Royal Rumble Rewind: 2000

Entering into a new decade and century, the WWF rolled along. Despite Steve Austin being on the shelf at the time, the WWF continued to pump out entertaining shows and this one is no exception, thanks in part to a raccous New York crowd.

2000 Royal Rumble

Emanating from Madison Square Garden in New York City, NY

D’Lo Brown and Grandmaster Sexay have drawn #1 and #2 respectively. A pretty boring opening two if you ask me. Sexay dances, so D’Lo attacks him. Good move. D’Lo goes to powerbomb Sexay, but in a scary looking spot, Sexay reverses it into a hurricanrana. We don’t need another Droz incident, thank you very much. Sexay tosses D’Lo, but he hangs on. Mosh comes out at #3. Soon after, Kaientai, who were snubbed from the Rumble, come out and try to attack the combatants. However, they’re quickly disposed of. Sexay sloppily bulldogs D’Lo, who lands right on Mosh’s leg. Mosh appears to have legitimately hurt his ankle. #4 is Christian, who is greeted by Mosh. Not a whole lot happening thus far. Rikishi is the #5 entrant and he receives a big pop. Rikishi comes in and quickly eliminates Mosh. Then Christian suffers a similar fate. D’Lo gives Rikishi a legdrop, but that is no sold and Rikishi gets up to give him the Rikishi Drop. He easily eliminates him after that. Just as Rikishi starts to go after Sexay, Scotty 2 Hotty comes out at #6. Instead of fighting, the three decide to dance. I find this moronic and stupid, but the crowd eats it up. After busting a move, Rikishi grabs both Sexay and Scotty and tosses both of them out. Well, that almost made up for the dancing. The unfortunate next entrant is Steve Blackman at #7. Blackman gets some brief offense before suffering a Rikishi Drop himself. Just like that, he’s gone too. I think we have our Diesel push right here. The competition gets bigger at #8 with Viscera. The two slug it out and then Viscera drops Rikishi with a belly-to-belly suplex. Rikishi comes back with three stiff kicks and then a shoulderblock to knock him out of the ring. The Bossman comes out at #9 and you just hear this audible groan from the crowd. The Bossman refuses to get into the ring, but Test comes out at #10 and attacks him. He sends him into the ring, where Rikishi beats him up.

#11 is the British Bulldog and he goes after everyone. We’re paired up now as Test and the Bossman duke it out and the Bulldog tries to eliminate Rikishi. At #12 Gangrel comes out, but that doesn’t matter, because right behind him are Kaientai. They try to interfere again, and once again they’re unceremoniously dumped. As Test and Gangrel battle in the corner, Rikishi gives them a butt splash. We see on a double feature that Taka Michinoku took a nasty face first bump when he was tossed out. Edge comes out at #13 and is almost eliminated by the Bulldog within his first 30 seconds in the ring. Then, in a shocker, who shows up at #14? Bob Backlund! Sweet! He gets in and is jumped by the Bossman and the Bulldog. All of a sudden, everyone teams up and dumps Rikishi from the ring. Crowd doesn’t like that one. A big pop for the #15 entrant, Chris Jericho. He makes an immediate impact by dropkicking Backlund out of the ring. Back to the campaign trail for Bob. Here comes one of the Rock’s biggest threats, Crash Holly at #16. The Bulldog and Edge grab Crash and try to eliminate him, but he crawls back in under the bottom rope. Chyna is the #17 entrant and she goes right after Jericho. Jericho backdrops her to the apron, but then she suplexes him out of the ring. As she gloats, the Bossman bumps her off the apron to quickly end her night. As Farooq comes out at #18, the Mean Street Posse, also snubbed from the match, come out and jump him. The Posse are thrown out, but so is Farooq. Not quite sure what’s going on there. #19 is Road Dogg and he goes after Test. The Bossman tosses Crash, but again he crawls back in under the bottom rope. As Al Snow comes in at #20, the Bulldog goes out at the hands of the Road Dogg. Everyone seems to be sluggish right now waiting for the next mass exodus.

Once again an entrance is overshadowed by extra participants. This time, it’s the #21 entrant, Val Venis, who is overshadowed by Funaki, who feebly tries to wreck havoc on the entrants. This gives Jerry Lawler another excuse to show the replay of Taka falling on his face. The #22 entrant is Prince Albert and nobody cares. Meanwhile, Snow and Val backdrop Edge out of the ring. For some reason, Road Dogg has grapevined himself to the bottom rope. Hardcore Holly is #23 and the ring is really starting to fill up now. Once again, Crash teeters on the brink of elimination. Finally, the crowd wakes up as The Rock comes out at #24. He goes right after the Bossman and eliminates him with ease. Sadly, Snow and Val stop The Rock from getting rid of anyone else for the time being. Our #25 entrant is Billy Gunn, who targets The Rock upon his entrance. The Rock DDTs Crash and then launches him out of the ring. This prompts Hardcore to come over and attack The Rock. The Big Show comes out at #26 and is immediately met by The Rock. These two have an issue after Show took offense with The Rock calling him a jabroni (*rolls eyes*). Show goes over by Test, who is on the apron, and boots him to the floor. Well, Test gets the longevity award for tonight. Now Show dumps Gangrel out of the ring. As Show continues his dominance, Bradshaw comes out at #27. Right behind him is the Mean Street Posse. Bradshaw fends them off, but then is tossed out himself by the Outlaws. Now the Acolytes and the Posse brawl down the aisle. We’re paired up again as it’s Val & Albert, Show & Road Dogg, Hardcore & Gunn, and The Rock & Snow. Through hellfire and brimstone, Kane is out at #28. He comes in and immediately throws out Val. Now he goes after Road Dogg, who is still clutching the bottom rope like a security blanket. Kane clotheslines Albert out of the ring, but no one notices because they’re all watching the Godfather come out with the hos at #29. One last time, our favorite Chinese (he’s Japanese!) guy, Funaki, comes out and one last time he’s thrown out of the ring. We close with a wimper rather than a bang as #30 is X-Pac.

We now begin to weed out the crap as Snow clotheslines Hardcore out of the ring. The Godfather charges at Show, but Show clotheslines him right out. Now The Rock eliminates Snow. Road Dogg finally gets up to, of all things, laugh at Snow and wouldn’t you know it, he gets dumped too…by Billy Gunn. Don’t understand that one. However, Gunn barely enjoys the moment before Kane clotheslines him to the floor. Our final four are now: The Rock, Big Show, Kane and X-Pac. The Outlaws drag Kane to the outside and attack him. As the officials try to stop them, The Rock tosses X-Pac out of the ring. Since no one saw that, X-Pac gets back into the ring. Kane and Show try to chokeslam each other to no avail. Kane is able to hit Show with an enziguri and then slam him. However, X-Pac comes over and hits Kane with a spinning heel kick that knocks him out of the ring. Then X-Pac gives the Bronco Buster to Show. Show quickly gets back up and press slams X-Pac to the floor. The Rock delivers a spinebuster to Show and then connects with the People’s Elbow. As The Rock tries to eliminate Show, he puts on the brakes and chokeslams The Rock. Show tries to dump The Rock, but The Rock hangs onto the top rope and propels Show to the floor. The Rock is 2000 Royal Rumble winner.

Postmatch: The Rock gets on the mic and says he’s going to Wrestlemania, but Show comes back out and attacks The Rock. We end the show with him telling The Rock that this isn’t over.

Bottom Line: There were a handful of fun moments here, but overall this is a middle of the road Rumble. Its main problem was a lack of suspense. The only two likely candidates were The Rock and Big Show and since Show was coming off an unsuccessful title run, it was pretty much The Rock’s to win. Since those were the two main candidates, I would have liked if they would have teased out the final minutes between them to add some more drama. Overall, an ok Rumble that was without a moment that has stood the test of time, unless you count Taka’s face splat. *** ¾