Ranking every WWE Royal Rumble PPV in history
By Luke Norris
19. WWE Royal Rumble 2012
Match card & results
- Steel Cage Triple Threat Match for the World Heavyweight Championship: Daniel Bryan (c) def. Big Show and Mark Henry
- The Bella Twins, Beth Phoenix and Natalya def. Alicia Fox, Eve Torres, Kelly Kelly and Tamina Snuka
- John Cena vs. Kane ended in a double countout
- Brodus Clay def. Drew McIntyre
- WWE Championship Match: CM Punk (c) def. Dolph Ziggler
- Sheamus wins 30-Man Royal Rumble Match
This is a bit of a strange entry. What’s weird about the 2012 Royal Rumble pay-per-view event is that there’s no one great match on the card but outside of the squash of Drew McIntyre by Brodus Clay, there’s nothing overly terrible. It’s a pretty decent card from top to bottom, even if the Royal Rumble match certainly isn’t one of my favorites in the world. As a whole, I just couldn’t justify knocking it down anymore than I did but I still couldn’t get it too close to the top half. Very odd.
The night started with the Steel Cage World Heavyweight Championship Match that was just too short. Everyone worked well and everyone came out looking okay and Daniel Bryan looked like a world beater by defeating two very large individuals in The Big Show and Mark Henry. The women’s match followed and I greatly enjoyed Beth Phoenix at the end of this match because she looked like the dominant force of the division that she was supposed to be.
John Cena and Kane had a decent match that unfortunately ended in a double countout, which didn’t seem to make sense when it happened but after things got to the backstage area and Kane once again got into it with Zack Ryder, it actually did end up working. Ryder was extremely popular at the time with the internet show and Kane wheeling him down to the ring in his wheelchair and then hurting him even further in front of his girlfriend (nice impromptu tears from Eve) was a nice heel move.
The WWE Championship Match was really about CM Punk and John Laurinaitis and their whole crazy storyline and like it’s happened so many times in his career, Dolph Ziggler was just sort of there. But as it’s happened so many times in his career, Ziggler went out and put on a great show. He and Punk told a nice story in the ring, even if the last half of the match was taken over by the outside stuff. Still the best match of the night though.
As for the Rumble match, I wasn’t crazy about the winner and certainly wasn’t crazy how Sheamus won the title at WrestleMania (that was the 18-second debacle over Daniel Bryan) but there were at least a few fun moments. Kofi Kingston continued to wow and this time avoided elimination by walking on his hands on the floor, which was very cool. Kharma entering the mix was nice and The Miz looked great in this match, lasting over 45 minutes from the number one spot.