What to know about Indianapolis Royal Rumble, WWE's 3rd-largest event

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — The Circle City will host its first-ever Royal Rumble, the third largest event WWE puts on.

Lauren Sparkman is the co-chair of the local organizing committee for Indiana Sports Corp and WWE.

“There will be a men’s rumble and a women’s rumble,” Sparkman said. “Thirty men and 30 women in each rumble, and, every 90 seconds, another superstar enters the ring and you never know who it’s going to be. It could be a returning superstar, it could be a celebrity, it could be a legend who hasn’t been in the ring in a while.”

Indiana Sports Corp will make sure all visitors have plenty to do leading up to the rumble.

“We have the title belt behind us. The Children’s Museum was excited to partner and put the title belt on their dinos,” Sparkman said. “We have Chreece Hip Hop Festival programming, an incredible Top Rope Tailgate downtown on Saturday before the Royal Rumble, and even things that you might not expect like Dr. Andy Finely at IU Indy who wanted to host a conversation about wrestling as an art form.”

Artists have also jumped in and created WWE-inspired pieces. “Most of the activations we’ve built are the product of our community partners and artists in the community raising their hand with ideas of how they wanted to activate,” Sparkman said. “So whether it’s our visual artist activations, both artists Kyng Rhodes and JD Bills are lifelong wrestling fans who wanted to create pieces to support this event.”

Kyng Rhodes designed a piece called “The Circle City Enters the Rumble” for the Indianapolis International Airport.

JD Bills did a mural in Fountain Square called “Ringmasters.” It is installed on the the Murphy Arts
Center at 1043 Virginia Ave.

This is the start of what’s being touted a first-of-its-kind partnership between WWE and Indiana Sports Corp. “WWE has never partnered with a city or a sports commission in this way so it’s going to be a really exciting partnership,” Sparkman said. “(It) is going to bring the WWE universe, which has fans from all over the world, to Indianapolis over the course of the next several years.”

The Royal Rumble will start at 6 p.m. Saturday in Lucas Oil Stadium. Remaining tickets start at $150 each, according to Ticketmaster.