Who Were the Runners Up in the 2008-2018 Royal Rumble Matches?

Royal Rumble Runners Up 2011-13

Santino Marella: Comes within a whisker of winning the 2011 Royal Rumble

2011 - Santino Marella

Well, what would have happened if comedy character Santino Marella had last eliminated Alberto Del Rio to win the first 40 man Royal Rumble match in history?

It would have been a far more interesting result, that's for sure.

Fans had almost forgotten that Marella was still in the match and when he rose quietly from the ring apron with the intention of outwitting Del Rio, it looked too good to be true. But that was not to be as Del Rio eliminated the Italian to win his first Royal Rumble match.

Del Rio failed to wrest the title from Edge at Wrestlemania in what turned out to be the Rated R Superstar's final match before bowing out due to an injury. Marella would win soon win the United States Championship and compete instead in a throwaway eight-man tag team match at the big show.

Edge vs Marella would certainly have been fun though.

2012 - Chris Jericho

Everyone predicted the newly returned Chris Jericho would win the 2012 Royal Rumble, and he made it to the final two, where he was surprisingly eliminated by Sheamus in one of the least memorable Rumble encounters in recent memory. Jericho would also go on to fight in a title fight though at Wrestlemania, so the fact he did not win the Rumble had no bearing on his Wrestlemania status.

2013 - Ryback

John Cena won the Royal Rumble match in 2013 as WWE put in motion their plan for Cena vs The Rock 2 at Wrestlemania 29, this time with the WWE Championship at stake.

However, what if runner up, Ryback had won instead? The Rock vs Ryback may not have had the same mainstream appeal and is a bit of a tongue twister of a match to be honest but in January 2013, Ryback was a hot commodity and if the man born Ryan Reeves had defeated Rock to win the title instead of Cena, then a new main eventer would have been born.

Perhaps WWE missed a trick here. Ryback instead was cleanly beaten by the past-his-sell-by-date Mark Henry in a throwaway undercard match and then somehow was named the number one contender for the WWE Championship at Extreme Rules the following month.

That feud with Cena saw his main event aura permanently extinguished.