Only two wrestlers can win the Royal Rumble matches, but WWE can still book certain stars to look strong. Brock Lesnar, Asuka, Liv Morgan, and Gunther are all examples of this. None of them won their respective Rumble match but still picked up momentum during the first stop on the road to WrestleMania 39. Everyone can't look good all the time—that's the nature of professional wrestling—but a handful of WWE stars lost a bit of their shine at the Royal Rumble. No one took a hit they can't recover from, but there were certainly some interesting developments that fans should keep an eye on in the coming weeks.
Not everything that occurred at the Royal Rumble was to set up matches at WrestleMania 39. Elimination Chamber is on February 18, meaning that WWE has three episodes of Raw and SmackDown to flesh out that card. Even with that in mind, several wrestlers seemed to get lost in the shuffle over the weekend. That's not necessarily a fault of their own. They aren't in charge of their own booking, after all. Still, some of the in-ring performances left a bit to be desired. With that in mind, here are seven superstars who saw their stock take a hit at the Royal Rumble. Keep in mind that this list won't be in any particular order.
6 Seth Rollins
Seth Rollins will be fine after a forgettable showing at the 2023 Royal Rumble. His being Teflon doesn't change the fact that he had minimal impact on the match's proceedings. He did eliminate Bobby Lashley, which indicates that WWE will stick with the tremendously stale United States Championship title feud featuring those two and Austin Theory. Getting sent over the top rope by Logan Paul was an exciting rub, but it's impossible to feel like Seth Rollins picked up any ground here. He was a dark horse to win the Rumble entering the weekend. Instead, he only secured two eliminations of his own before getting pitched out Paul—Logan's only elimination of the entire match. It was a clear choice to have the Royal Rumble come down to Cody Rhodes and Gunther instead of Rhodes and Rollins, leaving Seth stuck in neutral on Raw despite being one of the brand's most consistent performers.
5 Rey Mysterio
Fans hoped to see Dominik and Rey Mysterio come face-to-face at the Royal Rumble. A match between these two has been brewing all year, and the battle royal could have been an interesting spot for Rey and Dom to come face to face. Judgment Day got their comeuppance from a returning Edge, who eliminated Finn Balor and Damian Priest before getting drug out of the ring by those two plus Dominik. This turned out to be a pretty important spot in the show, as Rhea Ripley appeared to aid her faction before Beth Phoenix made her return as well. Ripley ate a spear from Phoenix, entered the women's Royal Rumble at No. 1, and still won the whole thing. Rey was nowhere to be seen, as it was implied Dominik beat him up backstage and stole his entry into the match. Rey Mysterio would have been a welcome addition to a Rumble noticeably thin on legends.
4 Alexa Bliss
Literally, no one involved in the ongoing Bray Wyatt storyline left the Royal Rumble looking stronger than they entered it. Even the most ardent defenders of supernatural elements in professional wrestling would have to agree. Alexa Bliss has been falling deeper under Mister Howdy's influence for the last two months. This match should have given her a better shot at dethroning Bianca Belair, right? Or at least given her the ability to get in more than a bit of basic offense. That isn't the way this midcard match went, however. The EST easily disposed of Bliss, leaving her on the brink of tears in the middle of the ring while Howdy appeared on the Jumbotron. It wasn't the worst match of the night, but it did nothing to improve Bliss' stock in WWE. Now she's left back at square one with a new gimmick and edge that didn't help her in the most basic circumstances.
3 LA Knight
Feuds with Bray Wyatt aren't historically good for the other wrestlers involved. Seth Rollins spoke about this Bray Wyatt problem before his return. Various other superstars have discussed how difficult it is to work with his characters, most of whom are impervious to damage and invincible. LA Knight did his best to look strong in a Pitch Black match that was ill-fated from the start. Wyatt's gimmick fights have never lived up to the promised spectacle. There were a few cool spots in this one, but in the end, the black lights looked more like a teenager's room from the 1980s than a pro wrestling match. What part of this was supposed to inspire fear or awe? That's not on Knight, but he doesn't look better after his Royal Rumble match than he did before. His promos against the Eater of Worlds were impressive, and his presence allowed him to stand in the same ring with Bray Wyatt and Undertaker without shrinking. Hopefully, WWE took note of this and didn't push him back down the card after this loss.
2 Nia Jax
WWE set various records at the 2023 Royal Rumble. Unfortunately, Nia Jax might go down in history as the worst No. 30 entrant and most poorly received return at the battle royal simultaneously. Fans don't have short memories; they remember her previous run with the company all too well. She gives WWE another strong heel to work with, but the cost—the health and safety of her opponents—is high. There's no doubt that audiences are more rigid on women wrestlers than men, but the heat on Jax isn't related to that. She's responsible for numerous needless injuries, all of which were avoidable and careless. When Nia entered the Royal Rumble, the ring was full of up-and-comers who could have used that strength spot. It took all 11 other women left to eliminate Jax, but fans weren't feeling her return at all.
1 Bray Wyatt
Readers with strong deductive reasoning skills probably saw this coming. Bray Wyatt made his long-awaited return on October 8 at Extreme Rules. The Royal Rumble was on January 28. That's 112 days—just 10 shy of a third of an entire calendar year—between his re-debut and first actual wrestling match. This Uncle Howdy storyline has been moving at a glacial pace, and the Pitch Black match had no chance of living up to the build. There's no doubt Mountain Dew paid a pretty penny to have its logo splattered everywhere, but the bout between Wyatt and Knight didn't deliver on any level. Howdy missing his elbow drop spot at the end of the segment was the cherry on top of this unwatchable smattering of black lights and lame special effects. Bray Wyatt is supposed to be the top babyface on SmackDown. This fight made him look like anything but a star capable of being at the top of a WWE marquee.