5 Best No. 20 Entries in the Royal Rumble match
The first ever Royal Rumble PPV was held on January 24th, 1988 at Copps Coliseum in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. The inaugural event wasn't even headlined after the match itself, instead, the main event of the evening was a tag team match between the Islanders against the Stallions in a 2 out of 3 falls match.
Unlike the modern day iterations, the Rumble match lasted 33 minutes and the whole event lasted 2 hours and 23 minutes in total. The event also only saw 1 title defense, that of the Women's Tag Team titles between the Jumping Bomb Angels defeated the reigning champions The Glamour Girls, to win the titles.
The WWF Champion at the time, Hulk Hogan, appeared at the event in a non-wrestling capacity as he and Andre the Giant signed the contracts for their title match for the Main Event show on February the 4th.
Other notable events that occurred during the event was Dino Bravo attempting to bench press 715 pounds, a world record at the time, but was assisted by his spotted Jesse 'The Body' Ventura. However, the highlight of the event was undoubtedly the 20-man Royal Rumble the legacy of which would go on to become the WWE's biggest annual tradition, outside of Wrestlemania.
You can see the other entries in this series below:
Part 1 is here; Part 6 is here; Part 11 is here; Part 16 is here
Part 2 is here; Part 7 is here; Part 12 is here; Part 17 is here
Part 3 is here; Part 8 is here; Part 13 is here; Part 18 is here
Part 4 is here; Part 9 is here; Part 14 is here; Part 19 is here
Part 5 is here; Part 10 is here; Part 15 is here