WWE Royal Rumble 2017: Ranking All 30 Match Winners

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15. Shawn Michaels – 1995

Shawn Michaels would continue to be on the upswing in WWE. He took on a bit of a different role, though, with Diesel (Kevin Nash) as his bodyguard. As always with friendships in WWE, they eventually come to an end, which would be the case with WrestleMania 11.

Before that, there would be the 1995 Royal Rumble match to set this up. It would see Michaels enter first, go the distance, and pull off the famous “skin the cat” rope spot, which saved him from elimination and made for one of the Rumble’s most dramatic moments. The only thing that somewhat dampers this is the one-minute intervals between entrants, which wasn’t one of WWE’s greatest ideas.

This put HBK into the main event against former bodyguard Diesel, who held the WWE Championship head into their match. The seven-footer was one of the main guys of WWE’s lackluster era of the mid-1990’s, and didn’t last long when he bolted for WCW.

The match would see Michaels bring in new bodyguard, Sycho Sid. Given they were the heels going after the much larger babyface, they didn’t stand a great chance. Diesel would get his WrestleMania win and walked out with the title still in hand. This led to a Michaels face turn, and the rest would be history.