The 2014 Royal Rumble was a professional wrestling pay-per-view (PPV) event produced by WWE. It was the 27th annual Royal Rumble event and took place on January 26, 2014, at the Consol Energy Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It was the first Royal Rumble to be held in the city of Pittsburgh and the first WWE pay-per-view event held at the Consol Energy Center.
The event was based around the men's Royal Rumble match, a modified 30-man battle royal in which the participants enter at timed intervals instead of all beginning in the ring at the same time and the winner received a WWE World Heavyweight Championship match at WrestleMania XXX. This was the first Royal Rumble since 2002 where there was only one eligible championship for the winner to challenge for at that year's WrestleMania. This came as a result of the previous World Heavyweight Championship being unified with the WWE Championship at TLC: Tables, Ladders & Chairs the previous month; the World Heavyweight Championship was retired while the WWE Championship became the WWE World Heavyweight Championship.
The event featured five professional wrestling matches, including one match on the kickoff pre-show. The main event was the 2014 Royal Rumble match, which a returning Batista won by last eliminating Roman Reigns to become a two-time winner, after 2005, and the fifth multi-time winner, after Hulk Hogan, Shawn Michaels, "Stone Cold" Steve Austin, and John Cena. Other matches saw Randy Orton successfully defending the WWE World Heavyweight Championship against John Cena, Bray Wyatt defeating Daniel Bryan, and Brock Lesnar defeating Big Show. On the kickoff pre-show, Goldust and Cody Rhodes lost the WWE Tag Team Championship to the New Age Outlaws (Road Dogg and Billy Gunn).
Considered one of the worst Royal Rumble pay-per-views of all time, the event is notable for the overwhelmingly negative audience response to the Orton–Cena and Royal Rumble matches. The fans booed Royal Rumble winner Batista in protest and chanted for Daniel Bryan (who was not part of the match) and runner-up Roman Reigns, though the Bryan–Wyatt match was praised. The event marked the final WWE appearance of CM Punk, who abruptly left the company on bad terms the following day and retired from wrestling for the next seven-and-a-half years; he then joined All Elite Wrestling in August 2021, but after controversial issues that led to him being fired from AEW in August 2023, he returned to WWE at Survivor Series: WarGames in November that year, and competed in his first televised WWE match in a decade at the 2024 Royal Rumble.
The event received 467,000 pay-per-view buys, down 8.8% from the 512,000 buys for the previous year's event. This was the final Royal Rumble event to air exclusively via traditional PPV outlets due to the launch of the WWE Network streaming service after the Elimination Chamber event the following month.
Production Background
The Royal Rumble is an annual professional wrestling event, produced every January by WWE since 1988; that first event was a television special before it became a pay-per-view (PPV) event beginning in 1989. It is one of the promotion's original four pay-per-views, along with WrestleMania, SummerSlam, and Survivor Series, referred to as the "Big Four". It is named after and centered on the men's Royal Rumble match.
The 27th Royal Rumble event was scheduled to be held on January 26, 2014, at the Consol Energy Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The venue opened in August 2010, replacing the former Mellon Arena, which made this the first WWE pay-per-view event held in this venue, although the arena was originally going to host the 2012 Survivor Series. On the final episode of Raw before the Royal Rumble event, Batista returned to WWE after an absence of nearly four years, and the Royal Rumble match was scheduled to be his first return match.
The Royal Rumble match is a modified battle royal in which the participants enter at timed intervals instead of all beginning in the ring at the same time, and the match generally features 30 wrestlers. Since 1993, the winner earns a world championship match at that year's WrestleMania. Since 2003, there had been two eligible championships for the winner to challenge for at WrestleMania, but for 2014, there was only one eligible championship to challenge for at WrestleMania XXX, which was the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. This made this the first Royal Rumble since the 2002 event to only feature one world championship. This came as a result of the previous World Heavyweight Championship being unified with the WWE Championship at TLC: Tables, Ladders & Chairs the previous month; the World Heavyweight Championship was retired while the WWE Championship became the WWE World Heavyweight Championship.
Storylines The event comprised five matches, including one on the Kickoff pre-show, that resulted from scripted storylines. Results were predetermined by WWE's writers, while storylines were produced on WWE's weekly television shows, Raw and SmackDown.
A highly promoted match featured WWE World Heavyweight Champion Randy Orton defending the title against long-time adversary John Cena. At Survivor Series in November 2013, Orton successfully defended his WWE Championship against Big Show, on the same night that World Heavyweight Champion John Cena defeated Alberto Del Rio to retain his title. After Orton's victory at Survivor Series, Cena came down to the ring with his title, and celebrated with the crowd as The Authority (Triple H, Stephanie McMahon, and Kane) looked on, much to Orton's chagrin. The next month, at the TLC pay-per-view, Orton defeated Cena in a Tables, Ladders, and Chairs match to unify the two titles as the WWE World Heavyweight Championship. On the December 30 episode of Raw, Cena was awarded a rematch for the title against Orton at the Royal Rumble, with the match stipulation of a traditional one-on-one singles match, except that it could only be won by pinfall or submission. On the January 13, 2014, episode, Orton suffered an upset loss to Kofi Kingston and took out his frustrations by attacking Cena's father, who was attending the event at ringside.
On the December 30, 2013, episode of Raw, Brock Lesnar returned with his manager, Paul Heyman, to announce his intentions to challenge the winner of the upcoming WWE World Heavyweight Championship match between Randy Orton and John Cena at the Royal Rumble. Lesnar then dared any wrestler who disapproved of that notion to challenge him, which was answered by Mark Henry, and a brawl would ensue, ending with Lesnar delivering an F-5 to Henry. The following week on Raw, Henry challenged Lesnar again, only to have Lesnar dislocate his elbow with the Kimura lock in storyline, which led Big Show to come out afterwards to confront Lesnar. On the January 10 episode of SmackDown, Big Show issued a challenge to Lesnar, Paul Heyman accepting on behalf of Lesnar and scheduling the match for the Royal Rumble event.
Announced on WWE.com, Goldust and Cody Rhodes faced The New Age Outlaws (Road Dogg and Billy Gunn) for the WWE Tag Team Championship on the Royal Rumble Kickoff Show preceding the pay-per-view. This match was made when The New Age Outlaws defeated Cody Rhodes and Goldust in a non-title match on the January 17 episode of SmackDown due to a distraction from Vickie Guerrero.
On the October 28, 2013, episode of Raw, The Wyatt Family (Bray Wyatt, Luke Harper, and Erick Rowan) attacked Daniel Bryan backstage, which ignited a feud between the two. The next month at Survivor Series, Bryan teamed with CM Punk and defeated Harper and Rowan. The rivalry between Bryan and the Wyatt Family continued in December, as the latter defeated the former in a 3-on-1 handicap match at TLC, with Wyatt attempting to recruit Bryan in the previous weeks. On the December 30, 2013, episode of Raw, Bryan defeated Harper and then Rowan in a gauntlet match so that he could face Wyatt, whereupon Harper and Rowan interfered for a disqualification and beat him down, before announcing he would join the Wyatt Family. However, on the January 13, 2014, episode of Raw (after Bryan and Bray Wyatt were defeated by Jey Uso and Jimmy Uso in a Steel Cage match), Bryan betrayed Wyatt and attacked him, culminating with Bryan hitting his flying knee finishing maneuver on Wyatt. The following week on Raw, Bryan explained that his joining the Wyatts was a ruse to infiltrate the stable and bide his time to strike, and that he would wrestle Wyatt at the Royal Rumble event with the added stipulation that if Bryan wins, he would have the right to compete in the 30-man Royal Rumble match later that night.
Event + Other on-screen personnelRole:Name:English commentatorsMichael ColeJerry LawlerJohn "Bradshaw" LayfieldSpanish commentatorsCarlos CabreraMarcelo RodriguezRicardo RodriguezInterviewerRenee YoungRing announcersLilian GarciaJustin RobertsRefereesCharles RobinsonJohn ConeMike ChiodaJason Ayers Rod Zapata Pre-show panelJosh MathewsRic FlairShawn MichaelsJim Duggan
Pre-show Before the show aired live on pay-per-view, the Royal Rumble Kickoff pre-show was shown live on YouTube and other digital platforms. Backstage, the general managers of Raw and SmackDown, Brad Maddox and Vickie Guerrero, respectively, rolled the "Rumble Drum" to give wrestlers their numbers. Alberto Del Rio, R-Truth, The Real Americans (Jack Swagger and Antonio Cesaro), Kofi Kingston, The Great Khali, and Damien Sandow picked their numbers during the segment.
In the pre-show, Goldust and Cody Rhodes defended the WWE Tag Team Championship against The New Age Outlaws (Road Dogg and Billy Gunn). Towards the end of the match, Rhodes applied a dropkick to Dogg, but was unaware that Gunn blind-tagged in for the latter. From the back, Gunn entered the ring and delivered a Fame-Ass-er to Rhodes, to win the match and the titles for the Outlaws.
Preliminary matches In the first match on the pay-per-view portion of the show, Bray Wyatt faced Daniel Bryan. Early in the match, the referee saw Bray's Wyatt Family members Luke Harper and Erick Rowan attempting to interfere, so he ejected them from ringside. During the match, Wyatt targeted Bryan's head, ramming it into the ring-post. Bryan later mounted a comeback with a running tornado DDT off the ring apron, planting Wyatt's head on the floor. Wyatt managed to escape Bryan's Yes! Lock submission hold by biting Bryan's hand. To avoid Bryan's running knee, Wyatt rolled out of the ring to the floor. Bryan then attempted a suicide dive but Wyatt caught him and executed a Sister Abigail into the barricade. After another Sister Abigail in the ring, Wyatt scored the pinfall victory.
In the next match, Brock Lesnar (accompanied by Paul Heyman) faced Big Show. Lesnar attacked Big Show before the match started, and then hit him with a chair. When the match started, Big Show landed his KO Punch, but Lesnar picked up the victory after executing an F-5. Lesnar then continued to attack Big Show with a chair after the match.
In the penultimate match, Randy Orton defended the WWE World Heavyweight Championship against John Cena. After both wrestlers failed to win despite executing their RKO, Attitude Adjustment, and STF moves, both wrestlers resorted to using their opponent's signature moves but still could not win the match. At the end of the match, Cena again trapped Orton in the STF submission hold, but the lights temporarily went out due to the arrival of The Wyatt Family on the ring apron. Orton took advantage of the distraction to drop Cena with the RKO to pin him and win the match.
Main event