Royal Rumble 2012: Why This Is the Beginning of the Best Time of the Year

Hello Fellow Bleachers!

The silver anniversary of the Royal Rumble is only four days away, and even with hardly any build up of the actual rumble match, I am getting seriously pumped up for it.

The first pay-per-view of the new year is always the jumping off point for, in my opinion, the best time of the year in the WWE universe.

For starters, the winner of the Rumble match alone sets the beginning of a feud that will usually climax at the grandest stage of them all, WrestleMania. The winner has a guaranteed title shot at the biggest PPV of the year, although this year may have a twist on that.

I saw a comment awhile back that someone made about Michael Cole, saying that the winner will receive a main event match at Mania.

Maybe this is the year that the Royal Rumble winner chooses to try and end The Undertaker's streak?

Imagine if the person winning the Rumble brought about the long awaited return of The Undertaker. The fact that it has never been done before is more than reason enough to try it this year—as speculation is at its all time high that WrestleMania will be The Undertaker's retirement match.

That alone could be a bigger star-making moment than a title match at Mania, due to the legendary status of The Deadman and his WrestleMania streak.

The rest of the Rumble match also delivers opportunities to begin new feuds for many stars—numerous times throughout the history of the Rumble match, feuds have been ignited over an elimination of one individual by another.

Depending on the reception of these feuds, many tend to stay hot until WrestleMania rolls along, giving the wrestlers a huge stage to perform on and try to steal the show.

Even though the Rumble alone sells this PPV, the other matches on the card should not disappoint either.

John Cena vs. Kane

Even with the overacting of Cena this past Monday night, most people will agree that this is the freshest we have seen John's character for quite some time. Many are itching to see the result of this match due to the fact that it may be the infamous "Cena heel turn."

Bryan vs. Show vs. Henry

Big Show and Mark Henry have been putting in some of the best work of their respective careers in the last year, and Bryan is really coming into his own with his new character shift to heel. We all know how good Bryan is in the ring, and even if Henry can't exceed expectations due to injury, this match should still have an interesting dynamic to it.

CM Punk vs. Dolph Ziggler

The greatness of this match is going to hinge on how badly Laurinaitis gets involved throughout. We have seen Punk and Dolph put on great matches, and this should be no exception due to the fact that it's a PPV match. If the Funkman asserts himself too many times in the match, it would serve the purpose to further the storyline between him and Punk, but would detract from the match itself.

If he truly is going to try and screw Punk over, call it down the middle for most of the match, and do the screw-job (or screw-job attempt) at the end of the match.

We are definitely entering the homestretch on this wonderful yearly adventure on the "Road to WrestleMania", and I couldn't be more excited for it.

It's like the holidays never went away.