3. Seth Rollins – Give credit where it’s due, the severely-outsized Rollins held his own against two of the most dominant powerhouses WWE has ever had, kicking out of AA’s and F-5’s left and right, and with surprisingly little help from J&J Security. WWE is doing an excellent job of branding Rollins as the replacement for Randy Orton, and Rollins is often much better on the mic than Orton was. Look for the Authority poster-boy to have some kind of huge part in the Road to Wrestlemania.
2. Bray Wyatt – Most people could probably anticipate that Bray Wyatt would have a big performance in the Royal Rumble, but next to Rusev there was nobody more difficult to keep down than Wyatt, who was in the ring alone for at least several minutes in between quick-and-easy eliminations of the likes of The Boogeyman, Sin Cara, Zach Ryder, and even his former Wyatt Family members Luke Harper and Erick Rowan. Wyatt recorded five eliminations in a row before shocking the WWE universe by eliminating Daniel Bryan. He lasted nearly 47 minutes in the Rumble before being eliminated by a double-team from The Big Show and Kane
1. Brock Lesnar – If there was any scenario in which we could most easily envision someone as dominant as Brock Lesnar losing the WWE title, it would be a Triple Threat match with no disqualifications in which he didn’t even need to be pinned to lose it. As great as John Cena has typically been at “defying the odds” on this night it was Lesnar, who overcame what seemed like nearly a dozen moves that would have knocked out normal superstars, but instead shrugged them off like it was nothing. Very seldom has there been a performance where one man takes literally every hit thrown at him and come back the way Lesnar did – and his injury scare was legitimately one of the most concerning things of the entire night. For Lesnar to get back into the ring with what might have actually been a legitimately broken rib and win that match. Simply, wow.
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