WWE Royal Rumble 2019 Final Rating: Women Steal The Show, Rollins Burns It Down

The road to WrestleMania is officially off and running after WWE Royal Rumble 2019 tore the house down last night in front of nearly 50,000 WWE fans at Chase Field in Pheonix, Arizona.

Last night’s WWE Royal Rumble 2019 was a tremendous first pay-per-view of 2019 for the WWE and things are heating up across the entire WWE with WrestleMania 35 plans becoming clearer after a night filled with great matches and surprising twists.

The main card kicked off with the SmackDown Women’s Championship match between Asuka and Becky Lynch, and these two women left everything they had in the ring.  This was a very good match from start to finish with both women pulling out all the stops to walk away as champion.  However, The Empress Of Tomorrow would get the last laugh after making The Man tap out and Asuka retained her title.  Lynch’s night was just beginning, however.

The Miz and Shane McMahon challenged The Bar for the SmackDown Tag Team Championship up next and this turned out to be a solid enough match despite its rather insignificant feel on an already stacked card.  It felt like Miz and Shane would walk away with the improbable win, and that’s exactly what happened after their team unity and Shane O’Mac’s insane shooting star press was enough to capture the SmackDown Tag Team Championship.

Ronda Rousey’s Raw Women’s Championship defense against Sasha Banks followed and for a match that had a lot of hype heading in, this more than lived up to expectations.  It was a physical, technically-sound match that was excellent throughout its entire duration.  The Boss pushed The Baddest Woman On The Planet to her absolute limit, but it wasn’t enough in the end and Rousey was able to hold off Banks after a Piper’s Pit put down The Boss for the three count.

The second-ever women’s Royal Rumble match was up next and for as good as the first one was last year, this version might have been even better.  It was a captivating match that featured several different mini storylines and dynamics.  The match consisted of all current superstars as well, whether it was superstars from the main roster or NXT, which was a nice change of pace compared to last year’s legends-heavy match.

However, Lana’s night turned out to be dicey after injuring herself earlier in the night.  She was unable to compete, so who took her place?  None other than The Man.  From that point on, things heated up and Lynch would get revenge on Nia Jax by eliminating her.  The final two came down to Lynch and Charlotte Flair and despite Lynch being spent from an earlier match and being sneak-attacked by Jax, The Man walked away with the win and she is headed to WrestleMania.

The WWE Championship was at stake next when Daniel Bryan defended his title against AJ Styles.  While this was still a good enough match, it was much slower-paced than fans would have liked, and putting it on after the women’s Royal Rumble match did it no favors either.  The finish was particularly surprising when the previously injured Erick Rowan intervened and wound up costing Styles after the ref was down, allowing Bryan to win and retain his title.

Finn Balor’s monumental opportunity to dethrone Universal Champion Brock Lesnar followed and Balor would push Lesnar to his limit.  The amount of offense Balor got in on The Beast Incarnate was a bit surprising, but Lesnar got his usual amount of punishment in as well.  Towards the end, Balor hit an injured Lesnar with a coup de grace and it looked like the miracle was happening, but Lesnar countered into a kimura lock and made Balor tap out after a very good match.

The main event men’s Royal Rumble match closed out the show by getting off to a memorable start with Elias and Jeff Jarrett interacting.  This match featured a nice blend of NXT stars and main roster standouts and several subplots were thrown in throughout the match, including Mustafa Ali eliminating 2018 Royal Rumble winner and current United States Champion Shinsuke Nakamura as well as the current thorn in his side in Samoa Joe.

Things really took an unexpected turn when The Irresistible Force attacked entrant number 30 R-Truth from behind, taking his spot in the match in the process.  Jax became just the fourth woman in history to join the men’s Royal Rumble match and she got an insane amount of offense in given the circumstances and even eliminated Ali.  However, Jax took a Dolph Ziggler superkick, a Rey Mysterio 619, and a Randy Orton RKO before being eliminated.

The final four came down to Seth Rollins, Andrade, Braun Strowman, and Ziggler, but after Andrade and Ziggler were taken out, Strowman got to feast on the already-injured Rollins, who was taken out by Bobby Lashley after he eliminated Lashley.  However, The Architect was able to pull through and after hitting Strowman with a stomp on the ring apron, he eliminated The Monster Among Men to win his first Royal Rumble match and punch his ticket to the big show.

More from Royal Rumble

• CM Punk will return to WWE after 10 years at Royal Rumble 2024 (Prediction)
• Early predictions for WWE Royal Rumble 2024 winners
• Top three moments from the 2023 Royal Rumble
• Listing 5 wrestlers who should have won a Royal Rumble match
• Top five Iron Man (and Woman) performances in the WWE Royal Rumble

Overall, this was a truly great pay-per-view that featured a little bit of everything.  There were two outstanding women’s championship matches, a fantastic women’s rumble match, unexpected new tag team champions, a potential new stable formed with the WWE Champion, a main event resurgence by Balor, and a wild men’s rumble match.  It was the perfect way to kick off the 2019 pay-per-view schedule and the road to WrestleMania.

There were only two matches that weren’t high-quality or great, those being the SmackDown Tag Team Championship match and the WWE Championship match.  But even those matches were good and featured standout moments.  Some might feel the Royal Rumble match winners are too predictable, but Lynch and Rollins are the obvious most deserving superstars that could have won those matches, so job well done by the WWE.

It’s officially WrestleMania season after an action-packed way to get things started off right last night.

WWE Royal Rumble 2019 Final Rating: 9 out of 10