Jaaawn Cena

[Steven]

Also been liking most of his matches since his return. I haven't seen last nights RAW but everything else I've seen from him has, at the very least been fun, and at best, been really good, borderline excellent.

 

I think part of it is that he hasn't really been the focus of the shows since he came back. That's probably going to change around Rumble/Mania season though. That aside, personally, at this point I've found most John Cena matches to be enjoyable if a bit overly formulaic at points before and after.

[Jimmy Redman]

I'm not wild about him adding the rana as a regular move, to me that worked perfectly as a super rare surprise move that he had to bust out in desperation after not being able to beat Punk for half an hour, you know? Because I mean, John Cena using a huricanrana is...weird.

 

Anyway, on some level I do love the irony of John Cena turning into a MOVEZ guy.

 

One thing I have always wished Cena would do moves-wise is throw more lariats. Cena is a guy who can look really awkward or soft or loose in the ring, but man he can throw some God damn wicked clotheslines. Those things always look nasty.

[ZThomas]

With bret, it's also worth noting that most of his great matches weren't main events. In fact, during his run as a main eventer, he wasn't actually in the main event all that often.

I was thinking last week that if Montreal never happened and he never got hurt. Bret would've been having some of his best matches if he was around the entire attitude era and beyond.

[Wolfman]

Uh, no.

[goc]

I think the thing that stands out the most about the match lists people have posted for Cena is that in 2007 he was having great matches with pretty much everyone they threw at him. 2006 was really kind of when he started to hit his peak with the Edge feud. Then in 2007 he had great matches with Umaga, HBK & Great Khali, plus a pretty good one out of Bobby Lashley. The start of the Orton feud felt like something that was building up to be great until he got injured in October.

 

After coming back from his first big injury, the torn pectoral in October 2007, he hasn't had that same consistency. In 2008 his big return against Orton turned out really disappointing, which I think was due more to him rushing back from injury than anything else because he and Orton went on to have great matches in 2009. He makes a return at the 2008 Royal Rumble only to go out with another injury after a pretty good match with Batista at SummerSlam. He had surgery for a herniated disc in September and was back in November for a good if somewhat disappointing series with Chris Jericho.

 

2009 started with the really good Raw match with Shawn Michaels from London then some stuff with Big Show and Edge that felt like it wasn't as good as it should have been. I felt he really picked things up once he got back to feuding with Orton though, with the great I Quit match, and the Ironman match which is my personal favorite Cena/Orton match.

 

I think the end of 2009 started to show he wasn't able to elevate his opponents like he used to when he started his feud with Sheamus. 2010 started pretty good for Cena with good series with Batista who was at HIS career peak as a heel, a few months before leaving WWE. Once he got back to Sheamus it was another disappointing match and then a great SummerSlam 5 on 5 match against The Nexus, even though a lot of people hated the finish I still think the match holds up. Once he got to wrestling Wade Barrett it still felt like 2007 John Cena would have been having much better matches with the guys WWE was trying to push quickly into the main event. The Nexus feud seemed to drag on forever ending only for Cena to transition into a feud with Miz.

 

2011 started bad for Cena, I don't blame him for this however. While I think he could have done better with Sheamus or Wade Barrett, Miz was just pushed way higher than he should have been. Cena/Miz had one of the weakest WrestleMania main events ever. Then Cena ends the Miz feud only to have what I think is his most disappointing PPV main event ever with R-Truth in June but things did get better for Cena when they finally found someone new he could have great matches with when they paired him up with CM Punk. Once he transitioned to Del Rio, it felt like a lackluster series but WWE has never actually put any effort into booking Del Rio so that's always been a problem with him. Survivor Series had a really weak tag match with Cena & Rock vs Miz & Truth which the buyrate indicated no one cared about.

 

2012 started with a silly feud with Kane with really weak matches. The WrestleMania match with The Rock felt disappointing when you consider the massive amount of hype it had going into it. He did follow that up with one of his best matches ever with Brock Lesnar in April but booking did him no favors after that sticking him with a really lame match against John Laurinaitis in May and getting stuck wrestling DOA Lord Tensai on TV. His matches with Big Show are always disappointing to me because I feel like he's never had a better match with Big Show than he had with Khali which feels impossible. Once they finally got him paired up with CM Punk again it started to pick up with a really great match at Night of Champions in September but he gets injured the year and the rest of the year is disappointing. I didn't care much for the Dolph Ziggler match at TLC but a lot of people seem to like it.

 

2013 starts with Cena winning the Rumble and then getting with the Shield including a really great 6 man tag with Ryback & Sheamus against The Shield at Elimination Chamber. Follows that up with another really good match with CM Punk on Raw but WrestleMania against The Rock felt like another disappointment. After WrestleMania he remains involved with The Sheild, having some really good 6 tags with Daniel Bryan and Kane on Raw in April and May but getting stuck with Ryback on PPV in May in June in really overbooked, lackluster matches. He has a great match with Daniel Bryan at SummerSlam before going out for surgery.

 

But since coming back he's been stuck wrestling Alberto Del Rio in another set of matches that are good but nothing to go out of your way to see. It seems weird that Cena would be able to get better matches out of Great Khali in 2007 than he ever got out of Big Show. Or that his stuff with Umaga is miles ahead of anything he did with Sheamus, Ryback or Wade Barrett. Maybe I'm just looking at 2007 with rose colored glasses, but I watched some of that stuff not too long ago and it still held up to me. I can't speak to the Bobby Lashley match since I haven't seen it in so long but it still feels like that match was better than anything Cena has done with Alberto Del Rio, which seems crazy. But I'm SURE it's better than the stuff Cena did with Miz or that one PPV match with R-Truth. I think it seems pretty clear that while Cena can still have great matches, his consistency is not the same as it was since his initial torn pectoral in 2007.

[Jimmy Redman]

As for the points you made in the last paragraph, I don't think any of those things are that strange.

 

Firstly, Smackdown 27/2/09 is the Cena/Show match you're looking for. But even accepting the premise of Khali > Show when it comes to Cena, it's really not that weird since there are always guys who don't have much chemistry with each other or never put it all together. Even though I like their aforementioned best match a lot I would put Cena and Show in that category. Ironically I think it's because Cena sells too much for him. It's normally a good thing, and can be a good thing when done right, but sometimes he's laying dead from the first move which looks silly relative to how others sell for him, and it kills the match dead to never recover. When I saw them at a house show it was like that. On the other hand, Khali was much more of a freakshow so a cartoon style match was more effective.

 

Also, Umaga was the dog's bollocks in that period. One of the very best in the company. He was miles and miles better than Ryback has ever been or Barrett was in 2010. Sheamus is great in the ring now as a babyface, but was decidedly average as a heel when Cena worked with him. Of course Cena and Umaga at their peaks had better matches than with those guys at those times.

 

Miz is also mediocre in the ring. Very few have been able to get anything special out of him, and the huge stage he was put on only made that worse. Cena and Miz have had some good TV matches at other times. The broken ring match with Alberto was awesome and they've had some real good TV matches as well. The recent matches are meh, but Cena is hurt and Alberto is dead in the water.

 

I think it's easy to cherry pick the worst of now vs the best of 2007 and make an unfavourable comparison. You can do it the other way too. I agree Cena was more consistent back then, but I mean of course he was, that was his career peak in the ring. I don't think that has to mean anything negative about what he's done since then. He still has MOTYCs for WWE every year, and I'd find it hard to put him out of a, say, Top 10 for WWE for any year either.

 

For what it's worth, I loved the first Rock match, and I thought Kane at the Rumble, non-finish aside, was one of the best Kane singles matches I can think of.

[rvd356]

Best big match wrestler ever? Umm Ric Flair?

 

Best WWE "big match" wrestler? Well HBK & Bret had a lot of big matches, and I like both better.

 

Best WWE title/WHC match wrestler ever? Yeah I'd buy that.

[goc]

I've been watching some 2004 Smackdown stuff on the Network because it's a giant hole for me. It's interesting to see how different the typical John Cena fan looks in the crowd. 20 something white guy with a jersey doing you can't see me and brushing off their shoulders. I think some of the reason he might get such a hated reaction from those same fans now is because of how he went from being fake Eminem to fake Will Smith and really quickly.

 

He was still pretty damn good in 2004 though, he and Rene Dupree had a match better match than I expected at Judgment day.

[Superstar Sleeze]

John Cena vs Bray Wyatt - WWE Payback 2014 Last Man Standing

 

I would say my favorite trend of 2014 was each PPV having an overbooked, entertaining clusterfuck on the show. It spices the show up and allows more intersection between different characters and ties the matches, angles and character motivations together better due to the booking to be very limited. Unlike the Attitude Era, these matches do not feel as overexposed and the wrestling surrounding the hijinx is better than in that era. That being said while I find these matches entertaining they fall more in the Summer Blockbuster category than Oscar-winning performances. A perfect example of this which is Cena vs Wyatt Last Man Standing, which has made multiple Top WWE Matches of 2014 list.

 

To me this match begins and ends with Cena hurling those steel steps right into Wyatt's face. I mean he fucking nailed him. First time, I watched it, I was convinced that was the finish and when it was not, I knew they never could top it and the match would feel anticlimatic. Instead, Wyatt just hits Sister Abigail in the next spot. It is fun, but the spots and transitions are arbitrary and capricious. It is violent, but you do not feel the visceral hatred. The beginning of the match is a rushed version of their typical match. Cena feeds Wyatt a ton of great cutoff spots to show off his explosive transitions. They trade finishers and the Wyatts and Usos brawl for a bit. It all feels very perfunctory. This when that hatred would come in handy to really build interest instead they are resting on Cena's presence, which always ignites a thunderous reaction rather the story they are telling in the ring. Cena uses the chair and writes it off as it is legal so now Cena is not in a moral quandary. I was never buying all that anyways. This when the counters were flying and just hitting spots. The Usos and Wyatts have a really fun little street fight on the outside which ends up with everyone going through tables. They have one last holy shit bump which is Wyatt's cross body through the barricade, which was pretty cool. Cena then just walks over to the pyro area and FUs Wyatt's ass through a box and then tips over a heavy box to win. The steel steps should have been the finish.

 

It is a fun Summer Blockbuster that I will forget tomorrow save for the steel steps. There was no real substance it was just instant gratification. I have no problem with that, but this is definitely overhyped in my opinion. On top of that, there was so much action movie violence rather than that gritty violence you would see in street fights of yore that really made this feel very much like exhibition. The best stuff to come out of a shitty feud, but not real worth going out of your way to see. ***1/2

 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

WWE World Heavyweight Champion John Cena vs Brock Lesnar - WWE Summerslam 2014

 

Brock Lesnar gave a heel performance for the ages in the biggest match of the year. It was the little touches like stepping on Cena's hand, the trash talk, and the desire to make Cena give up. He could have pinned him at pretty much any moment after about two minutes into the match, but he wanted to dominate and humiliate Cena. He wanted to force Cena to tell the referee he could not continue because Brock Lesnar beat him so senseless. Like any good villain, Lesnar's hubris almost cost him on two different occasions. The elbows into the FU was electric and the STFU brought people to their feet. Jerry Lawler was the perfect voice for all the children that did not want to believe their hero was going to be vanquished at the hands of the meanest schoolyard bully there ever was. Good conquers evil, right? Not when evil is Brock Fucking Lesnar. When he did the Zombie Sit-Up complete with a crazed look and maniacal laugh, it was the perfect horror movie image that the monster was not going to stay down. Sufficiently rattle though by STFU, Brock quit playing with his food and hit the F-5 to win the match in a similar vein to the Seahawks' complete annihilation of the Broncos in the 2014 Super Bowl.

I am a Brock mark. As soon as he gets into the ring, I hang on every single explosive and impactful move. Immediately every match becomes bigger when Lesnar is involved and becomes a fight for survival. So many matches from this decade are struggle between being a choreographed exhibition against a predetermined sporting contest. When Lesnar walks down the aisle, all that is effaced from my mind. I know I am going to watch a fight. The opening 30 seconds of this match maybe my favorite opening 30 seconds from any match (with only Tenryu vs Mutoh from 2001 coming close). The amount of struggle in that opening moment. Cena meeting the Beast head on and trying to fight fire with fire. For Lesnar to snap off an F-5 so early was just an incredible climax. The only thing ballsier than the match they gave us would have been to end the match right there. Part of me thinks they should have. The beatdown was a merciless onslaught of unmitigated violence. I talked about Cena's selflessness in the Cesaro match, but on no stage was it more apparent. How many top babyfaces would have been so secure to allow them to essentially be squashed by the top heel on the second biggest PPV of the year? None come to mind. The only two matches that come close to how this one was booked were Vader vs Sting from Great American Bash '92 and Brock Lesnar versus The Rock at Summerslam '02. The difference was the Sting match was a little more competitive and Vader is always willing to bump for his opponent and in the Rock match he was leaving WWE for months. Cena got two flurries of offense and would be expected to show up within coming weeks and continue to compete.

 

The match is carried by strong heel and babyface performances and unique circumstances, but because of its lopsided nature it is not something I consider a slam dunk Match of the Year Contender. It feels like a great first act in a play that hooks you immediately. I believe wrestling matches should be viewed in context, but ultimately need to be able to stand alone. i do not think this match can standalone and it is too tethered to its aftermath. That aftermath is very disappointing. Just when everyone says they have seen everything ever in wrestling WWE pulls off something that I am struggling to find a comparison point to. I would say this is something never been done before. Yet, they treat it like just another John Cena loss where he comes back with no injuries, dominates the entire Wyatt Family and is hungry as ever. He essentially no sold the match. Just like the spots in a match, which should have consequence on the next spot in a match, the match itself should have consequences in the storyline. If the WWE does not respect their own booking, then how can I? For that reason, it is why I am knocking this match down a peg, because its influence was not as strong as it should have been. ****1/4

 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

WWE World Heavyweight Champion Brock Lesnar vs John Cena - WWE Night of Champions 2014

 

I have not seen this match on one single match of the year list yet, but currently this is my favorite to be my selection for WWE Match of the Year 2014. I imagine a lot of it has to do with the bad taste people have in their mouth in regards to the finish. I will try to defend the finish, but I understand why it is not for everyone. My initial slight quibble with the match is that John Cena did not discover something new to defeat Brock Lesnar. Then I realized how unwonted that would be. Cena defeats opponents not because of his MOVEZ~!, but because he has an unbreakable will. Even when it is stupid and dangerous, he is still going to march into the fire and not blink once.

 

In this match, Cena did learn a couple things from the previous dreadful encounter. First, he could not afford to dig such a deep hole for himself early and just survive the onslaught. He needed to avoid being dropped on his head and he held onto the ropes with all his might. In mirror moment, he scored an early FU, but unlike the the early F5 at Summerslam this had little effect on Lesnar. I loved Lesnar's game plan early of using the Kimura to sap Cena's strength and control Cena. It was a perfect defense against Cena's fastbreak offense. Without the early F5, Lesnar never had the same dominant advantage. Instead, he used the Kimura to cut Cena off and keep Cena at bay. In doing so, he set Cena up for his big throw-based offense. We saw a variety of suplexes from Lesanr and a variety from which he could hit them from including as cutoffs to Cena. Like I said without the early F5, Cena was able to score some more headshots that rattled the Beast. I loved Cena's game plan, which was a mixture of survival, rope a dope and bomb throwing. That was the second thing Cena learned, once he survived, he needed headshots and kill blows. This was not the time for shoulderblocks and bullshit. He was going for hard uncharacteristic Cena elbows. That back elbow was fucking some Misawa-level shit. He just needed to survive long enough for them to take their toll. I loved Lesnar's reactions to Cena's spells of offense. He is content to play with his food, but he is scared, he does not fuck around. Cena rattles him with a wicked back elbow and goes for the FU, time to drop him on his head. Cena hits the FU and Lesnar right on it going for an F5, but Cena applies the STF. You can feel the desperation from the big bad bully and he goes back to the Kimura. Now control feels fleeting and the tension really is building. It is all because of how all Lesnar's reactions feel desperate and as a heel he is reacting to the babyface. That is perfect heel psychology. He is being forced to play catch up ball because Cena has finally rocked him. Even though Lesnar seems to regain control with the Kimura, it feels much more tenuous. The strength spot from Cena picking Brock up and ramming him in the turnbuckles is babyface wrestling at its finest. Cena will not be denied tonight. Cena quickly hits an FU, but has enough sense to know that is not enough so he locks in the STF to sap Brock's strength and energy. I love how before Brock gets to the ropes he is pulling him back and one time rips Brock from the ropes. It feels like a real struggle and fight. Cena also knows that STF like the Kimura is a setup to something bigger, the knockout blow: a fourth and fatal FU. Then Seth Rollins hits him with the Money In The Bank Briefcase.

 

So before I defend the finish, let's wrap up the match proper. I thought this was really well-executed, high drama pro wrestling. It demonstrates how important that early F5 was. Cena was able to avoid thus Brock had to go into contain and attack mode. He was never able to hit the F5. He had his chances but he was caught playing with his food, he would go back to the contain (Kimura) and attack (suplexes). At the end of the day, he let Cena hang around too long and Cena made him pay with that wicked back elbow. After that back elbow, he had to play catch up ball. You give Cena an inch and he is going to take the mile. With renewed confidence, Cena was not going to denied on that and you can sense the desperation and fear in Lesnar. It was beautiful pro wrestling. if they ended it with the Cena victory, I would rate the match highly even if, I thought the booking was very myopic and stupid. In fact this is probably the layout I would have selected for the upcoming Royal Rumble match. What I envisioned does not discount the greatness of Cena's and Lesnar's performances in this match.

 

Defending the finish, from Rollins's perspective if Cena wins outright, Cena will have gone through hell, but he will still be standing and will not be ripe for the pickings. Lesnar by all counts was down and out. So if Rollins could successfully knock Cena out with the briefcase then Rollins should be able to pin Lesnar easily to become the WWE World Heavyweight Champios. The two arguments I have heard why this was stupid was that Lesnar would just BROCK Rollins or Cena would attack Rollins (as happened). To the first, Lesnar was clearly portrayed as being out from the Fourth FU and the added curb stomp and how he was selling there was no way he would just steamroll Rollins. To the second point, well Rollins should have done a better job making sure Cena was knocked out. The plan was foolproof if he executed it properly, but in haste he did not finish the job on Cena so Cena was able to prevent him from cashing in out of anger (YOU FOOL!). I hold that booking was sound on the finish from a psychological point of view even if it was not what I would have chosen. The match never reached the transcendent levels of Brock/Cena Extreme Rules 2011 and with the overbooked finish, it has a tenuous claim to the match of the year at a ****1/2 rating.

[JerryvonKramer]

John Cena vs CM Punk (7/11/11)

 

This is from Chicago, Money in the Bank. I really wanted to enjoy this match more than I did. I didn't takes notes because I wanted to take it in as a fan. Felt very disjointed and spot orientated to me. Something about this style just doesn't resonate with me at all as a wrestling fan. Kick outs can't substitute for psychology.

 

There are some sick sick spots here. Punk's knee to Cena's head. The knee into the gut. Cena's leg drop from the top. But I didn't connect with this at all and can't really understand what the guys in the roundtable were hyping. I don't understand on what planet something like this would get the same rating as Flair vs Steamboat at the Chi-town Rumble.

 

Maybe this is one of those deals where you had to be there, but I was really really disappointed with it.

 

***3/4

[Timbo Slice]

It got labeled as an all-timer because of the timing, how much we as fans knew, and the setting helped a lot. A few years removed from it, with what happened to Punk and the style it was at the time, it's probably a lesser match, but it's still as memorable a match as WWE has produced in quite some time.

[JerryvonKramer]

John Cena vs Brock Lesnar (4/29/12)

 

This is also from Chicago. Again, no notes from me just going to take it in and review after.

 

Okay this was fan-fucking-tastic. All-time great babyface performance from Cena, all-time great monster heel performance from Brock. Tremendous psychology and superb storytelling. Totally amazing match. Easy *****

 

And possibly the most brutal match in WWF/E history. Cena's fire and rage in the closing moments is for the ages. One of the most authentic and genuine moments I've seen out of the modern product. So so good.

[Timbo Slice]

And with that one...yeah, that's gonna stand the test of time as the best match both guys ever had.

[Jesse Ewiak]

Yeah, watching the Cena-Punk match without the background of the Punk promo, the rumors are all over the 'Net leading up to the match, the actual live experience, Punk's actions right after the show, and so on. In the ring, it's a really just a high-end WWE-style match.

[ohtani's jacket]

That's not necessarily the case. I watched both cold and thought Punk/Cena was outstanding and Punk/Lesnar overrated.

[Stiva]

The one thing that I can level against Lesnar/Cena is that the wrong guy went over. But, the actual match builds to Cena winning well enough that, as a standalone match, it works.

[JerryvonKramer]

That's not necessarily the case. I watched both cold and thought Punk/Cena was outstanding and Punk/Lesnar overrated.

 

Surprising. Why?

[ohtani's jacket]

People were selling it at the time as a shoot style match/worked shoot, or at least the WWE/John Cena equivalent of one, and I thought that was bollocks.

[GOTNW]

Cena-Lesnar 2012 was an amazing experience the first time I watched it just because of how unconventional it was for a WWE match. When I rewatched it with the question of "is this really an all time great match some pimp it as" my answer was a resounding no. Their 2014 matches were better. I wouldn't argue with someone who'd call the Summerslam 2014 match an example of great storytelling in pro wrestling.

[NintendoLogic]

Cena/Lesnar was an incredible experience on first viewing, but the ref bump has largely ruined it for me on subsequent viewings. I don't have a problem with ref bumps, but it happened after the match had been stopped so the ref could treat Cena's cut. Blood necessitates a match stoppage, but the ref getting knocked out doesn't? How the hell does that make any sense? That's a huge logic gap I just can't look past. I also agree with OJ that there wasn't anything remotely shoot-style about the match.

[Karl]

Just watched the Extreme Rules match for the first time and it was good....preferred their SummerSlam match from last year more though.

 

On Cena - I just cannot connect with him in any way. I can appreciate what he does - I think he's a real good promo, had more than his fair share of really good matches but despite that, I just dont get engaged by him at all.

[El McKell]

Cena/Lesnar was an incredible experience on first viewing, but the ref bump has largely ruined it for me on subsequent viewings. I don't have a problem with ref bumps, but it happened after the match had been stopped so the ref could treat Cena's cut. Blood necessitates a match stoppage, but the ref getting knocked out doesn't? How the hell does that make any sense? That's a huge logic gap I just can't look past.

I don't understand how this is really a logic gap; the referee stops the match for blood, but who's even there to stop the match while the referee is down?

[goc]

Cena/Lesnar was an incredible experience on first viewing, but the ref bump has largely ruined it for me on subsequent viewings. I don't have a problem with ref bumps, but it happened after the match had been stopped so the ref could treat Cena's cut. Blood necessitates a match stoppage, but the ref getting knocked out doesn't? How the hell does that make any sense? That's a huge logic gap I just can't look past. I also agree with OJ that there wasn't anything remotely shoot-style about the match.

 

 

All matches in WWE are stopped for blood while they glue the cut, it's been going on for like 5 years or more now. No matches are ever stopped when a ref gets bumped so yea I don't get that criticism. It's consistent with the internal logic of WWE style.

[Matt D]

Let's talk about Cena vs Zayn.

 

It's looking like Sami hurt himself on the way in(apologies for the sped up gif. That's what gifyoutube does for me):

 

 

Cena immediately hit two protobombs to start the match (after the commercial break) and gave them reason to portray it as those hurt the shoulder. Sami sold like a king, broadly selling to the back row as if it was a wrestling injury, instead of a legit one. That they still accomplished a lot of what they set out to do given the circumstance was pretty amazing.

[Stiva]

Yeah, I'll agree that it was a great match but man, does Cena ever need a new finisher. Nobody is buying the first Attitude Adjustment as a match-ending move anymore.