10 takeaways from WWE Royal Rumble 2019
No one would have believed that an event intended to be a one-shot event on the USA Network would turn into an annual tradition. Fewer still would have held out any hope that the over the top rope battle royal would end up setting the stage for WrestleMania and beyond, but that is exactly what has happened with the WWE's Royal Rumble event.
The Royal Rumble match has certainly delivered its fair share of shocking moments and surprises, but there is a lot going on beyond the battle royal and who managed to win it.
Not only is the Royal Rumble setting up the main events for both Raw and Smackdown for Wrestlemania, what happens on the undercard is also indicative of what direction the WWE intends to take. This applies especially to which talent are going to be pushed, which will be held back, and who truly managed to stand out at the annual battle royal.
Here are ten things we can take away from the Royal Rumble 2019.
#1 RAW's tag team division is still an afterthought
First and foremost, we can tell from the Royal Rumble that the RAW brand's tag team division is still something of an afterthought.
During the kickoff show, the Glorious Alphas, Bobby Roode and Chad Gable, took on the mismatched team of Rezar and Scott Dawson. The match had a stipulation that if the Alphas were defeated then both the Authors of Pain and the Revival would get future title shots.
While the match wasn't bad, it seemed rather rushed and poorly planned out. There was some storytelling with Dawson and Rezar unable to get on the same page, but overall it felt like the filler that it was. It seems that the tag team division continues to be an afterthought on the Raw brand.