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Although the Royal Rumble match is always the most exciting WWE match of the year, it can often be plagued by the winner of the match being leaked to the internet, months, weeks and sometimes just days before the event happens.
That is how it has been in recent years, however during the first 20 or little more years of the match, the winner has been just about anyone. While many fans have been able to correctly guess who it could be every year, sometimes almost everyone is caught off and doesn't see the winner coming. Here are five such incidents.
#5 Bret Hart & Lex Luger - 1994
If you were to list the top five WWE superstars of 1994, both Bret Hart and Lex Luger would be apart of it, so it is not too surprising that either of them could have won the match, but both?
Yes, at the 1994 Royal Rumble, there would be two last men standing as Bret and Lex would both go over the top rope with both men touching the floor at the same time, and instead of restarting the match like 11 years later when the same thing unintentionally happened with John Cena and Batista in 2005, it was instead announced that both men had won the match.
Apparently, at the time there was some talk of possibly doing a Yokozuna vs Lex Luger vs Bret Hart triple threat main event WWE Championship match at WrestleMania X before they ultimately decided on two separate singles matches for the title.
#4 Vince McMahon - 1999
Heading into the 1999 Royal Rumble match, the popular opinion was that WWE's biggest star 'Stone Cold' Steve Austin would win his 3rd consecutive Royal Rumble match and face The Rock for the WWE Championship in the main event of WrestleMania XV. Although the WrestleMania main event happened, Austin didn't get there the way everyone expected him to.
Steve Austin had been the only major star at that time to be competing in the Rumble match. Although it would feature the like of former WWE Champion Kane and future World Champions Triple H, Jeff Jarrett, Edge and Ken Shamrock, there were really no other believable winners in the match other than Austin. They had been building up to Austin getting Vince McMahon alone in the ring and beating him senseless for months, so everyone thought it would be just that before a Stone Cold win, but what we got instead was a shock Rumble win for the owner of WWE as he eliminated Austin with the help of The Rock.
As expected, Vince would later lose his Championship match to Austin in a stipulation Cage match at the St. Valentines Day Massacre pay-per-view.
#3 Sheamus - 2012
The 2012 Royal Rumble event currently remains to have the last Royal Rumble match to date where the winner was a complete surprise.
Heading into the match, the favourite to come out on top was the recently returned Chris Jericho, who was already pencilled in to be facing CM Punk for the WWE Championship at WrestleMania XXVIII in Miami, Florida. This much became even more obvious to those who thought so when it came down to Jericho and Sheamus, and then came the surprise. Sheamus would elevate Chris to the ring apron and Brogue Kick him to the floor, leaving a stunned audience.
The decision to have Sheamus win was ultimately praised for being surprising, but despite Jericho being the planned winner getting leaked, many fans still would have preferred Jericho to come out on top as it would have been a better storyline starter for his feud with CM Punk and many have also always wanted Jericho to win a Royal Rumble match, and this was the closest he had ever come to doing .
#2 Edge - 2010
During a WWE live event on July 3, 2009, Edge suffered a torn Achilles tendon and later underwent successful surgery, after which it was reported that the 'Rated R Superstar' would be missing anywhere between 9 months and just over a year of action.
Amazingly Edge returned to action after just under seven months where he made a surprise Royal Rumble entry at number #29 and quickly eliminated Chris Jericho and John Cena to win the match. Edge risked a lot to return that early, including shortening his career, but as he was, in his words, 'wrestling on borrowed time' after having broken his neck in 2003, he likely didn't see his return as much of a risk as it actually was.
#1 John Cena - 2008
During a match with Mr Kennedy on the October 1, 2007, episode of RAW, John Cena suffered a legitimate torn pectoral muscle. John soldiered on through the match and an attack afterwards from Randy Orton. The injury was claimed to have been suffered from Oron's RKO onto the announce table after the match by WWE announcers, but it really happened after a botched hip toss during the match with Kennedy.
WWE announced that John was too miss anywhere between 7 months to an entire year of action. However that didn't happen, instead, John truly lived up to his 'Super Cena' moniker bis-toed to him from the fans as Cena made a surprise return as the number #30 entrant in the 2008 Royal Rumble, just under 4 months after the injury occurred.
The building nearly blew off Madison Square Garden as his theme music hit and when he last eliminated Triple H to take home the win.
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