Royal Rumble 2013 Dumbest Ass Award: Dolph Ziggler

The Royal Rumble match is a 30 man over the top rope battle royal, and it's every man for himself. That invites strategy. It's a tactical war as much as a test of physical strength and endurance. Too often, wrestlers either forget this fact or ignore it completely. They do so by engaging in such ridiculously dumb behavior like outright stopping eliminations from occurring. There are exceptions, of course, like tag teams or factions attempting to work together to give themselves the best chance to win but generally, it's a really stupid idea to stop an elimination.

In each Royal Rumble, there are always wrestlers who stop multiple eliminations. In some cases, a wrestler will stop an elimination that has a monumental effect on the match and is detrimental to his chances of winning in a way he ultimately cannot overcome. I like to refer to such a wrestler as the "Dumbest Ass." Special considerations made for other stupidity.

Here, we'll hand out the award for "Dumbest Ass" in each of the Royal Rumble matches that have taken place so far.

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2013

The one you don't even really remember ever happened.

Dumbasses

Chris Jericho

1. He's up on the top turnbuckle with Dolph Ziggler and hits a superplex back into the ring. That's inexcusably bad.

Santino Marella

1. This guy, man. Holy what in the world. He gets in the ring, throws everyone in it over the top rope and then celebrates in the middle of the ring. The thing is NONE of the guys he threw out actually went out. They surround him and he calls timeout so he can get the Cobra out. He manages to hit Kofi Kingston with it but when he goes for Chris Jericho, Y2J holds his hands up and Santino stops. He's promptly chopped, superkicked, and thrown out. Every time I see this guy in a Royal Rumble I think of Robert Downey Jr in Tropic Thunder talking about how Ben Stiller's character played Simple Jack: "Like the dumbest motherfucker that ever lived."

Goldust

1. He's battling with Cody Rhodes on the apron after both had gone over the top rope. All he has to do is knock his brother off and he's out. He clotheslined him back into the ring. Cody eliminated him almost immediately.

Kofi Kingston

1. His elimination saves are great, they really are. This was the Royal Rumble he used JBL's chair as a pogo stick and bounced his way back to the ring without his feet touching the floor. Cool! Then, once he got back on the apron he eliminated Darren Young as he came flying over to hit Kingston off. But after doing so, he walked from one turnbuckle to the other, still outside on the apron, staring at Young the whole way. Cody Rhodes came over and hit the Disaster Kick to eliminate him.

Godfather

1. He got in the ring and watched Dolph Ziggler dropkick him right back out of it. His music never even stopped playing.

Heath Slater

1. Both Chris Jericho and Wade Barrett are trying to push Sheamus out of the match, and they're close. It's then that Slater strikes, grabbing Barrett and taking him away to fight across the ring. Great strategy, Heath.

Dolph Ziggler

1. This is one of the dumbest moves ever. John Cena gets in at number 19 and he's on fire, just chucking dudes left and right. After multiple eliminations, he goes after Chris Jericho, lifting him up for the AA but moving over to the ropes so he tosses Y2J out of the ring. Jericho grabs the top rope and is fighting it off but he's on the brink. Ziggler sees this, rushes over, and PULLS JERICHO DOWN to fight with him. Cena just walks off because that's the best response to a dumbass invading your space with his idiocy.
2. Incredible. He jumps Sheamus to hit that big DDT he does and Sheamus catches him. He takes him over to the ropes and dumps him off but Ziggler saves himself on the apron and lands a shoulder to the midsection to buy himself enough time to get back in the ring and get out of danger. Instead of doing that, he did exactly what Chris Jericho did a year before. He stood up and watched Sheamus Brogue Kick him out of the match.

Kane

1. He teamed up with Daniel Bryan to eliminate Great Khali and then just stood there, right near the ropes, staring at Khali. Bryan, of course, eliminated him immediately. I mean, sure, they were working together as Team Hell No, tag champions at the time, but you've gotta keep your head on a swivel in the Royal Rumble, man. Kane's been in enough of these to know better.

Daniel Bryan

1. Speaking of keeping your head on a swivel, after eliminating Kane, Bryan stood in the ring and did the YES chant. Cesaro then came over and tossed him out. Bryan landed on Kane and asked to be put back in the ring. Nope!

Jinder Mahal

1. As soon as he gets in the ring, he goes after Sheamus to club him in the back. The problem? Sheamus was in the process of tossing out Bo Dallas.

Damien Sandow

1. Ryback comes in, picks Sandow up, and sets him down over the top rope on the apron. Sandow lands a forearm to get Ryback off him but instead of climbing back in the ring he watches Ryback rush him and push him out.

The Dumbest Ass

Dolph Ziggler

Honorable mention for Santino Marella and his impressive idiocy but Dolph Ziggler made a truly baffling save and then committed the same crime as the guy who lost the match once it was down to one-on-one the year before. Maybe you could argue he was tired, seeing as he had been in for something like 47 minutes by that point, but I'm not buying it. There's no excuse to watch a dude kick you in the face. To illustrate this point, Sheamus was the next guy out because he tried that shit on Ryback and got thrown out for it.

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Previous "Dumbest Ass" award winners:

1989: Bad News Brown
1990: Ultimate Warrior
1991: British Bulldog
1992: Hulk Hogan
1993: Randy Savage
1994: Lex Luger
1995: Lex Luger
1996: Diesel
1997: Mil Mascaras
1998: Disciples of Apocalypse
1999: Stone Cold Steve Austin
2000: Big Show
2001: The Rock
2002: Undertaker
2003: Undertaker
2004: Big Show
2005: Rey Mysterio
2006: Big Show
2007: Shawn Michaels
2008: Undertaker
2009: Undertaker
2010: John Cena
2011: Rey Mysterio
2012: Chris Jericho