The Royal Rumble is one of WWE’s longest running pay-per-view events and it requires a large venue to hold the 50,000 plus fans that are expected to attend. The Arizona Diamondbacks have such a venue.
The Arizona Diamondbacks will lend Chase Field to the WWE for the Royal Rumble this upcoming Sunday. The event is one of the WWE’s “big four” pay-per-views and it regularly commands a large audience as the event marks the beginning of the road to WrestleMania.
The Royal Rumble is normally held at arena’s that hold roughly 20,000 fans, but it has also been successfully held at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas on multiple occasions. As the attendance number for previous Royal Rumble events at the Alamodome have brought in 50,000+ fans, the sports-entertainment company required a larger stadium in Phoenix than the Talking Stick Resort arena and its 18,422 seating capacity.
As this event will feature the “Man” Becky Lynch, the “Demon” Finn Balor, “Rowdy” Ronda Rousey, the “Beast Incarnate” Brock Lesnar, the “Phenomenal” AJ Styles, and the “New” Daniel Bryan alongside two Royal Rumble matches, it will be quite a spectacle. In order to see an event take place at Chase Field a few months before opening day, the WWE Network offers a free trial of their streaming service that works similar to MLB TV.
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Although a Royal Rumble event has not previously taken place at an MLB stadium, numerous WrestleMania events have occurred on a baseball diamond. WrestleMania VI and WrestleMania X8 both took place at the SkyDome (now the Rogers Centre), WrestleMania X-Seven took place at the Reliant Astrodome, WrestleMania XIX took place at Safeco Field, and WrestleMania XXVIII took place at Sun Life Stadium.
Many other stadiums have been used for various wrestling events such as Shea Stadium, Busch Stadium, and the Tokyo Dome, but outside of the aforementioned WrestleMania venues, no other baseball stadiums have housed one of the WWE’s “big four” pay-per-views. Even though numerous baseball matchups have taken place at the Alamodome, it is not normally categorized as a baseball stadium.
Each of the WrestleMania events at baseball stadiums also held at least 54,000 fans, so it is widely expected that Chase Field will have a large, energetic crowd cheering on their favorite WWE Superstars. The WWE Championship has also changed hands four of the five times it has been on the line on a baseball field at WrestleMania, so it will also be interesting to see if AJ Styles is able to dethrone Daniel Bryan for one of the most coveted prizes in sports-entertainment.
According to Evan Cole on RumbleRamble.com, the eco-conscious Bryan recently shared his displeasure for Chase Field after they introduced the “Royal Rumble Burger,” so the crowd will likely shower the WWE Champion with boos while cheering on his opponent. Nonetheless, despite being an on-screen villain, Bryan may have the best interests of the crowd’s health in mind as the special burger is an 18 oz pork bratwurst patty on a toasted onion roll with cheddar cheese, smoked bacon, crispy coleslaw, fried onions, and BBQ aioli topped with fried mac and cheese wedges.