WWE Royal Rumble 2016

It’s difficult to know what was more critical about this year’s Royal Rumble- that we were provided with a much needed boost to WWE’s narrative as we enter Wrestlemania season, or that the Rumble’s reputation was restored with an exciting and satisfying 30-man over the top rope main event. With so many injured superstars who would have no doubt played a part in the key matches at ‘Mania were it not for their respective ailments, WWE’s approach to the Rumble was vitally important- deliver here and it would be a good omen for a period that the company are hoping will lead to the biggest show in their history in Texas, fail to deliver and watch as Raw’s record-low autumn/winter TV ratings evolve into a catastrophe during the normally lucrative January-April season. As important, though less immediately, is that the last few years have seen the Royal Rumble brand take a bit of a pasting- since 2011 the Rumble match, for years the most anticipated contest in WWE’s calendar, has seen a dire mixture of uninspiring victors, lazy booking, poor execution and unpopular decisions. The last 2 in particular have seen mass rejections of the winners, Batista in 2014 and Roman Reigns in 2015- thanks in part to fans preference for the super-over and continuously overlooked Daniel Bryan, but also due to neither man’s suitability as the babyface mega star they were being portrayed as.

WWE Survivor Series 1996

Survivor Series 1996 was supposed to be the beginning of a new dawn for the WWE following a year of losses brought on by the defections of Scott Hall and Kevin Nash to WCW and the subsequent rise of the NWO. WWE had claimed what has to be considered its first real victory in the war with their competitors since WCW had debuted Monday Nitro in direct competition to Raw, when they managed to secure the re-signing of Bret Hart after months of negotiations. Despite his dissatisfaction with Shawn Michaels’ positioning as the top star in WWE and the money that was on offer to him at WCW, Bret had elected to stay loyal to the company that had made him famous and chose the long term security of a reported $20million dollar, 20 year deal with Vince McMahon, over an eye watering $3million dollar per year, 3 year deal in Atlanta. At the time, Vince McMahon breathed a huge sigh of relief- WCW wouldn’t be getting hold of another one of his biggest stars and he now had a massive extra selling point for the Survivor Series event- the return of ‘The Hitman’. It made Bret Hart the highest paid wrestler in the company, by a long way, and seemed to suggest that things might start going in WWE’s favour for once.