Ranking EVERY WWE Royal Rumble Match - From Worst To Best
10. 1997
Following his 1996 King of the Ring win and subsequent rivalry with Bret Hart later that year, the 1997 Royal Rumble was Steve Austin climbing yet another rung of the ladder to superstardom.
Stone Cold was starting to come into his own, Austin 3:16 was taking off in a big way, and it was only a matter of months before the Texas Rattlesnake would fully cement his babyface turn at WrestleMania 13. And of course, in typical Austin fashion for the time, he scored the first of his three Royal Rumble wins in controversial fashion, dumping Hart out to win the match after ringside officials had missed Austin’s own elimination at the hands of the Hitman.
The finish here brilliantly lent into Bret Hart’s frustrations at constantly being screwed over, which in turn facilitated the stupendous heel work - well, anti-US work - from Hart and his Hart Foundation throughout the rest of 1997.
Rarely in the history of the Royal Rumble has the match been as much about one person as it was in ‘97, with Austin entering at #5 and scoring a mammoth 10 eliminations by the time was all said and done. As part of those eliminations, Stone Cold’s dumping of Marc Mero, Owen Hart, Savio Vega, and Jesse James was followed by the phenomenal visual of the cocky, brash Austin’s face frozen in shock at Bret Hart’s arrival at #21 - with Austin serving up an all-timer of a reaction as the Excellence of Execution headed to the ring.