What’s the story?
In his recap of the Royal Rumble for Wrestling Observer’s Figure Four Online, Dave Meltzer noted that SmackDown Live superstar Luke Harper has likely turned ‘face’ as he attacked his fellow Wyatt Family members, Bray Wyatt and Randy Orton, during the 2017 Royal Rumble match.
In case you didn’t know…
Randy Orton registered his second Royal Rumble victory after last eliminating Roman Reigns at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas last night. In the closing stages of the match, it was down to Orton, Bray Wyatt, Roman Reigns and Chris Jericho. A ‘Superman Punch’ from Reigns accounted for Jericho, leaving him and the Wyatts as the last three men in the race for a ticket to WrestleMania.
Even as ‘The Viper’ and Bray tried to double-team against ‘The Big Dog’, he managed to toss ‘The Eater of the Worlds’ over the top rope. However, Randy Orton countered an attempted spear on him with an RKO and eliminated Roman to win the match.
The heart of the matter
Bray Wyatt and Randy Orton were already in the ring when Luke Harper made his entry in the Royal Rumble match at #25. He started off by making short work of Apollo Crews before setting his sights on Orton. Wyatt, as usual, tried to play the peacemaker but received a lariat from Harper for his efforts.
‘The Backwoods Brawler’ attacked Randy as well and proceeded to set up Bray Wyatt for a ‘Sister Abigail’. ‘The Apex Predator’ came to the rescue, though, and delivered an RKO to Luke Harper. However, Harper did manage to stick around for a while before being eliminated by Goldberg.
What next?
The turn of events at the Royal Rumble has added an interesting angle to the Wyatt Family storyline and post-Rumble episode of SmackDown Live is sure to witness the repercussions of it.
Sportskeeda’s Take
His fallout with The Wyatt Family may have provided Luke Harper the perfect opportunity to gain more prominence as a singles wrestler. We will be hoping that Harper is given enough scope to prove whether he belongs to the big league or not.
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