7 Things You Should Know About WWE Royal Rumble 2003

4. First Rumble Match Post Brand Extension

There was a unique dynamic to this Rumble because it was the first one that took place after the brand extension. The big hype going into it was that it was a special show because there would be 15 Raw guys and 15 Smackdown guys in the match. There weren't that many interesting scenarios in the match between Raw/Smackdown guys. There was a fun one early on when Raw's Christian tried to hug his "brother" Edge from Smackdown, but Edge fought him because he was a face and Christian was a heel at that point. Looking back at it, they probably should have done a better job of creating some more interesting scenarios in the matchup. It happened in the years that followed where there was more of a Raw/Smackdown issue, so that was a bit of a missed opportunity. It was a boring Rumble aside from the hot start with Michaels/Jericho and the last ten minutes. Since they put big names like Lesnar and Undertaker in as the last two guys, that meant that they had the ring full of guys before they entered so they could get rid of the lesser names.