Ranking Every WWE Title Match At Royal Rumbles Worst To Best

While the then-WWF had positioned Triple H as a bona fide main event player who had recently captured his second WWF World Title, the Game's Street Fight war with Cactus Jack at the 2000 Royal Rumble took Hunter to a whole other level.

Given Mick Foley's Hardcore Legend nickname, it meant Triple H was in for a true battle here. Tearing Madison Square Garden up, these two put on their greatest match ever - with some disgusting bumps, chilling visuals, and the story told that, yes, Helmsley could hang with someone as deranged as Cactus Jack as he won via a Pedigree that slammed Foley's face into thumbtacks.

This was Mick Foley doing all he could to add a violent, brutal edge to Triple H as Foley prepared to hang up his boots; something that would famously be delayed. Going even further, the Micker would again bust his tail to make Hunter look like a badass the following month at No Way Out, where Triple H defeated Foley in a gruelling Hell in a Cell outing.

In the ascension of Hunter Hearst Helmsley becoming a genuine top tier talent, nobody did more for the real-life Paul Levesque than Mick Foley, and it was matches like this Royal Rumble contest and the aforementioned No Way Out offering that were pivotal in giving a vicious, violent, visceral edge to the Triple H character.