WWE Royal Rumble 2023 It takes place tonight (Saturday, January 28) from the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas. Starts at 7:00 PM ET with the Kickoff Show leading directly to the main course at 8:00 PM ET on the peacock in the United States, the WWE Network elsewhere, or your local cable pay-per-view provider.
Cody Rhodes returned to WWE to win the Royal Rumble and the title at WrestleMania
The Royal Rumble match is unlike anything else in WWE, which is one of the reasons this event is always among the most anticipated WWE nights of the year.
The rules for the 30-man Royal Rumble match are simple. Two wrestlers begin the match, a new superstar enters the fray at regular intervals, and an elimination occurs when one of the competitors goes over the top rope and both feet hit the ground. The winner of the match is the last person standing after 29 other wrestlers have been eliminated. The winner wins a world title match WrestleMania.
Here are the 19 wrestlers officially announced for the men’s Royal Rumble match:
- Kofi Kingston
- Santos Escobar
- bouncing back
- Austin theory
- Seth Rollins
- Bobby Lashley
- Baron Corbin
- Rey Mysterio
- Gunther
- Cody Rhodes
- omos
- Drew McIntyre
- Seamus
- Braun Strowman
- Carrion Cross
- Dominic Mysterio
- Xavier Woods
- The distinction
- Brock Lesnar
You will play many different stories during this match. Let’s start with last year’s winner, Brock Lesnar. He returned to WWE this week at Bobby Lashley’s F5. Will Bob willingly accept help from Omos if that’s what it takes to take down The Beast?
Another story to watch out for is what happens when Rey and Dominic Mysterio meet. Although Dominic turned to the dark side last year, Ray refused to raise a hand for his son. This approach could bite Rey in the ass tonight, especially given how eager Doomsday was to hurt and eliminate Rey.
Speaking of The Judgment Day, will we see Edge return to WWE in this match? He has a bone to pick with these guys after what they did to his wife, Beth Phoenix, in October.
Who else might appear as a surprise entrance? Logan Paul? bad bunny Matt Riddle? Randy Orton? Ken? A forgotten comic man in the middle of the card for over a decade?
Finally, let’s talk about the potential winners. Based on the official list of participants, it appears WWE is counting on Cody Rhodes to main event WrestleMania this year. Cody returns tonight after more than seven months on the sidelines and will try to pick up where he left off as the darling face of the men in the company. He has emerged as the favorite of the nineteen official entrants, especially since back-to-back wins for Brooke don’t seem like the best idea.
But Sami Zayn has also emerged as a major favorite to win, even though he may not even be in the match. Zayn is probably the most popular man in WWE today due to his excellent character work as the titular Uce of The Bloodline. Tensions have been running high recently between Sami and Roman Reigns, and there’s a clear story telling where Sami won the Royal Rumble and Reigns fights in wrestling’s biggest show of the year.
Some people hope The Rock will make room in his busy schedule for WrestleMania This year’s match, and in that scenario he’s also a potential Royal Rumble winner tonight.
Last year’s men’s Royal Rumble match was a dull disaster, so hopefully this time WWE will remind us of all the things that make a Royal Rumble match so much fun. It’s the first time Triple H has run WWE Creative for Royal Rumbleso he must have the drive to make it special.
The rest of the card
Here are the four remaining matches currently announced Royal Rumble:
Women’s Royal Rumble match
The rules here are the same as the men’s match, only this time it will be 30 women trying to throw each other over the top rope in order to win a title match at WrestleMania.
WWE has done a poor job of generating interest in this match, despite having over two months to get there. This is in part because only seven women have been announced for the match in the 48 hours since. That number is up to 12 now, and here they are:
- Liv Morgan
- Candice Larry
- Rhea Ripley
- Raquel Rodriguez
- Shayna Pazler
- Zelina Vega
- whatever
- Bailey
- Dakota Kay
- iyo sky
- Lacey Evans
- Xia Li
The lack of Becky Lynch seems like a sore thumb, though I expect she will join the match looking for revenge against Bayley, IYO SKY, and Dakota Kai.
Ronda Rousey will definitely not be in this match. Singles champions don’t usually enter this match either, so it seems unlikely that Bianca Belair or Charlotte Flair would be in the mix. Alexa Bliss is also likely off the table since she has a separate match on the card. Sasha Banks and Naomi left WWE a long time ago. The end result is a women’s Royal Rumble match that sorely lacks superstar power on paper.
As far as potential winners are concerned, Rhea Ripley stands out from the group as the big favorite. Raquel Rodriguez has also been pushed hard in the final weeks leading up to the match.
Hopefully WWE has some interesting surprises lined up to fill the stadium, because this Royal Rumble match needs a lot of help.
WWE Universal Championship: Roman Reigns (c) vs. Kevin Owens
Roman Reigns has been Universal Champion for so long that he now recycles opponents he has already defeated several times earlier during his run on top. When Owens’ previous failures to beat Roman came together with the reality of it WrestleMania Soon, it is extremely difficult to find a scenario where he KOs out of this match as the new champ.
The story here in many ways revolves around Sami Zayn choosing loyalty to The Bloodline over his friendship with Owens. However, Zayn was so eager to prove his worth as a member of The Bloodline that he stepped out of line with Roman several times. He challenged Roman again this week SmackDownshows up to help Solo Sekua even though the chief of the tribe tells Sami he doesn’t even want to see him Royal Rumble.
Paul Heyman tried to convince Reigns to take Sami out of The Bloodline on Raw XXX, but Jey Uso assured Sami and stopped it from happening. Reigns said Zayn’s “final test” will take place tonight. We already saw Sami pick Roman over KO a couple of months ago at WarGames, so it’s not clear what that means.
It looks like Sami’s time with The Bloodline is about to end, even with Roman as the favorite to win this match. Roman has been using Sami for his own benefit all along, and once Reigns is finished with a KO, he may very well decide there is nothing more to take from Sami in terms of his usefulness in The Bloodline.
Black Court Match: Bray Wyatt vs. LA Knight
This is Bray Wyatt’s first televised match since returning to WWE over three months ago. and sponsored by Mountain Dew.
The story here stretches back to mid-November when the LA Knight responded to White’s apology by slapping him twice in the face. Knight is then targeted in mysterious attacks behind the scenes, which introduce Uncle Hoody into the story. Wyatt and Hoody seem to be two different people on the surface, but Wyatt contradicted himself about who Hoody was.
It was clear that Wyatt and Knight were destined to fight, so WWE put them in this Pitch Black match Royal Rumble. WWE didn’t even bother to explain the specific rules for this new match type. They give the general idea that everything works out, but that’s not very helpful.
Knight has been done with his mic and catchphrases for the past couple of months, but most of that goes out the window once the game starts. White is very comfortable in the dark and will very likely swallow him up in any match a Mountain Dew Peach Black match requires.
Raw Women’s Championship: Bianca Belair (c) vs. Alexa Bliss
Alexa Bliss and Bianca Belair were allies two months ago at WarGames, but Wyatt’s return to WWE has brought back some of Alexa’s erratic behavior from the dark days when she was trapped under Bray’s spell.
Bliss has turned her attention to winning the gold tournament, and Uncle Howdy has made his presence known as part of that effort. Blair doesn’t really understand what the hell is going on, and who can blame her?
Alexa tried to injure Bianca by attacking her with a vase. Bliss herself was also intentionally disqualified in the first title match in order to inflict further punishment on Belair. The hero needed stitches as a result of Alexa’s aggression. However, Bianca’s track record of dominance over the past two years suggests that she is the strong favorite to retain the gold.
summary
It’s the Royal Rumble! This is always an exciting time to be a fan of professional wrestling, not only for the Rumble matches, but also because this event officially begins the road to WrestleMania. So be sure to gather around a close group of friends, either in person or here in the comments at Cageside Seats, count down the clock to zero with each new entrant, root as hell for your favorite wrestler(s). than a miracle, and be ready to go on a wild ride.
What are you going to look for Royal Rumble?
