastar is a myth. It took the promotion a long time to work out exactly what to do with him. This meant that the line-up for the ’97 Rumble was a little thin, to say the least.

To beef up the numbers, Vince McMahon made a deal with AAA for several of the Mexican promotion’s performers to wrestle on the show. The most notable of these was the legendary Mil Mascaras, one of the biggest stars in the history of lucha libre.

Who would get the rub of eliminating lucha libre’s first international superstar? Why, Mil Mascaras, of course! The Man of a Thousand Masks wasn’t about to let any old jabroni throw him out of the match, so he took it upon himself to get in and get out. Of course, Mascaras still found time to eliminate the other AAA competitors, rendering the entire exercise pointless.

Mil Mascaras only jobs to Mil Mascaras.

Contributor
Contributor

Born in the middle of Wales in the middle of the 1980's, John can't quite remember when he started watching wrestling but he has a terrible feeling that Dino Bravo was involved. Now living in Prague, John spends most of his time trying to work out how Tomohiro Ishii still stands upright. His favourite wrestler of all time is Dean Malenko, but really it is Repo Man. He is the author of 'An Illustrated History of Slavic Misery', the best book about the Slavic people that you haven't yet read. You can get that and others from www.poshlostbooks.com.