Lex Luger Recalls Vince McMahon’s Reaction To Royal Rumble 1994 Finish
Lex Luger has given his thoughts on the controversial finish to the 1994 Royal Rumble when he tied Bret Hart.
There have been 36 Royal Rumble events in WWE history with the 37th edition set to take place on January 27, 2024.
The Royal Rumble match is one of the biggest matches in all of WWE because the winner of the Royal Rumble gets a World Championship match at WrestleMania, which is a tradition that WWE has been doing for 30 years.
At the 1994 Royal Rumble in Providence, there was a controversial finish when Lex Luger and Bret Hart went tumbling over the top rope while both men went on to hit the floor at the same time.
It was announced at the show that Lex Luger was the winner. Then they changed it to Bret Hart. Neither referee was around to see the guys fall. The WWF President Jack Tunney showed up to try to calm down both guys.
That’s when ring announcer Howard Finkel made the announcement: “The winner of the 1994 WWF Royal Rumble…the winners are Lex Luger and Bret Hitman Hart.”
Lex Luger Shares What Vince McMahon Thought About The Finish
Vince McMahon is the former WWE Chairman & CEO who approved of the tie finish to the Royal Rumble match. It was the first time that finish was ever done in WWE as far as Royal Rumble matches go. At the show, Vince was on commentary with WWE Hall of Famer Ted Dibiase.
In a video on WWE’s YouTube channel where he watched some of his older matches, Lex Luger recalled how excited Vince McMahon was about the tie finish.
“Vince jumped out of his chair — I heard — because when they went back in slow-mo you couldn’t even tell with that technology back then that we both hit simultaneously. It was like 1 in 100.”
Luger also praised Bret Hart for being an incredible performer as well.
“Bret never misses a beat and everything he does is so good. It’s a joy to be in the ring with Bret. I love the guy outside of the ring, [I] got just tons of respect for Bret ‘The Hitman’ Hart.”
The only other time that the Royal Rumble nearly ended in a tie was in 2005 when Batista and John Cena went tumbling over the top to the floor at the same. That wasn’t the plan because Batista was supposed to win. That’s why Vince McMahon ran out to the ring, tore his quad muscle getting into the ring and demanded a restart from a seated position. When they restarted, Batista eliminated Cena to get the win.