Acting for Two: In 1998, Mick Foley entered the Royal Rumble match three times, once as each persona he was using.note at that time, he wasn't performing under his real name In order, he entered as Cactus Jack, Mankind, and Dude Love.
Author's Saving Throw: The 2005 finish was a great fix to a hilarious screw up. After Batista botched the ending, sending both himself and John Cena to the floor at the same time, the referees improvised a bit until Vince McMahon came out, tore both quads, and had the match restarted to get a proper ending.
Enforced Method Acting: According to the man himself, Pat McAfee's surprise spot as a participant in the 2024 Royal Rumble was just as much of a surprise to him. Supposedly, no one gave him a heads-up that he would be the number 22 entrant, making his reaction towards getting in a ring with Omos and Bron Breakker (naturally, a self-elimination) all the more genuine.
Long-Runners: It's been running annually since 1988.
Real Life Writes the Plot: The 40-man Royal Rumble didn't become a tradition because there apparently just weren't enough members of the roster to fill all the spots. Even though it is believed that the number increase was conceived to accomodate all the members of both The Nexus and The Corre, which were quite large stables, according to one writer, they were still struggling just to fill it as it was.
Throw It In!: The 2005 Royal Rumble had Batista botch him and John Cena going over the top rope, ending it with a double elimination. However, the referees were able to play along with it by arguing as to which superstar landed first (Batista was from RAW and Cena from SmackDown) to make it All Part of the Show until Vince McMahon could reinstate the match.
The 2016 Royal Rumble became infamous for having shoddy camera work: focusing on the face of Roman Reigns instead of the titantron during the debut of AJ Styles, missing several key spots during the match, and missing several eliminations, most noticeably Kofi Kingston's. This was because a blizzard hit the northeastern coast that weekend and stranded one of the production crews.
A similar incident to the above happened in the 2020 Men's Royal Rumble, where Edge returned after a 9 year forced retirement, to the tune of audience cheering, but it was hampered by the camera cutting away too much, like it was trying its best to catch everyone's reaction. It got the point where Edge's first spear since his actual return, on Dolph Ziggler, was cut away to see the crowd's reaction. There were even calls for the camera guy's job, and even Ziggler himself made his complaint heard on Twitter. Fortunately, when the match was uploaded in its entirety on WWE's YouTube channel a year later, it featured a different cut that showed Edge's spears.
During the 2023 Women's Royal Rumble, Nia Jax was meant to make her surprising return as the 30th entry, however, due to technical errors, her music abruptly started playing with no countdown, leaving everyone a bit confused. While it did not hamper the rest of the match, it was clearly an error on backstage.
Umaga was supposed to return to the WWE by entering the 2010 Royal Rumble match, but it didn't happen due to his death in 2009.
Kaval was originally in the poster for the 2011 Royal Rumble, implying his participation in the match. However, he was released in December 2010, removing him from the poster.
In the 2016 Rumble, it was originally supposed to be down to Roman Reigns and Triple H, but given the reaction people had on Roman's X-Pac Heat, an audible was called to have Dean Ambrose take the final spot, while Roman makes it to the top 3.
Alicia Fox and Paige were both supposed to be in the 2018 Women's Royal Rumble but got injured right before it. Kairi Sane from NXT was Alicia's replacement, and it's suspected that Kelly Kelly was Paige's.
John Cena was supposed to participate in the 2019 Men's Royal Rumble but had to leave to shoot a movie, the kayfabe reason is that he got injured just a couple of weeks before it.
The 2020 Men's Rumble was supposed to have been won by Roman Reigns and Shayna Baszler would win the Women's Rumble. At almost the last minute, it was changed to Drew McIntyre and Charlotte Flair respectively.
Sasha Banks was the originally planned winner of the 2022 Women's Rumble match but was changed to Ronda Rousey once the latter became available.
Charlotte Flair was supposed win the 2021 Rumble until someone in creative realized with Edge winning the men's Rumble, no new stars were being made, it was switched to Bianca Belair.
Rey Mysterio was supposed to be involved in the 2023 Men's Rumble match, but got injured on the go home episode of SmackDown the night before. No one took his spot as it was used to further push his feud with his son Dominik, by having him come out with Rey's mask, insinuating that he and The Judgment Day faction took him out before hand.
Michelle McCool revealed on Twitter that, due to fan demand, she was called to take part in the 2023 Women's Rumble match 9 days prior to the event, indicating that she originally wasn't going to be booked for it.
Brock Lesnar was booked as an entrant in the 2024 Rumble, but was replaced by Bron Breakker at the last minute due to Lesnar being potentially implicated in a sex trafficking and assault lawsuit alongside Vince McMahon and John Laurinaitis.note The lawsuit itself withheld the name of the talent in question, only identifying him as "a world-famous athlete and former UFC Heavyweight Champion with whom WWE was actively trying to sign a new contract", though The Wall Street Journal identified him as Lesnar. This included Breakker taking in all the spots and eliminations that were supposed to be done by Lesnar — including his own elimination by Dominik Mysterio.
General trivia:
The commentary team of Vince McMahon and Jesse Ventura, who were partnered together on WWF Superstars of Wrestling and Saturday Night's Main Event, is often overlooked due to the chemistry of the Gorilla Monsoon/Bobby Heenan team (of WWF Prime Time Wrestling and Superstars' sister program, WWF Wrestling Challenge). Yet, the McMahon-Ventura duo — the flagship commentary team at the time — worked together one time on one of the WWF's "Big Four" events ... and the first Royal Rumble (on January 24, 1988) was it. This came about only because Monsoon was originally assigned to be the lead commentator for the event but fell ill shortly beforehand, pressing McMahon into service. note Monsoon's illness also led to McMahon's first play-by-play announcing stint at a WWF televised show at Madison Square Garden in five years, said show taking place one night later; the show that famously featured Hulk Hogan and Bam Bam Bigelow vs. Ted DiBiase and Virgil (with André the Giant as the heels' corner man) in the main event. Also, the 1988 Royal Rumble was the only time one of the "Big Four" shows was presented on television (the USA Network) instead of pay-per-view.
