Anyone watch this last night? Punk's opening of the rumble was spectacular. Dumping jobbers out of the ring and cutting a promo DURING the Rumble? Priceless.

No, the WINNER was priceless. Loved it.

The whole show was pretty good, though the Women's match should been more of a match than a spot. I was happy with the show (though disappointed I didn't win anything in our Rumble pool).

I think your Michaels scenario is a huge possibility!


Definitely a different Rumble. All of the pre-matches sucked.

Undertaker/Mysterio was entertaining. Loved the Rumble.

I'll give you the Women's match was a joke, but I really thought the first two matches were incredibly solid.

Several things I liked from the show last night. When Taker first turned down Shawn's challenge we said that there would be one of two finishes to the Rumble - HBK wins for the rematch or the ending we got. Everyone in the house was glad we got the ending we did, even my son who is an HBK fan and doesn't like bad guys winning. I actually enjoyed Beth Phoenix getting a spot, and laughed that she got to eliminate Khali.

I'd have to say that aside from having to watch Randy Orton (don't like him, he bores the heck out of me when he isn't just being annoying and this I can count on a single hand the number of times he's gotten a crowd reaction in the last year), the most annoying thing for me was that there weren't any surprise guest slots in the Rumble.

I do agree that CM Punk was truly entertaining. I honestly would have liked for him to last a little longer. Very well done.

I think the winner was a surprise (entrant). I mean, I honestly didn't expect him to be IN the Rumble. I figured he'd show up and eliminate his old partner, but that's about it.

I actually really enjoyed the Rumble this year. I liked all the matches. What made me even happier was that the day before I made a couple of bets with some friends and I managed to get almost everything right - the outcome of all the matches (including whether or not there would be interference) along with the Rumble itself. I only missed everything about the Women match and didn't get the Rumble winner's #, nor the First and the Last entrant. The spoils didn't amount to much except a couple of beers and a satisfaction, but I still enjoyed the Rumble!

I put together a pool this year. It was five bucks a person and we drew entry numbers. Whoever came out was who we got on our team. The guy whos' team tossed the most out ended up with their money back, while the Rumble winner got the rest. I had Michaels and Cena and thought things were looking good for a while on both fronts. Alas, the guy who had Punk ended up with one more elimination than me thanks to Beth FREAKIN' Phoenix. Alas, I didn't have #29 either.

Come to think of it...I never win ANY type of pool that I run. Well, at least I know I'm honest!

Isn't our winner about due for some face time by now?

I agree. And judging by the reaction that he got both when he came out and when he won, this is what we're gonna get.

EDIT: And indeed from what I've seen on Raw, the switch on the turn has been pulled already.

I unfortunately called the winner, so that was a bit of a letdown for me.

The surprises were Bourne, Ziggler, Morrison, the winner, and Beth. Everyone else was announced. And Hurricane and Regal lost their spots.

And I've never seen taker gush like that. Accidental bloody noses are terrible.

I thought it was Hurricane and Santino... <shrug>

As for tonight...reaction to the Rumble winner seemed mixed until the champ came out. I think the fans were waiting to see whether he was going to be heel/face.

Also, loved the ending to the Michaels/Orton match...VERY fresh. The first two elimination chamber qualifiers, while clear who would win, seemed to be about making the young guys look good. About damn time.

Sorry, I forgot he was in it at one point. He wasn't on the thing I checked the day before. I was kinda sad I Hurricane was an idiot and got pulled.

Oh, and JTG was an unannounced entrant too AFAIK.

The Rumble is usually my favorite PPV of the year. This year didn't disappoint.

- The Christian/Ezekiel match was very good. At this point, I'm wondering if they're just going to have Christian hang onto the title until they go through with the rumored re-branding of ECW.

- The Miz/MVP match was very good also. Kind of a surprise that they threw it on the card almost spur of the moment, but given that the feud is obviously going to continue, it could be forgiven. I kind of hope this will lead to a "best of" series or some other stipulation for the next US title match. Has Miz ever been in a ladder match?

- For Randy vs. Sheamus, it's amazing what a crowd can do to a match that would otherwise be a crushing bore. That Atlanta crowd must truly hate Sheamus to root for Randy the way they were.

- Mickie vs. Michelle was really, really short for a feud that's been building for over a month now, but given that I was worried the match was going to end in a DQ, the ending we got pleased me. Though I wonder what's going to happen when Michelle cashes in her rematch clause.

- I'll be the first to admit that I actually started to think Rey had a shot at beating Taker. Probably because Batista had been lying down for Rey so often lately that I had started to wonder if Taker would do the same. I'm such a silly goose. Oh well. And I initially missed seeing him get busted open, so when I looked back at the screen I mistakenly wondered why Taker was wearing a Hitler mustache.

- I'd probably put the Rumble match this year in the list of top five Rumbles in WWE history. Very well done. From Punk's dominance early on, to Beth's surprise inclusion, Edge's return and thankfully, no total goof entries this year (See: Drew Carey, Hornswoggle, Santino, Etc.), it was a great match top to bottom. The only mild criticism would be that there was only one point in the Rumble where they had nearly eight or so people in the ring at the same time.

Additionally, for a company that tries to protect Cena from situations that'll get him booed, having him eliminate fan favorites like Kofi, Shelton and Yoshi probably did him no favors.