Anything Can Happen: The Rumble Needs an Underdog Winner

I don’t know about the rest of you guys, but I’m kinda tired of how predictable the Royal Rumble is. I can’t even say “has become,” because the winner of the Rumble has pretty much been telegraphed since the mid 90s. I remember, heading into the 1995 Rumble, thinking that Shawn Michaels was a pretty easy pick to win, and boom, he did. From that Rumble on, it’s been pretty easy to pick who would be walking out the winner. Sure, some years presented at least a couple different choices, but overall, it’s been pretty simple. Don’t believe me?

2014 saw Batista winning in a move that almost everyone had reported as being “the plan”. Some of us more stubborn fans held onto hope that Daniel Bryan would walk out the winner, but that was clearly stupid on our parts. Batista was rumored to win, and then, shock of shocks, Batista won the thing. 2013 saw John Cena win it so he could get his rematch with The Rock set for WrestleMania 29. I’ll admit to not picking Cena that year, but that was more because I figured that was too obvious, and he could earn a title shot at Elimination Chamber instead. I think I picked Jimmy Uso to win, ha. Again, they went with the super easy and obvious, and Cena walked out the winner. Sheamus in 2012 was probably the least obvious in recent years, and that’s only due to some whispers that Jericho was supposed to win until everyone figured it out, and Sheamus was an audible. Del Rio was no shocker in 2011, and even the “surprise” of Edge winning in 2010 was something I had called from the summer of 2009.

Oddly enough, from where I sit, the last honest to goodness surprise win of a Royal Rumble was John Cena in the 2008 edition. And really, is “John Cena wins the Rumble,” when ignoring the circumstances, really that much of a surprise?

It’s not that the Royal Rumble is a tired concept. It’s not even close to that. It’s a great match, and usually one of the more entertaining cards of the year. However, it has lost the ability to make us truly wonder who’s going to win. At best, we talk ourselves into making weird picks, or mockingly talk about how they’ll mess it up anyways.

Which is why I think having a complete underdog win the Royal Rumble is the best thing that can possibly happen.

Sure, it’s probably (definitely) not happening this Sunday, but it’s something that should be considered for next year.

Having a match where 30 superstars “draw numbers at random” somehow always end up with a top contender winning a title shot just doesn’t ring authentic. I know it’s always a bad idea to talk about logic and wrestling, but this one seems simple enough. Why can’t we have a Rumble where the big stars all draw really, really shitty numbers? Why can’t the last 10 entrants all be super low on the card guys, now with an incredible chance at earning a title shot they’d never get by climbing the ranks?

For me, having a complete underdog win the Rumble, even just once, completely turns the entire match on its head. We would no longer be able to so surely predict who would win the thing, because it would always be in the back of our minds that some out of nowhere guy could win this thing. In a way, it’d be similar to when John Cena lost his Money in the Bank cash-in. Just like that, we knew to no longer consider every cash-in a guaranteed win. Sure, more often than not, it will end successfully, but we also have a John Cena and a Damien Sandow that says “See? Not every time!” Just putting that little bit of doubt would help to rejuvenate the intrigue of the Rumble itself. Sure, it will most likely be (Top Challenger A), but man, maybe it’ll be (Low Level Wrestler B). Adding just the smallest amount of doubt as to who can win would only be a good thing. Don’t believe me?

Yeah, I’ve touched on this before, but it bears repeating: the place was going NUTS when it looked like Santino (of ALL people) was going to win the Royal Rumble in 2011. And sure, the detractors can try to argue that it was more that they were cheering against Del Rio winning the thing, and that’s somewhat valid, but I refuse to believe that is why every single person was screaming their lungs out- because they hated Del Rio that much. It was the anticipation of an ending that absolutely no one saw coming. It was the thrill of the surprise, the “Holy shit, is he really going to do this??” moment that we just never really get in Royal Rumble matches.

And that’s really what I want to see return to the Rumble specifically – the feeling that, as the saying goes, “anything can happen.”

In the most “random” match on the calendar, it’s frustrating to see finishes that are the most obvious year in and year out. But really, there’s more to this than simply creating confusion where there is only certainty.

In my opinion, and underdog Rumble winner also accomplishes the goal of creating a new main eventer, even if for only a short moment in time. For two months, this superstar can get a test run as a bona fide main eventer. If it works, then great, we’ve got a new top talent. If it fizzles, then fine, we can easily have him lose at WrestleMania and move on. We’ve certainly had challengers lose a title shot before, so I wouldn’t consider that the worst thing in the world.

But this isn’t just about the winner himself. I see big opportunities for the sitting champion, as well, when faced with a huge underdog challenger. For starters, if we have a heel champion, he will now have two months to just run his opponent down. Yeah, sure, that violates the Mick Foley Rule of “always make your opponent seem like a threat,” and while I normally love that rule, I also think that having a dominant champ suddenly be afraid of some lower tier wrestler simply because he avoided being thrown over the top rope is kinda silly. Giving a heel champion the ability to just run his opponent down, to make us think there’s no chance this guy can win… it could be glorious. Even better if the champion were to actually lose. And hell, even if the champ wins, there’s nothing wrong with an “I told you so!” speech. It wouldn’t even matter if the challenger was a heel or face in this instance – the champ is still going to be really, really sure of himself. That’s much better than the usual heel champ who is a chickenshit the entire time, right?

If the champion is a face, however, we still have a great opportunity to build up a “fighting champion” who will take on all comers, regardless of how worthy he really is. A champion who doesn’t rely on feuds to set up his next defense, and who really doesn’t care who the opponent is. He wouldn’t be dismissive, but would simply talk about belief in self, and knowing that he has what it takes to remain champion. A simple build to be sure, but one that absolutely works.

Conversely, the star making opportunities for the underdog winner differ from the heel/face allegiance as well. A heel underdog allows for constant crowing, constant “No one ever believed in me!” type speeches. He could step his game up heading into WrestleMania, too. Perhaps a more vicious offense, a change in look, even taking on a manager- all these steps could be taken to slowly build the “joke” challenger into someone we shouldn’t be overlooking.

On the flip side, a babyface underdog clearly has a list of benefits. It gives the fans someone to cheer against a heel champion. It gives us a feel good story. We could give the history of the wrestler, and go to the often visited “his journey has finally paid off” narrative that guys like Shawn Michaels, Steve Austin, and Rey Misterio enjoyed. And much like the heel, we could have the babyface challenger train with a bigger star, or debut a new finisher, or slowly start winning matches in more dominant fashion as he continues to prepare. If the final payoff is said underdog actually unseating the champion, then we could very well have another viable star on our hands.

We could also put the underdog winner through a “prove it” type of scenario at the February pay per view. If a face were to win the Rumble as an underdog, having a few bitter heels say he doesn’t deserve such a huge shot could lead to a multi-man match (or an Elimination Chamber) to settle it for good. If the underdog wins again, he proves he absolutely deserves a shot. If he loses, then no harm, we can still have our two super-duperstars go at it in a title match while the fans still enjoyed a fun ending to the Rumble that had no actual effect on the long-term booking.

Really, we can all nitpick exactly what would/should happen following the Rumble, and I’m sure we all have some good ideas. However, I think that we can all agree on the fact that the Rumble is usually one of the easiest matches to predict, and for that reason has gotten to be a bit boring. We watch to see who the surprise entrants will be, or who will eliminate the most people, but hardly ever do we tune in simply to see who will win. Having an underdog come out on top in a not so distant Rumble can only help to restore the chaotic and unpredictable nature of wrestling that we all love so much.

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