WWF Royal Rumble 1993

Date: 01/24/1993

Location: Sacramento, CA

Announcers: Gorilla Monsoon and Bobby Heenan

The Setup

This was the first Rumble where the winner earned a WWF title shot at WrestleMania, following disappointing PPV business metrics for the Rumble. This also featured Razor Ramon’s first and only WWF title challenge on a PPV, after only being on TV for a little over seven months.

Business Notes 

VSplanet.com listed the show at 268,000 PPV buys, ranking third among the five WWF PPVs that year, behind Wrestlemania and Summerslam. They also ranked second in the five Rumble PPVs until that point, trailing the 1991 version, headlined by the show’s first-ever WWF title match, Ultimate Warrior defending against Sgt. Slaughter (440k PPV buys). Overall, while a pretty low number by their previous boom standards for a PPV, it had to be somewhat encouraging to know the show did better than the prior year, when the Rumble winner won the title, guaranteeing a new WWF champion (260k buys). 

Prowrestlinghistory.com has an attendance of 16,000 for a $187,000 gate in their PPV debut in Sacramento. 

The Results  

Steiners def. Beverly Brothers in 10:33. This may have been the best Steiners tag match of their WWF run, which is a textbook example of damning with faint praise, but the match was still very good. Scott pinned Blake with the framkensteiner. These two teams had good chemistry going back to when the Bevs were Minnesota Wrescking Crew 2 in WCW. It showed. I hated the Beverlys’ gimmick and their booking for their entire run. What a waste of talent. ***1/2 

Intercontinental Title Match: Shawn Michaels (C) def. Marty Jannetty in 14 20. They did a finish where Sherri accidentally cost Marty the match, which was a good finish to set up a Mania match that would have happened had Marty not been shitcanned, as he would be repeatedly in his career. I remember their Raw matches being better, but this was the best match on the show. ***3/4 

Bam Bam Bigelow def. Big Bossman in 10:10. The work was solid, but it had zero heat. Bossman lost clean with the headbutt from the top, as this is his PPV swan song until his return in ‘98. **1/2

WWF Title Match: Bret Hart (C) def. Razor Ramon in 17:52. Scott Hall had a bad wheel, but Bret still carried him to a good match. If there was a problem, the match lacked any big-match feel at all for a WWF title match. Razor was extremely new to the company, and as much as I loved Bret at the time, I don’t think he hit the believable main-eventer role until his second reign in 1994. Bret did win with the sharpshooter, and it was pretty rare for there to be a submission by someone at the level of a WWE title challenger. ***1/4

Yokozuna won a Royal Rumble in 66:35 **1/4

Rumble Notes

 -When the Rumble came down to Savage and Yokozuna at the end, I remember watching this live and thinking Savage had to win because of his level of stardom, but they were pushing Yokozuna hard for a main event role. He had seven solo eliminations, a new record at the time, including Earthquake to prove who the real sumo and big man was. 

-Giant Gonzalez debuted, illegally threw Undertaker out of the Rumble and sucked pretty hard. I understand why they didn’t want to go with El Gigante’s old gear, which looked like it was both from Big 5 and not microwave safe, but the furred bodysuit was a fashion faux pas as unforgiving as socks with sandals. 

-Flair was in this match, despite already losing the taped “Loser Leaves the WWF” match against Mr. Perfect on Raw. He would finish up on their European tour in February. This was Flair’s last PPV match until Royal Rumble 2002, when he faced Vince in a street fight. 

-The Rumble itself was largely pretty dull. There was a lot of filler in this one. 

-I believe this was their first “outsider” entrants’ Rumble match, with Tenryu and Carlos Colon appearing. This is the show where Gorilla facetiously calls the near movie discount-age Colon “young man.” 

-Bruce Prichard revealed on his podcast that there was at least some discussion about bringing in Scott Steiner as a surprise entrant who would win the match and wrestle Bret at Mania. What a match that would have been, and imagine how wrestling history would have changed after that.

-Bob Backlund was the Iron Man, going 61:10 and placing just fifty-two seconds behind Flair’s 1992 Rumble win. He also eliminated Fatu and Rick Martel. This turned into nothing, as Backlund lost to Razor quickly at Mania. 

Additional Gaga

This was the debut of Lex Luger as “Narcissus,” and he was announced to the live crowd by Bobby Heenan while he seemed to climax at the same time. He was phenomenal here. One thing I don’t hear people mention much is that there was a slight pop for the name Lex Luger, but the more fans saw the gimmick and Heenan as the sleaziest of hype men, the less they got into it. He should have just been Lex Luger, but that’s another story.

The Verdict

Thumbs Up 

The undercard saved a very so-so Rumble match to give the show this rating. There were just too many people in the Rumble that didn’t have a chance of wrestling Bret Hart at Wrestlemania to be too much fun, but the rest of the show is a breeze. Plus, Bobby announcing Lex is an all-timer. This was a perfectly fun wrestling show overall.