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John Cena vs. Bret Hart


Wade Garrett

Cena or Bret  

85 members have voted

  1. 1. Who is better?

    • John Cena
      36
    • Bret Hart
      49


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My understanding is that the Sharpshooter was basically forced on him. The way Bret tells it in his book, Pat Patterson came up to him one day and asked him if he knew how to do a scorpion deathlock. He didn't, so he had Konnan of all people teach it to him, and the rest is history.

Konnan was hanging around in WWF then?!

 

Max Moon was designed for him.

 

When did Bret actually start using the sharpshooter?

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This is tough. Cena, clearly, has lot more high end matches. However, he had montly ppvs and was in that situation a lot to have them. That is why I hate the great match theory.

 

I liked both guys match structure, selling and storytelling. Where, I think, Bret has the edge is believe-ability in the ring and finishing sequences.

 

Bret was Bret in the ring. A no nonsense never give up technician who would beat you with skill. Cena is a man with super strength that will never give up, but just throws stuff at you until you eventually go down.

 

Switch each other and what would had happened. Would Bret being having as many great matches as Cena would have? I think most likely. However, putting Cena in Bret's shoes could be iffy. Long ppv matches with Diesel, Hakushi, Jean Pierre Laffite, etc.. maybe he pulls stuff out of them, but I don't have the confidence that I have in Bret.

 

I think it's close though.

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This is tough. Cena, clearly, has lot more high end matches. However, he had montly ppvs and was in that situation a lot to have them. That is why I hate the great match theory.

 

I liked both guys match structure, selling and storytelling. Where, I think, Bret has the edge is believe-ability in the ring and finishing sequences.

 

Bret was Bret in the ring. A no nonsense never give up technician who would beat you with skill. Cena is a man with super strength that will never give up, but just throws stuff at you until you eventually go down.

 

Switch each other and what would had happened. Would Bret being having as many great matches as Cena would have? I think most likely. However, putting Cena in Bret's shoes could be iffy. Long ppv matches with Diesel, Hakushi, Jean Pierre Laffite, etc.. maybe he pulls stuff out of them, but I don't have the confidence that I have in Bret.

 

I think it's close though.

 

Bret had monthly PPV's in May-Dec 1995, Jan, Fed, March, November, December 1996 as well as 97 (I know he had a knee injury).

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This is tough. Cena, clearly, has lot more high end matches. However, he had montly ppvs and was in that situation a lot to have them. That is why I hate the great match theory.

 

I liked both guys match structure, selling and storytelling. Where, I think, Bret has the edge is believe-ability in the ring and finishing sequences.

 

Bret was Bret in the ring. A no nonsense never give up technician who would beat you with skill. Cena is a man with super strength that will never give up, but just throws stuff at you until you eventually go down.

 

Switch each other and what would had happened. Would Bret being having as many great matches as Cena would have? I think most likely. However, putting Cena in Bret's shoes could be iffy. Long ppv matches with Diesel, Hakushi, Jean Pierre Laffite, etc.. maybe he pulls stuff out of them, but I don't have the confidence that I have in Bret.

 

I think it's close though.

 

Bret had monthly PPV's in May-Dec 1995, Jan, Fed, March, November, December 1996 as well as 97 (I know he had a knee injury).

 

Mostly on the undercard and only for a year or two. Cena has had monthly ppvs for how many years? 9 years on top?

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Since I had that SummerSlam 06 file to watch the ECW stuff, I watched the Cena vs Edge main event hoping that would wash the bad taste out of my mouth, and it did. Edge is kinda goofy at times, and Cena clearly isn't versatile in term of offense, but they had a very good main event match without the finishers/kickout spamming annoyance. It's fascinating to hear the crowd reaction to Cena in 2006 and in Boston ! That in itself makes the match fun to watch, and Cena is kinda like a 90's Tokyo Dome-like worker : the simpler he works, the best it is. That was the case here, so. Pretty clever finish too. It's really hard to compare him with Bret actually, as the context and way of working are so different. I guess he's kinda like Bruno in a way.

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  • 1 year later...

Cena's latest indy tendencies got me thinking about his career and his wrestling ability in general. I came to the conclusion that his stuff since 2015 doesn't really diminish what he did when he was really good/great because you could argue he is in his post-prime and what he is doing doesn't represent his best work.

 

That being said, as I thought about it, he is nowhere near as good as someone like Bret, IMO. Cena has more decent-good matches for sure but that's more due to accumulated quality resulting from the sheer volume he worked. It's harsh to say he was hit or miss but he could be inconsistent. I'd take Bret's average performance (even when he might BS his way through a match) over Cena's average performance. Bret is way superior when it comes to inputs and he is much more versatile.

 

Bret also completely swamps him when it comes to truly high end matches (****+) matches, IMO. In fact Bret's list of great singles matches against a variety of opponents is pretty staggering. I have no idea why some people say he doesn't have the volume for an all timer.

 

Cena is easily the better ace though.

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As a worker? Bret for sure imo. As a promo? I mean both have had bad promos, but Cena strikes me as the better promo. I'm not crazy about his character and he has some bad ones, but he also can be very good and frequently has shown that, so he's definitely more talented. Bret's best promo work is 1997 and that stacks up, but the rest is mostly far behind from what I've seen. He can be very good, but he's not as talented imo.

 

I doubt it, but Cena might have a bigger volume of ****+ matches simply because he's been an ace for over a decade and was one in an era of monthly PPVs and where TV could also get big quality matches. Bret's work looks believable and his storytelling is almost always simple, straightforward, and effective (both the biggest advantages I think he has over Shawn, which is a common comparison.) Also, Bret got some very high quality matches out of substandard subworkers. My impression is that Cena often gets that when he's with a superior technical worker.

 

In terms of peak years, what Cena years would people put ahead of Bret's 1994 and 1997?

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  • 4 weeks later...

I find it hard to see the argument that Cena even has a chance when compared to Bret Hart , Cena has never come close to having as good of a year as Bret Hart did in 1997 , Bret Harts work during this time was off the charts and rivals anybody in the history of wrestling for best year as a performer. You can't over look the fact that Bret Hart worked in Japan for many tours and for many years , also he had Stampede wrestling days that was close to 10 years worth of work , people cant forget this when talking about Bret Hart. Cena is one dimensional in and out of the ring ,he works hard but that doesn't go very far if you don't properly know how to work in the first place. Cena improves daily and is a beast but until he proves to me that he can step outside of the WWE and work then I will NEVER be able to give him the proper respect he may deserve.

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I think John is way more consistent with his great matches than Bret ever was and the last two years have proven that to me. I feel that a lot of Bret's work is boring to me, I feel it's very slow and plodding to be frank. I think Bret is great at his style of match but can't adapt, Cena has had great matches with almost every opponent he's had including The Great Khali, JBL, Randy Orton, and other subpar workers. I feel Bret works to the level of his opponent which is a detriment when he faces bad wrestlers.

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What's the feeling on 2008-2010 Cena? That was another one of my down periods for watching wrestling but I have seen some stuff I really liked (anything with Batista, some Big Show stuff) but also some things like the endless attempts at making the Orton feud feel special or the Miz stuff sorta misfiring that I'm kinda eh to. How was the NXT stuff?

 

I don't know if it's really an out there opinion but I think from 2011-2014 he was as good as he was in 2007. Maybe not on a PPV to PPV basis but it's pretty crazy how much great stuff he put in in that time, especially looking at his mentality switch of "trying to become The Guy" in 2007 to being "The Guy" during that time period.

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  • 3 weeks later...

What's the feeling on 2008-2010 Cena? That was another one of my down periods for watching wrestling but I have seen some stuff I really liked (anything with Batista, some Big Show stuff) but also some things like the endless attempts at making the Orton feud feel special or the Miz stuff sorta misfiring that I'm kinda eh to. How was the NXT stuff?

 

I don't know if it's really an out there opinion but I think from 2011-2014 he was as good as he was in 2007. Maybe not on a PPV to PPV basis but it's pretty crazy how much great stuff he put in in that time, especially looking at his mentality switch of "trying to become The Guy" in 2007 to being "The Guy" during that time period.

 

I think he was at worst a Top 5 guy in WWE from 2008-10. In 2007 he was on another planet, but there's no great drop off in quality when he comes back from the injury.

 

The list of his high end matches from those years is pretty impressive:

 

 

vs Orton, No Way Out 2008

vs Triple H, Night of Champions 2008

vs Batista, Summerslam 2008

vs Jericho, Survivor Series 2008

vs Jericho, Armageddon 2008

 

vs Shawn, Raw 12/1/09

vs Show, Smackdown 27/2/09

vs Edge, Backlash 2009 (LMS)

vs Orton, Breaking Point 2009 (I Quit)

vs Orton, Bragging Rights 2009 (Ironman)

 

vs Batista, Wrestlemania XIV

vs Batista, Extreme Rules 2010 (LMS)

vs Batista, Over the Limit 2010 (I Quit)

WWE vs Nexus, Summerslam 2010

vs Barrett, HIAC 2010

vs Dolph, Raw 20/12/10

vs Dolph, TLC 2010 (Ladder)

 

 

And there's a lot of really good TV stuff as well - matches vs Swagger, Jeff Hardy, Triple H, Dolph, Gabriel, Jericho, Punk, Henry, that Bourne tag...just off the top of my head.

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