The Royal Rumble is one of the most chaotic matches of the calendar year, and to avoid the match going completely off the rails, WWE have to plan for every scenario in the match.

Unfortunately, no matter how well WWE plans for the annual matchup, sometimes, things happen that are completely out of their control.

From wild in-ring botches to hilarious production mistakes, the Rumble match has seen its fair share of wild and unplanned moments that have no doubt led to utter bedlam in the backstage area.

So – with that being said, let’s examine 10 Royal Rumble moments that led to mass panic backstage.

10: AJ Styles Gets Injured

The 2020 men’s Royal Rumble received vast acclaim, as it saw the WWE return of Edge, as well as a star-making moment for Rumble winner, Drew McIntyre.

However, the match also saw a notable and scary botch take place that resulted in former WWE Champion, AJ Styles being rendered unable to compete.

As Edge entered the match, he proceeded to spear everyone in sight, and when AJ took the move, he over-rotated and awkwardly landed on his shoulder. AJ had dislocated his shoulder, and after a brief conversation with Edge in the corner, AJ was thrown out of the ring, way earlier than planned.  

The elimination looked completely out of place as a viewer, and even Karl Anderson looked completely lost as to what had happened. Thankfully, the talent in the match were able to carry on in the aftermath of AJ’s impromptu elimination, yet you can easily imagine the mass panic backstage when it became apparent that AJ was seriously hurt.

9: Beth Phoenix Gets Busted Open

Speaking of the 2020 Royal Rumble, the women’s Rumble match also featured an unplanned moment that would have caused problems backstage.

WWE legend Beth Phoenix was without question the MVP of the match, as her work was timeless, and she showed, yet again, that she could easily have another major run in the company.

During the match, it started to become clear that Phoenix was badly busted open, and she was in-fact covered in blood.

Due to WWE being a PG product, and unscripted blood spots not being allowed, this would have made WWE officials lose their minds, and it was obvious from watching the match that Kevin Dunn was trying to avoid showing Phoenix on camera as much as humanly possible.

8: The WrestleMania Sign Bursts Into Flames

The safety of fans as well as the wrestlers themselves is paramount for WWE, yet in 2022, disaster almost struck at the Royal Rumble event.

When Ronda Rousey won the Rumble match, she proceeded to point at the WrestleMania sign, and something rather sinister occurred. In a terrifying moment, the WrestleMania sign burst into flames, and WWE were forced to bring the sign down, and distinguish the fire.

Thankfully, nobody was hurt, and WWE were able to rectify the problem immediately.  

7: The Rock’s Feet Touch The Floor

The 2000 Royal Rumble was going to be the defining moment of The Rock’s character. The Great One was going to win the annual matchup, and challenge Triple H for the WWE Title in the main event of WrestleMania 16, in arguably one of the biggest matches of the entire Attitude Era.

The issue was that Rock’s Rumble win was completely botched, and WWE had no choice but to address the blunder on TV.

The finish of the match was to see Big Show attempt to throw The Rock over the top-rope, only for The Great One to hold on, and then Big Show would fall to the floor.

This spot should have been relatively easy to perform, yet The Rock’s feet had touched the floor before Big Show’s, and this was shown crystal-clear on camera.

Was turning the botch into a storyline the right approach? Well, whilst it was disappointing that The Rock wasn’t the clear-cut winner of the Rumble, it did add some legitimacy to the concept, and WWE deserve a ton of credit for not insulting the viewer’s intelligence.

6: Nia Jax’s Hilarious Blunder

The #30 spot in the Royal Rumble is arguably the most prestigious spot in the matchup.

Fans always expect a major name, or even a surprise to enter the match in the number 30 position, and in 2023, WWE’s production team made such a significant blunder with the #30 entrant in the women’s Rumble.

Before the countdown for the number 30 position had even started, Nia Jax’s theme song began to play completely out of nowhere. Fans were completely baffled as to what was happening, and WWE had no choice but to commence the countdown.

There was sheer panic from everyone, and the WWE commentary team were at a loss for words. Whilst one of the worst yet comedic botches in Rumble history, it was certainly memorable, and it was definitely a unique return for the former Women’s Champion.

5: Alex Riley’s Mishap

One of the key aims of the 2011 Royal Rumble was to further the feud between The Miz and John Cena. The two were going to main event WrestleMania 27, and WWE believed the Rumble was the perfect opportunity to plant the seeds for their eventual collision.

The initial plan for the match was going to see Miz’s protegee, Alex Riley eliminate Cena from the match. The problem was that Riley accidentally slipped over the top-rope just minutes into his appearance, and WWE had to improvise on the spot, and come up with a way to eliminate Cena, whilst still furthering the Miz and Cena storyline.

WWE’s new idea was for an already eliminated Riley to distract Cena, only for Miz, who was on commentary at the time, to enter the match, and eliminate Cena.

WWE managed to pull this spot off perfectly, and it was hard to notice that this wasn’t the original spot planned for the match.

4: Randy Orton’s Pyro Botch

The post-Royal Rumble pyro spot which sees the winner pointing to the WrestleMania sign is a Rumble tradition, and when WWE delivered the spot in 2009, it went so badly wrong, that Rumble winner, Randy Orton was absolutely livid.  

When Orton pointed at the WrestleMania sign, nothing happened. Orton kept trying, and every time he did so, the pyro failed to hit, and it became an awkward visual, and no doubt WWE officials backstage were screaming into headsets trying to fix the blunder.

Mistakes can happen in any department in WWE, yet this is one of the most important elements of the Rumble match, so you would assume that this would have been practised and perfected before the show went live on the air.

3: Stone Cold Steve Austin’s Unfortunate Slip

Stone Cold Steve Austin, AKA, The Ringmaster was set to be one of the final four men left in the 1996 Royal Rumble. However, this planned creative vision couldn’t go ahead, as Austin was accidentally eliminated early.

Austin’s elimination occurred when Fatu charged at Austin with a clothesline, and Austin was unable to hang onto the ropes, and he fell to the floor. There was obvious panic from Vince McMahon on commentary, as he decided to ignore the elimination, and act like it never happened. Unfortunately, for McMahon, Mr Perfect would allude to the elimination, meaning that McMahon was forced to confirm Austin’s early exit.

The WWE Hall of Famer offered some fascinating insight into his elimination on his podcast, and this is what the WWE great had to say:

"We were at the Royal Rumble and I was supposed to be finishing fourth in the match. So, your first year in the company, and you’re gonna be the fourth-to-last guy left in the ring, that’s a pretty good rub…I was doing a spot with, I believe it was Fatu, I can’t remember, one of the Samoans… And man, he had a lot of baby oil on. All the guys were oiled up, and so the ropes were very slippery. I was going to do a deal where he does something to me, and I was going to take a bump over the top, hang onto the top rope, come back in the bottom — well, zip zip, boom, I lost my grip, fell out on my keister down by the guardrail”.

2: Shane McMahon’s Infamous Night

Shane McMahon had one of the most infamous nights of his career at the 2022 Royal Rumble.

His antics, both backstage and in-the-ring, led to Vince McMahon firing him, which on the surface may sound drastic, but McMahon would have taken the same course of action if it was anyone else.

Shane was reportedly politicking his way into a favourable spot in the Rumble, and he was reportedly insisting that he would in essence be presented as the main attraction in the match.

Additionally, Shane was involved in a notable botch, which saw Shane forced to enter the match an entrant early, as the WWE production team accidentally played Shane’s music instead of Randy Orton’s.

Whilst this was a huge botch that would have caused drama backstage, Orton found the botch hilarious, and he was reportedly “rolling on the floor laughing”.

1: Vince McMahon Tears His Quads

The 2005 Royal Rumble featured one of the most memorable botches in WWE history.

The finish of the Rumble match initially ended without a clear winner, as both John Cena and Batista fell out of the ring at the exact same time.

This led to confusion and disorder backstage, as nobody knew what to do. In hilarious fashion, Vince McMahon decided to storm from the backstage area to the ring to get everything back on track. However, things went from bad to worse, as McMahon tore BOTH of his quads as he entered the ring, meaning he had to sit in the ring, and direct traffic whilst in immense pain.

Bruce Prichard offered a first-hand account on his Something to Wrestle with podcast about the incident, and this is what the WWE Executive had to say:

“… It’s like okay, let’s see who hit. Maybe Cena hit first and therefore Batista wins and you’re good to go. I think Dave hit first, so it was like, can the argument be made that they hit at the same time? All this is happening in a matter of seconds. It’s not like, ‘Okay, stop everything, now let’s figure out what to do. You’re trying to figure out as you go, and it’s like, ‘Okay, tell the SmackDown guy to raise John’s hand and tell the RAW guy to raise Batista’s hand.’ We’re thinking… maybe you can get to a match or you know what, start it over.’ Before you know it, Vince is out, and he is headed to the ring to figure it out. I don’t know that we necessarily had exactly what we wanted to do before Vince went out. Vince just bolted out and went to the ring and then when he slid in the ring, nobody could figure out why the hell he didn’t get up. He just sat on the damn mat….”

Eventually, the match was re-started with Cena and Batista as the final two, and The Animal was able to secure the win as originally planned.