The WWE Universe was expecting Samoa Joe to make his debut on the main roster debut at the Royal Rumble last night, but he didn’t end up making an appearance. He hasn’t been featured on NXT for a few weeks now, and he was not on the NXT Takeover: San Antonio card, so the fans assumed his time had finally come.
Related: Samoa Joe Teases Possible Royal Rumble Appearance
However, Samoa Joe was not one of the thirty men in last night’s Royal Rumble match, but there was a good reason why he didn’t make his debut during the event last night. According to CageSideSeats, the simple answer is WWE wasn’t planning for Joe to win the match.
The more detailed answer is WWE officials weren’t planning for Samoa Joe to win the Royal Rumble, so they didn’t want to waste his debut on a huge match that he was not going to win. It would have been a big moment, but WWE didn’t want to risk the loss of momentum.
There are still huge plans for Samoa Joe heading into WrestleMania 33, but WWE officials want to do his debut in a way that will display him as the next big thing instead of just another guy. It has been rumored that Joe will be facing John Cena at WrestleMania, but that is unconfirmed at this point.
Yet wasting Taker, Lesnar, Goldberg and others for Orton to win was ok. Odd.
Taker looked way out of shape, Goldberg is old and while I think Lesner should have won it, his part-time status makes Orton look much more deserving
All three went out like rookie chumps, that’s all.
The reason why Joe didn’t go out is because they wanted Randy to win, and if Randy won? People would be pissed at letting someone who already won the Rumble to win again. That’s why they sent out Roman, so people would hate on Roman and when Randy wins? The whole fanbase fell for their trick and letting them think: “At least it wasn’t Roman.” Instead of “I thought this was the new era, but they let Joe lose to someone who doesn’t need the push?”
So why did they allow AJ Styles to debut at last year’s rumble and not win. Joe could have entered and still did what he did on raw last Monday.