20 Pro Wrestling Firsts You Need To Know

12. First Royal Rumble Participant

Wrestling Bladejob
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Many variations of the Battle Royal have been tried in the decades since, with the Royal Rumble being the most famous. The very first Rumble was held in 1988, and probably due to the fairly thin roster at the time only included 20 participants. It was famously won by 'Hacksaw' Jim Duggan, who eliminated One Man Gang at the last to win the match.

Who drew #1 in the first ever Royal Rumble? None other than Bret 'Hitman' Hart. Due to the first-time nature of the match however, we only know this because Fink tells us, as both Hart and the supposed #2 were in the ring whilst Fink announced the rules. The man who drew #2 was Tito Santana (more on him later), then one half of the WWF Tag Team Champions.

So Tito and Bret were both in there from the get-go, but Bret goes down in history as the first entrant in the Royal Rumble? The first man eliminated? Butch Reed.

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.