More information has come to light regarding Drew McIntyre becoming enraged following one spot that did not go according to plan in the WWE Royal Rumble match.
Despite the fact that he was one of the top stars in the match, McIntyre’s elimination came out of nowhere as he was suddenly dumped out of the Rumble by Damian Priest. With commentary quickly referencing the elimination before moving on, the elimination was rushed and barely referenced.
Shortly after the show went off the air, news broke that the WWE star “stormed out” of Lucas Oil Stadium following the events that took place and that one participant was trying to “get themselves over” in the match. A follow-up report added that multiple stars also had issues with one of the participants for their actions in the match. Multiple sources have since followed up stating that McIntyre’s anger was legitimate and not part of a storyline.
McIntyre was notably absent from the February 3rd edition of Raw so did not address his elimination from the match. However, further reports have explained the point in the match that led to the 3-time World Champion becoming irate.
As reported by Mike Johnson of PWInsider, McIntyre was set to be eliminated from the match earlier but a series of events led to timing cues being messed up. McIntyre was set to have a staredown with Priest before number 30 entrant Logan Paul made his entrance but “several sequences involving LA Knight, including one with Roman Reigns, took far longer than planned or expected.” Jey Uso was also set to be a part of the spot as a teased elimination.
One source added that everyone “needed a minute” to get the match back on track but Paul’s entrance delayed things further, leading to the rushed McIntyre elimination.
With Paul in the ring, he and Knight did what was planned but accidentally backed into McIntyre, Priest and Uso, causing to the disjointed spot that saw McIntyre thrown out of the ring.
Timing Issues Affected Drew McIntyre’s Royal Rumble Moment
Also discussing the McIntyre situation on Wrestling Observer Radio, Dave Meltzer also stated that McIntyre should have been eliminated from the match earlier:
“The main issue was not the elimination where LA Knight did get in the way of Damian Priest as he was throwing Drew McIntyre over the top rope. I saw that and I thought that’s the spot. I have found out that it was earlier that was the [problem].
He was very loudly hot about it, it was not a secret or anything like that. It’s not an angle. It was basically exactly how it was reported, the feeling was LA Knight was doing stuff that was not planned in the match, that’s the claim and it got in the way of things that were supposed to happen including his actual elimination, when it was supposed to happen. Then it got in the way of his later elimination, it was actually supposed to happen earlier. And it took some time to get back in position for the elimination so the second elimination was not the planned elimination.
It wasn’t like one person was mad, it was a number of people. But [McIntyre] was loud when he got back to the dressing room about it.”
In other news, an update has been provided on plans for another international WWE show.
H/t to TJR Wrestling.