Here’s a pointless little experiment. During the 2007 Rumble, they made a big deal about it being the most star-studded Rumble yet. That got me thinking about the different Rumble rosters and which one had the best pedigree to it. So I scoured each list and counted how many world champions it featured. I counted the top titles for WWF, WCW, both WWE titles, ECW, TNA and NWA.

88: 3
89: 6
90: 8
91: 6
92: 10
93: 7
94: 9
95: 4
96: 10
97: 10
98: 10
99: 9
00: 9
01: 12
02: 14
03: 17
04: 17
05: 13
06: 14
07: 17
08: 13

Hm. Well, I guess they were onto something after all. Speaking of that match…

7) Royal Rumble 2007

“Everyone back in the pile!”

“DEY TUK OUR JEORBS!”

“DE TUKRJRBS!!”

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My apologies for the slight lateness. I blame sickness and temporary lack of internet connection.

If I were to come up with a list of the best use of the Royal Rumble in a videogame, it wouldn’t even be fair. We all know that WWF Wrestlefest would be #1. That’s as good excuse to post these gifs I made. Feel free to use them as avatars on your favorite message board.

Damn. 5 of those guys are dead.

I do recall having fun in WWE Smackdown: Here Comes the Pain and the way they used the Royal Rumble in career mode. They base it on the Rock/Big Show feud so that whoever you eliminate last has proof that your feet have touched the floor and that he deserves the Wrestlemania title shot. This leads to a match at No Way Out where you wrestle for the title shot. I remember fixing it up so that D-Von Dudley was my last victim, leading to an incredibly easy No Way Out match.

Then again, neither of the two main Dudleys have been in the Royal Rumble. Maybe I’m selling him short.

Let’s get to the top ten. So far the Rumble matches have been from okay to pretty good. The following ten are very much awesome. They’re just in different degrees of awesome.

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As a goof, I was initially going to keep track of how many times the commentators bring up how the Royal Rumble is “every man for yourself”. That lasted about ten minutes. When you see D’Lo Brown attacking Rikishi and the commentators say it’s because it’s every man for himself, you have to realize you might as well be marking down every punch.

13) Royal Rumble 2006

I bet there are so many confused non-wrestling fans visiting 4th Letter right now.

The set-up: Vince McMahon had been getting on Shawn Michaels’ case for a while for little reason, going so far as to say that he has no chance at winning the Royal Rumble. Meanwhile, the WWE was still reeling from the death of Eddie Guerrero, prompting his friend Rey Mysterio to dedicate the match to him. Other than that… nothing.

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The other night on Monday Night Raw, they started showing a video reel about all the statistics in the Royal Rumble. Most eliminations in total, most eliminations in one Rumble, longest time in the ring, shortest time in the ring, etc. It’s funny how they sidestep some of the information. Like how they say that as many people have won after drawing #1 as those who have drawn #30. They show Michaels, Undertaker and John Cena but seem to ignore a certain murderer. Heh…

They also don’t talk about who’s been in the most Rumble matches. Why? Because Kane has the record and including him on the list would likely bring attention to his old gimmicks of Isaac Yankem and Fake Diesel.

Now back to the list, starting with what I feel isn’t going to be a popular choice.

16) Royal Rumble 2000

I don’t know what strikes me as stranger. Undertaker being on there despite having nothing to do with the show or Big Boss Man being featured along with all those main eventers.

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You may have noticed that there are 22 spots on this list and – at the time of this writing – 21 Royal Rumble shows. That’s because there was an extra Rumble match that was so good that I couldn’t help but include it.

I was going to include the Corporate Royal Rumble for the hell of it, but that would have been #23 and that would’ve been pointless. There was a Royal Rumble match in ECW back in late 1996 that I remember, but unfortunately I’m unable to track down footage of it for my rewatching pleasure. The same could be said for a Rumble match they had on WCW Nitro years back, but that one was an epic failure. I recall intervals of about 30 seconds with order that didn’t come close to looking random.

Back to the list.

19) Royal Rumble 1993

Heh. Ultimate Warrior and Nailz were long gone by the time this show happened. Kamala wasn’t at the show either.

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I’m going to go in a different direction for the next week.

Since I was a kid, long before I even got into comics in the first place, I was into professional wrestling. The flashiness, the controlled violence, the good vs. evil and so on caught my eye. As I got older, I grew to appreciate more about it. I was able to tell that, wow, the Ultimate Warrior wasn’t very good and that someone like Tito Santana or Ted Dibiase was more worth my time. Even at its worst over the years, I’ve still followed it on some level. They always have at least a couple things worth watching for.

I started watching in early 1991. I remember this because on the episode of WWF Superstars, they kept going over the upcoming Royal Rumble pay-per-view. I ended up ordering the show and having a bunch of friends over to watch it. I was hooked. Fast-forward to the present. It’s a week away from the 2009 Royal Rumble and I have in my collection the ridiculous 20-disc set of the first 20 shows, as well as the DVD for last year’s event.

I’ve decided to rank them. Why? Because that set was fucking expensive and I want to get as much mileage out of it as I can. Even at its worst, it’s always a fun match and tends to be as unpredictable as you can get.

The rules of the Royal Rumble are simple. Thirty men draw a number from #1 to #30. The men who drew #1 and #2 enter first. Every minute or two later, another guy comes out. The way to eliminate someone else is to throw them over the top rope so that both feet hit the floor. The last man standing is considered the winner. In the early days, the winner would get bragging rights. Later, the winner would get a guaranteed title shot at Wrestlemania. And of course, there was the one time where the match itself was for the championship.

I’m only counting the Rumble matches themselves here, not the shows. Nobody cares about the Hogan/Andre contract signing or Razor Ramon vs. IRS.

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Hey, there. I didn’t have time to post about my trip in time, but at the moment, I’m kicking it in Arizona for a few days. I should be back Friday or so, but in the meantime, hermanos has the slack and that’s fine with me.

Just three things of note from my trip so far:

1) On the plane flight, I sat next to none other than former WWF Intercontinental and Tag Champion Tito Santana! God, that was awesome. We talked for a while about many things, but that guy was a complete class act. Totally friendly, good natured and still looks great. At first I didn’t want to say anything because I thought he was too young to be Tito.

2) The IMAX theater around here isn’t playing Dark Knight. Instead, they just have a series of educational films that will not make them money. How dense and/or retarded are they for not picking up on the goddamn Batman? It boggles the mind.

3) While at the local mall, I stepped into a KB Toys for the sake of looking at some action figures. Now, this store looks like they just get a series of figures, sell the ones worth selling and keep a never-ending supply of the ones nobody wants for years. For instance, for the Marvel Legends figures, I found about 15 Longshots and maybe 2 Lady Deathstrikes. Then I discovered a bargain bin of Rocky Balboa figures. At first I was excited. Rocky figures? That means I could pick up a sweet figure of Clubber Lang or Drago for cheap. Maybe if I’m lucky there will be an Apollo Creed in there.

Instead, I just found a huge pile of figures for the announcers and commentators. Not just for Rocky Balboa, but for the old movies as well. Who would want this? I’m serious. Who would ever want one of these? No kid, that’s for sure. I don’t think there are any fans of the movies who are licking their lips over this. I can’t comprehend how someone thought those would be a good idea.

That’s all for now. Be back in a couple days.

You may have noticed that for the past week or so, I haven’t said a damn word on this site. That’s because last Friday I went off to Philadelphia for the three day CHIKARA wrestling show known as King of Trios ’08. What a blast.

Me hanging out with Stupefied, El Generico and Player Uno. This should be the new Mount Rushmore.

King of Trios was the biggest tournament in wrestling history, featuring 28 sets of three-man tag teams. The first two days would feature 14 teams each, whittled down to four teams after ten matches and two byes. By the third night, they’re down to eight teams, with several non-tournament matches added on. Follow that? It doesn’t matter. All you need to know is that there were 31 matches over the course of three days and it was rocktastical.

That’s not to say that there weren’t any disappointments in the roster. CHIKARA top guys Chris Hero and Claudio Castagnoli are in Japan, so they missed out. Plus some of the more memorable guest stars from last year like Yago, Dino and American Balloon weren’t returning. Despite that, we had some of the reliable mainstays, surprisingly entertaining new guys and some bizarre surprises.

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About now I’m in the middle of writing three different articles while planning to finally update the Table of Contents. It’s annoying, because I want to have something to post, but I end up being torn between all the different projects and nothing really gets done in time. It’s like I’m a monster that has to choose between the scientist that created him or the loving child that befriended him. Too much time looking back and forth and too little time getting results.

What I’m meaning to say is that this here post is going to be really pointless. More so than usual.

As an introduction, let’s look at this quote from my interview with wrestler “Lightning” Mike Quackenbush:

“A certain type of personality and humor attracts a very specific demographic to CHIKARA, and in that way, we end up in bed with (figuratively speaking), and surrounded by, like-minded individuals. There are so many thematic similarities between pro-wrestling and comic books, that there is bound to be some level of crossover.”

This is very true. There are the obvious comparisons, like the concepts of heroes battling villains in a repeated contest of good vs. evil. Colorful costumes. Slick names, whether they be codenames or last names. Mantles are passed down. Bad guys turning to good guys. Good guys turning to bad guys. Characters with names like Sandman, Mysterio, Hercules, Nitro, Crossbones, Rorschach, the Punisher, etc.

But I got to thinking. There are a lot of similarities between comic books and professional wrestling that go unnoticed. Follow me.

In comics, one of the most entertaining guys is a talented man by the name of Morrison.

In wrestling, one of the most entertaining guys is also a talented man by the name of Morrison.

They both have connections to mind-blowing drugs, now that I think about it.

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Oh… that is so wrong.

We’re back for part two of our look of WWF Battlemania. Before starting, I should point out that Sensational Sherri, who was featured in the last article, has passed away at the age of 49. That’s a huge shame. Add another line to the list, I guess.

On a happier note, I’d like to mention that the Wrestlecomics part of 4th Letter got featured on the Wrestling Observer (twice!) and Figure Four Weekly Online. That’s pretty sweet, as Wrestling Observer is like the wrestling equivalent of Newsarama, only with maybe a shuffled step higher.

Continuing on issue #3 of Battlemania, we get to a story involving the Ultimate Warrior that I thought was actually pretty good. It’s shocking. Even more shocking was when I discovered the reason it was so good. Dwayne McDuffie of all people wrote this thing. That’s right. The guy who will soon be writing Justice League of America wrote a story about the Ultimate Warrior. I’m not knocking the guy in any way, and I do understand that you write what you can get, but I think it’s just such a random realization. Next you’re going to tell me that this guy wrote a Double Dragon comic.

Huh? He did? Oh. Well, now I know what I’m reviewing in the future.

“Follow Your Spirit”: Ultimate Warrior’s Workout
Ultimate Warrior vs. Sergeant Slaughter

We start the story with neither the Warrior nor Slaughter, but a battle royal in a second-rate gym filled with generic no-names. One of these generic guys is Ben Bradford. While the announcer mentions that Ben is a bit unorthodox in his wrestling style, he continues to dominate the match. In the front row is Lewis, Ben’s little brother. Lewis is confined to a wheelchair and is a major wrestling fan and art enthusiast.

Ben wins the match and is announced the winner. As a special surprise, his trophy and prize money are delivered by the Ultimate Warrior himself. Warrior holds Ben’s hand up and congratulates him on his victory.

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