Fantastic Posted July 15, 2014 Report Share Posted July 15, 2014 I just realised watching Raw last night that John Cena is now a 15 time world champion. One more reign would tie him with Ric Flair's recognised world title reigns, and negate that distinction of Flair's that both WCW and WWE have used to promote him over the years. My first thought is that he probably will. WWE seems to pull out all the stops in order to decorate Cena in any way that they can, as they seem determined to make a star that's bigger than both Hogan and Austin (it's not working, by the way). However, upon watching the little show of respect between Cena and Flair last night, I'm wondering whether WWE will preserve Flair's 16 time record out of respect and legacy? John Cena certainly doesn't need more title reigns. He's beyond the WWE World Heavyweight Championship, in much the same way the likes of Triple H and The Undertaker are beyond world title reigns. Obviously, Cena isn't part time like them, but he doesn't add any more value to the title now he's had so many reigns (many of which were uneventful or transitional), and holding the title doesn't elevate him any further either. He's the pinnacle of WWE, his name alone (not preceded by "WWE World Heavyweight Champion) sells tickets and PPV's. So, lets put it to the poll. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted July 15, 2014 Report Share Posted July 15, 2014 I think he'll have another run, if not a few more runs. People get injured, and he'll be the fall back guy. Just like he currently is. Also, if the Roman Reigns push flops, they may be forced to go back to him. He is the champion when they need someone transitional precisely because they don't want to hurt anyone who they think has a future by making them Ron Garvin. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steenalized Posted July 15, 2014 Report Share Posted July 15, 2014 I'd guess Cena is around for at least five more years and is basically always in or around the title picture by nature of being him, so a few more. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dylan Waco Posted July 15, 2014 Report Share Posted July 15, 2014 My guess is he gets to 20 and they sell that as a magic number going forward Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cm funk Posted July 15, 2014 Report Share Posted July 15, 2014 I think he'll have another run, if not a few more runs. People get injured, and he'll be the fall back guy. Just like he currently is. Also, if the Roman Reigns push flops, they may be forced to go back to him. He is the champion when they need someone transitional precisely because they don't want to hurt anyone who they think has a future by making them Ron Garvin. Pretty much this, so it's inevitable he'll see the belt a few more times It's their own fault due to their booking. They should always have a handful of guys being slow built and semi-protected and ready to take the ball at a moment's notice but they never do. They treat the mid card like shit with meaningless wins and loss trading, treat the secondary belts like shit, and now they find themselves in this present situation, again I don't even mind Cena having the belt right now, when they have this Brock main eventing SummerSlam plan in stone, Cena is literally the only guy worthy/ready to main event it with Bryan on the shelf. It's just indicative of their lack of long term planning that they have so few options, and how badly they've screwed up some of their main event potential level talent, Cesaro and Wyatt being prime recent examples. Ziggler and Sheamus have rebounded from it recently, after some downright horrible booking, and it's a testament to their talent. Wade Barrett recovered from years of shitty aimless booking and was getting really hot. I'm not the biggest Kofi fan but you can't deny that he's got something and crowds react whenever they give him something interesting to do or some direction. It's not impossible to recover from bad booking, but they don't make it easy on guys Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fantastic Posted July 15, 2014 Author Report Share Posted July 15, 2014 I'm wondering how long before John Cena decides that he cannot physically endure through his ridiculous schedule any more and cuts thing back a bit. The guy is 37 years old, he's got a list of injuries and a knack of not taking extended periods of recovery. How long is the wrestling bug going to last though? I don't think Cena harbors any particularly strong ambition of being a Hollywood star, but there's always the possibility that something else might divert his attention from wrestling. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigBadMick Posted July 15, 2014 Report Share Posted July 15, 2014 I'm wondering how long before John Cena decides that he cannot physically endure through his ridiculous schedule any more and cuts thing back a bit. The guy is 37 years old, he's got a list of injuries and a knack of not taking extended periods of recovery. How long is the wrestling bug going to last though? I don't think Cena harbors any particularly strong ambition of being a Hollywood star, but there's always the possibility that something else might divert his attention from wrestling. Didn't he say on Total Divas that he plans on being with WWE full time for at least 10 more years? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cm funk Posted July 15, 2014 Report Share Posted July 15, 2014 Cena has a role in an upcoming Judd Apatow movie and an Amy Poehler/Tina Fey vehicle which.....that's as A-list in the comedy scene as there is. He's definitely gonna be a wrestling lifer, but he's probably ready to wind it down and become more of a part timer. I think that was probably in the plans earlier this year and then the Punk and Bryan situations happened, they have no headliners, and they asked him to take the ball and he's doing what he always does. But with the promos he was cutting earlier in the year about young guys stepping up and passing the torch and based on who he's worked with and who he's put over......it seems clear he knows he doesn't have a lot of time left as a full time wrestler Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flyonthewall2983 Posted July 15, 2014 Report Share Posted July 15, 2014 Being in A-list movies hasn't stopped WWE from keeping the belt on guys before though. It's just a number, and as much as I respect him he's not done nearly enough of what Ric did in those 16 title runs. To even further my bias towards Ric here, I think WWE should have at given him at least one run with the title during his 2002-2008 run. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BillThompson Posted July 16, 2014 Report Share Posted July 16, 2014 I think the problem is that we're discussing Flair's 16 title reigns as if they're a great accomplishment. All those reigns represent to me is the weakness of modern booking and the inability to provide consistent champions. I'll take a guy with three reigns of around a year a piece over what Cena and Flair have done. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matt D Posted July 16, 2014 Report Share Posted July 16, 2014 16 time loser. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yo-Yo's Roomie Posted July 16, 2014 Report Share Posted July 16, 2014 I'd like to see someone go through Ric's reigns and break down how much value each one has. Same with Cena's. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Superstar Sleeze Posted July 16, 2014 Report Share Posted July 16, 2014 This may be a groan-inducing post because I am sure it is has been discussed, but what are the 16 recognized Ric Flair reigns. I am under the understanding that he had 10 NWA World Title Reigns, 8 WCW World Title Reigns, 2 WWF World Title Reigns and 2 WCW International World Titles. I imagine the International World Titles and four of the NWA World Title Reigns are discounted. Flair and Cena both had plenty of long title reigns. Modern booking definitely helped both, but only Flair was really helped by Russo-esque booking towards the end of WCW. To answer the question, I think he will break Flair's record. I hope they do a big chase out of both the 16th and 17th title reign. He needs a 1000 more days to catch Hogan so nothing doing there. They should have made it a bigger deal when he either past 1000 days as champion or when he past Pedro for fourth all time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted July 16, 2014 Report Share Posted July 16, 2014 The ones they acknowledge are: - Beating Dusty on 9/17/81 in Kansas City - Beating Race at Starrcade '83 - Beating Kerry in Japan on 5/24/84 - Beating Dusty on 8/9/86 - Beating Garvin at Starrcade '87 - Beating Steamboat at Wrestle War '89 - Beating Sting on 1/11/91 at the Meadowlands - Winning the Royal Rumble on 1/19/92 - Beating Savage on 9/1/92 in Hershey, PA - Beating Windham at Beach Blast '93 - Beating Vader at Starrcade '93 - Beating Savage at Starrcade '95 - Beating Savage at SuperBrawl VI - Beating Hogan at Uncensored '99 - Beating Jarrett on Nitro - Nash "giving him the belt back" on Nitro Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flyonthewall2983 Posted July 16, 2014 Report Share Posted July 16, 2014 How many championship reigns have both of them had, including non-WHC ones? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fantastic Posted July 16, 2014 Author Report Share Posted July 16, 2014 How many championship reigns have both of them had, including non-WHC ones? Couldn't tell you the extent of Flair's, but Cena: United States Championship - Defeated Big Show (March 14th 2004) - Defeated Booker T (October 3rd 2004) - Defeated Carlito (November 16th 2004) WWE and World Heavyweight Championship - Defeated JBL (April 3rd 2005) - Defeated Edge (January 8th 2006) - Defeated Edge (July 3rd 2006) - Defeated Chris Jericho (November 23rd 2008) *WHC - Defeated Big Show and Edge (April 5th 2009) *WHC - Defeated Randy Orton (September 13th 2009) - Defeated Randy Orton (October 25th 2009) - Defeated Triple H, Randy Orton, Sheamus, Kofi Kingston and Ted Dibiase (February 21st 2010) - Defeated Batista (March 28th 2010) - Defeated The Miz (May 21st 2011) - Defeated Rey Mysterio (July 25th 2011) *Co-WWE Championship - Defeated Alberto Del Rio (September 18th 2011) - Defeated The Rock (April 7th 2013) - Defeated Alberto Del Rio (October 27th 2013) *WHC - Defeated Alberto Del Rio, Bray Wyatt, Cesaro, Kane, Randy Orton, Roman Reigns and Sheamus (June 29th 2014) WWE and World Tag Team Championship W/ Shawn Michaels - Defeated Edge and Randy Orton (January 29th 2007) *WTT W/ Batista - Defeated Ted Dibiase and Cody Rhodes (August 4th 2008) *WTT W/ David Otunga - Defeated Drew McIntyre and Cody Rhodes (September 29th 2010) W/ The Miz - Defeated Heath Slater and Justin Gabriel (February 21st 2011) Total: 22 championship reigns Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lee Casebolt Posted July 16, 2014 Report Share Posted July 16, 2014 Taking a quick look at wikipedia, and trying to trim out the redundancies, it looks like Flair gets... 10 NWA World titles 8 WCW World titles 2 WWF World titles 3 Mid Atlantic Heavyweight titles 2 NWA Television titles 6 Mid Atlantic/NWA/WCW US titles 2 WCW International World Heavyweight titles 1 NWA Missouri Heavyweight title 1 WWE Intercontinental title 3 Mid Atlantic Tag Team titles 3 NWA World Tag Team titles 3 WWE World Tag Team titles Which comes to 44 titles. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sek69 Posted July 16, 2014 Report Share Posted July 16, 2014 The thing about Cena is while he's always going to be WWE's security blanket when they need to put the belt on someone, I don't think he's going to be able to physically be able to go at the level he's at much longer. While he may still be in cosmetic shape, Dave's always talking about how thrashed his body is. I'm sure he'd want to do what he does for the next 100 years, but at some point he's going to hit the wall. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted July 16, 2014 Report Share Posted July 16, 2014 When Cena becomes too old to be marketed to kids and women, he has also lost a big part of his value. Fans hate him so much that I wonder what kind of run he can have as a legend anyway. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fantastic Posted July 16, 2014 Author Report Share Posted July 16, 2014 When Cena becomes too old to be marketed to kids and women, he has also lost a big part of his value. Fans hate him so much that I wonder what kind of run he can have as a legend anyway. If he and Nikki Bella decide to have kids, you can bet that he's going to age a fuckload in the period leading to conception. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flyonthewall2983 Posted July 17, 2014 Report Share Posted July 17, 2014 So Cena = 22, Flair = 44. I can live with that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
donsem43 Posted July 17, 2014 Report Share Posted July 17, 2014 When Cena becomes too old to be marketed to kids and women, he has also lost a big part of his value. Fans hate him so much that I wonder what kind of run he can have as a legend anyway. You don't think that the kids that cheer him now won't cheer for him when they are older. I am sure a lot of the people who boo him now cheered for Hogan and Warrior when they were kids. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fantastic Posted July 17, 2014 Author Report Share Posted July 17, 2014 When Cena becomes too old to be marketed to kids and women, he has also lost a big part of his value. Fans hate him so much that I wonder what kind of run he can have as a legend anyway. You don't think that the kids that cheer him now won't cheer for him when they are older. I am sure a lot of the people who boo him now cheered for Hogan and Warrior when they were kids. The difference is that everybody cheered for Hogan and Warrior back then. It's easily a 60/40% average split in terms of boos and cheers respectively from the audience, where John Cena is concerned. Exlcuding Hogan's pre-Hulkamania or nWo days, which don't obviously apply here (because he wasn't playing a heel), there wasn't even a vocal minority booing Hogan or Warrior at any point that I can think of at any point. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
donsem43 Posted July 17, 2014 Report Share Posted July 17, 2014 WWF/E didn't encourage their fans to speak their minds as much as they do now. Was there ever a face that got booed back then? Maybe it's an apple/orange type comparison due to the change in culture, but I just don't see Cena being booed when he's at the legend stage of his career. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dexstar Posted July 17, 2014 Report Share Posted July 17, 2014 If Cena were to retire for a bit, and then return after a year or couple years away as a "legend", he'd get a mammoth pop. Remember - people hated him back in 2008 too, but when he came back early from the injury at the Rumble, the Garden went nuts for him. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.