I'm fairly confident when I say there will never be another performance in a Royal Rumble match that equals what Ric Flair did in 1992 when he won the WWF championship. He enters at number 3 and goes for nearly an hour before taking advantage of Hulk Hogan being a sore loser to last eliminate Sid Justice.
He was at his best along the way.
A truly epic sequence occurs halfway through that really solidifies Flair's greatness here and encapsulates the wider story of the match itself.
Flair was very nearly eliminated by Barbarian when Hercules came up from behind and tried to throw them both out. Flair managed to hang on while Barbarian went over. Seeing this, Big Boss Man rushed in and clotheslined Herclues out. His momentum carried him over, though he managed to stay on the apron and avoid elimination. Flair thought Boss Man was out and got up to celebrate only to turn around and see he wasn't alone. Cue the cowering in fear followed by a classic eye poke to take control:
Boss Man regained the edge not long after and had Flair down. He picked up a head of steam for a crossbody but Flair ducked out of the way and that was enough to get the big man out of the match. When The Nature Boy got up, he didn't celebrate that he was now the only man in the ring. Instead, he did this:
After shaking out the cobwebs from the ordeal with Boss Man, left alone to recuperate and regroup for just a few seconds, the horn sounded for the next participant, the 15th entrant in the match. Flair looked up to see that it was Roddy Piper and responded as such:
The two would have an electric confrontation. It mainly consisted of a tired Flair taking Piper's best shots and doing anything to survive, like ducking under the bottom rope and running away. When they got back in, Flair tried to rack Piper's throat on the top rope and when that didn't work, he begged off into the corner, where Rowdy went up on the second turnbuckle to fire off a series of punches. Flair, clever as ever, picked him up for an atomic drop but Piper, in an iconic moment, no sold it and poked him in the eye. Nature Boy, the dirtiest player in the game, had met someone just as crafty. He managed to hang on long enough for entrant 16, Jake Roberts, to provide some relief.
This was a wonderful illustration of Flair ducking, diving, and using any means necessary to keep himself in the match. But he also showed that he could go toe-to-toe with the tough guys and had the endurance to go the distance.
This match was all about Ric Flair going full Ric Flair and winning because of it. It's fitting that he was only responsible for five outs and two of them were his taking advantage of someone else's hard work, including the final elimination that gave him the victory.
Then he went to the back and, after turning in a performance that would stand the test of time as the best ever in a Royal Rumble, he gave one of the most memorable promos ever:
All of this is without mentioning one of the greatest Flair flops in history, by the way. Texas Tornado gets in fresh at number 9 and Flair decides to engage him first. This goes poorly, as Tornado unloads on him with punches in the corner, finishing with a spinning shot that Ric responds to in classic Flair fashion:
Never another like The Nature Boy.