King of the Ring (2015)

King of the Ring
Tournament information
Sport	Professional wrestling
Location	United States;
Dates	April 27, 2015–April 28, 2015
Tournament; format(s)	Single elimination tournament
Participants	8
Final positions
Champion	Bad News Barrett
Runner-up	Neville
Tournament statistics
Matches played	7
	← 2010 2019 →

King of the Ring
King of the Ring
	Official logo of the 2015 King of the Ring tournament
Promotion	WWE
Date	April 27–28, 2015
City	Green Bay, Wisconsin (April 27); Moline, Illinois (April 28)
Venue	Resch Center (April 27); iWireless Center (April 28)
WWE Network event chronology
← Previous; Extreme Rules	Next →; Payback
King of the Ring event chronology
← Previous; 2002	Next →; 2024
King of the Ring tournament chronology
← Previous; 2010	Next →; 2019

The 2015 King of the Ring was a professional wrestling event produced by WWE. It was the 11th King of the Ring event and was held on Tuesday, April 28, 2015, at the iWireless Center in Moline, Illinois. Unlike previous King of the Ring events, which aired on traditional pay-per-view (PPV) from 1993 to 2002, the 2015 event was livestreamed exclusively on WWE's online service, the WWE Network, which made it the first King of the Ring event to air on the platform, as well as the first dedicated King of the Ring event since 2002. The event featured the semifinals and finals of the 20th King of the Ring tournament, which was won by Bad News Barrett, who defeated Neville in the final and subsequently became known as King Barrett.

The opening round matches for the tournament were held on the April 27, 2015, episode of Monday Night Raw, which aired on the USA Network from the Resch Center in Green Bay, Wisconsin. This was the first tournament held since 2010 and the last to have a separate dedicated event until 2024; the event was planned to be revived in 2023 but was canceled and rescheduled for 2024 titled King and Queen of the Ring to incorporate the women's Queen of the Ring tournament, which was established as a female counterpart in 2021. This was also the only tournament held since the end of the first brand extension in 2011, which was reintroduced in 2016.

Background

The King of the Ring tournament is a single-elimination tournament that was established by WWE in 1985 with the winner being crowned "King of the Ring." It was held annually until 1991, with the exception of 1990. These early tournaments were held as special non-televised house shows and were held when the promotion was still called the World Wrestling Federation (WWF, renamed to WWE in 2002).^[1] In 1993, the promotion began to produce the King of the Ring tournament as a self-titled pay-per-view (PPV). Unlike the previous non-televised events, the PPV did not feature all of the tournament's matches. Instead, several of the qualifying matches preceded the event with the final few matches then taking place at the pay-per-view. There were also other matches that took place at the event as it was a traditional three-hour pay-per-view.^[2] The King of the Ring PPV was considered one of the promotion's "Big Five" PPVs, along with WrestleMania, SummerSlam, Survivor Series, and Royal Rumble.^[3]

King of the Ring continued as the annual June PPV until the 2002 event, which was the final King of the Ring produced as a PPV.^[4] Following the conclusion of the PPV chronology, the tournament began to be held periodically every few years, first making its return in 2006, which was held exclusively for wrestlers from the SmackDown! brand—the 2008 and 2010 tournaments also featured wrestlers from WWE's other brands. In April 2011, WWE ceased using its full name of World Wrestling Entertainment with "WWE" becoming an orphaned initialism.^[5] That August, the brand extension ended with both the Raw and SmackDown television shows featuring the full main roster. The 2015 tournament was the 20th King of the Ring tournament. It was held over two nights. The opening round matches were held on the April 27, 2015, episode of Raw, which aired on the USA Network from the Resch Center in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The semifinals and final were then held the following day on April 28 from the iWireless Center in Moline, Illinois before a SmackDown taping and aired live on WWE's livestreaming service, the WWE Network, which launched in February 2014. It was the first King of the Ring to have a separate dedicated event since the 2002 PPV, as well as the first to air on the WWE Network.^[6]^[7]

Results

Quarter-finals

Raw (Quarter-final matches) – April 27

No.	Results	Stipulations	Times
1	Bad News Barrett defeated Dolph Ziggler	King of the Ring quarterfinal match	8:18
2	R-Truth defeated Stardust	King of the Ring quarterfinal match	3:47
3	Sheamus defeated Dean Ambrose by disqualification	King of the Ring quarterfinal match	12:29
4	Neville defeated Luke Harper	King of the Ring quarterfinal match	10:12

Finals

WWE Network event (Semi-final and final matches) – April 28

No.	Results	Stipulations	Times
1	Neville defeated Sheamus	King of the Ring semifinal match	5:43
2	Bad News Barrett defeated R-Truth	King of the Ring semifinal match	4:37
3	Bad News Barrett defeated Neville	King of the Ring final match	7:10

Bracket

Quarterfinals
Raw
April 27

Semifinals
WWE Network
April 28

Final
WWE Network
April 28

Dolph Ziggler