5 Worst WWE Royal Rumble Winners of All-Time
By Tim Sherry
Credit: WWE.com
1. Vince McMahon – 1999
For all the terrific storylines and decisions that were made throughout the Steve Austin/Vince McMahon feud of the late 90’s and early 2000’s, there were a few horrible ones as well. Chalk the 1999 Rumble up as one of those horrible decisions. Never in the history of the event has a non-wrestler won the match and for some bizarre reason, Vince Russo, the creative genius he was, booked good old Vinny Mac to stand tall over 29 other actual wrestlers.
The logic in this entire match made virtually no sense, however, the idea started off great. Locked in the somewhat early stages of their legendary feud, Vince, in an effort to keep Austin away from a title shot from his Corporate Champion, the Rock, booked StoneCold as the #1 entrant. Shawn Michaels, the acting Commissioner at the time then booked Vince to be #2. Most people believed that this would lead to a 2 minute-long beat down of Vince which would ultimately lead to his elimination.
But that’s when insanity overtook logic. The Austin/McMahon fight spilled outside the ring and into the backstage area where Corporation members assaulted The Rattlesnake sending him to the hospital. For the next hour, neither man would be involved in the match, which in any other universe would mean an automatic elimination, but not this time around. Eventually, Austin returned and he and Vince were the final two. So most people were thinking, “Ok, well I guess this kind of makes sense.” And then suddenly even that logic was wrong as Vince dumped Austin over the top rope.
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Yes, that’s really what happened. Now unlike the last 3 on this list, at least this was a surprise. But what a ridiculously awful one and a waste of a huge moment that could’ve been saved to put someone else over. Of course McMahon didn’t go on to Wrestlemania and of course Austin did, but why get to it this way? Having a non-wrestler achieve such a huge honor lowers the prestige of this type of win and makes the product seem silly and poorly thought out.