While John Cena the actual human being seems like a pretty decent and charitable guy, the JOHHHHHNNN CEEENA wrestling character has always come across on camera like a mean-spirited bully who won't stop until he gets his way (ironic considering he's supposed to be the Hogan-esque superhero that little kids are meant to look up to) ...
Originally posted by Brandon Stroud If you don’t like John Cena, you’re a “smark.” That word was originally intended to mean “guy who knows too much about wrestling but isn’t actually in the wrestling business,” but has come to mean “person I hate.” If you have an opinion different from mine, you are a smark. It’s how Republicans use the word “liberal.”
(edited by Alessandro on 17.6.14 0938) My new inappropriate catchphrase: Vinegar, please!
Hogan was also a mean-spirited bully who won't stop until he gets his way, always cheating in his matches.
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I was up with this article to the Poop jokes. Yeah, they are not that clever, but this is the PG era in its earliest form. If you want to bash him for his degrading shoot interviews that is fine, but its not like everyone else is dropping F bombs all over the place.
The rest of that article is pretty dead on. The Cena and women part was interesting, too.
To me, Cena's all-time "What the Hell, Hero?" moment was #4 on this list, when he beat Rey for the WWE Championship. Seriously? You couldn't have at the very least waited a week? It was ridiculous that Rey had to defend the title he'd won two hours earlier against a fresh Cena, who had just congratulated him on winning the belt. And Cena is ostensibly a face!
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Kayfabe-wise, HHH said both Cena & Rey agreed to have the match that night. HHH was a face at this point, so there's no reason to believe he was lying or trying to screw over and/or pressure either/both of them, or to think he'd object if Rey suggested making the match for the following Raw w/ a week's worth of hype.
Rey didn't ask HHH to move the match to another show because he is a true-hearted hero. Someone asked him to defend the belt right away, so he did it.
The question is why would Cena either a) agree to a match that night instead of doing the right thing and asking HHH to let Rey recover or b) be the one to actually demand the title shot that night in the first place, after not even bothering to enter into the tournament himself? Two more details came up later that made Cena look like an even bigger asshole for what he did to Rey in retrospect:
-He freaked out on Del Rio after Del Rio earned Money In The Bank and cashed in on Punk. The mitigating factor is supposed to be that, when Cena would eventually win the Breifcase, he called his shot (like RVD did to Cena). But that doesn't change the fact that what Cena did to Rey was worse than what Del Rio did to Punk, since Del Rio had at least won a match to have the right to do it AND Punk knew it was coming.
-During the build-up to Cena vs. Punk at Hell In A Cell, Cena gets hurt but (according to him) medically cleared to have the Cell match against Punk, a match he berated Punk into taking because it was the "only match that mattered" for Punk's legacy. Then he says he could do the match, but he'll just let Ryback have it instead, because he can (in his own words) get a title match any time he wants. So clearly, he DID go and ask for a match against Rey the very night Rey won the belt.
Anyway, yeah, Cena screwing Rey out of the belt is probably the shittiest in-character move by a good guy, just ahead of Hogan helping eliminate Sid from the Rumble (Sid, at least, was taunting Hogan and left himself open for it.)
The way it was presented was that HHH spoke to both guys, who each agreed to the match. We don't know if Cena demanded the match under the "automatic rematch" clause (which HHH claimed he was cheated out of due to Punk leaving), but if so, why wouldn't they just go w/ that explanation? This was the night Vince was stripped of his duties & HHH picked to replace him, so it was more like HHH wanting to make a big splash as the boss (he also announced the return of Jim Ross, which supports the "big splash" theory).
Also, "Punk knew it was coming" - did Rey not know the match was coming. HHH talked to him (ostensibly at some point during the night & not right before HHH went out to the ring) & got his OK, so it's not the same as a MITB winner doing it right after a match.
I am not a Cena basher, and I don't care for it these days. But if he is the hero he is/was supposed to be, he would have said 'no' to the match that night and say he wants Rey well rested. Even if it was suggested by HHH and Rey agreed to it.
That's what the noble knight, which he so often has to play, is supposed to do. The fact that he doesn't do it, makes him a selfish a-hole.
Originally posted by dwatersMy son just reminded me that Cena was supposed to be fired from the company if he couldn't beat Punk at Money in the Bank. Yeah, that didn't last.
Technically, the board fired Vince before he could fire Cena, because he was going to fire Cena. Now Vince's firing, that stuck about as much as his exploding did.
Basically, Del Rio was always going to cash in on Punk at MITB and win the title. They correctly decided late in the game that it would be way better for Punk to leave as champion, but this left them with no SummerSlam plans.
They had the stupid tournament because it's "what really would've happened" if the champion quit. They made it worse by bumping the finals from Raw so Vince could come up and fire Cena instead.
This left three Raws until SummerSlam and they wanted to have a main event set up to promote for the last two weeks. So because they were out of time, Cena "had" to beat Rey and make both Cena and Rey look awful in different ways. If Cena had to come out of the show as champion or else the company would've gone out of business, why not have Triple H add him to the Rey/Miz final since he never got a rematch?
I assume an idea that bad made it through in that form because all energy was expended killing the planned angle for the same night where HHH brings back Punk, pedigrees him, and Punk loses the title to Del Rio in his first appearance.
It was totally inept, but thankfully everyone has collectively agreed to pretend that Cena vs. Rey main evented SummerSlam, Del Rio cashed in on one of them, and Punk returned before Survivor Series to unify the titles and have Howard Finkel announce him as the NEW undisputed WWE champion. Then Jericho won the Royal Rumble, and Sheamus didn't have the confidence to beat Daniel Bryan so quickly at Wrestlemania, but that's another story.
Originally posted by dMpI am not a Cena basher, and I don't care for it these days. But if he is the hero he is/was supposed to be, he would have said 'no' to the match that night and say he wants Rey well rested. Even if it was suggested by HHH and Rey agreed to it.
That's what the noble knight, which he so often has to play, is supposed to do. The fact that he doesn't do it, makes him a selfish a-hole.
While this makes sense, there's another way to look at it. Had the roles been reversed and Cena had been in Rey's position, would he have asked for a week off? Of course not. So Cena was showing respect to Rey by treating him as just as much a man as Cena. He didn't want to insult his friend by suggesting he needed time to rest.
Some interesting comments by readers at the bottom of the article:
Chris Jericho had Edge on his podcast and they talked about John Cena and the SummerSlam match against The Nexus. They (Jericho and Edge) actually tried to talk Cena out of going through with the DDT spot because of how it would torpedo the whole angle and Cena was having none of it. When the match was over, Cena admitted to them both that he was wrong and should have listened. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9FrSjPqgxs&feature=youtu.be&t=2m9s
I recently watched that TLC where Cena pulls down the set decoration and all the chairs fall onto Barrett. Michael Cole’s call is: “John Cena is burying Wade Barrett!” I was like, yeah, no shit!
“Cena instantly sorta latches onto whatever’s increasingly popular and siphons it for himself.” A move that Cena absolutely learned from Triple H.
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Originally posted by JustinShapiroIt was totally inept, but thankfully everyone has collectively agreed to pretend that Cena vs. Rey main evented SummerSlam, Del Rio cashed in on one of them, and Punk returned before Survivor Series to unify the titles and have Howard Finkel announce him as the NEW undisputed WWE champion. Then Jericho won the Royal Rumble, and Sheamus didn't have the confidence to beat Daniel Bryan so quickly at Wrestlemania, but that's another story.
Yep. Exactly as I remember it.
(Seriously, Rey vs Cena seemed like such a money main event for WWE, probably Rey's last big pay day and a missed opportunity)
I've always maintained that Cena is justifiably where he's at because of talent and the ability to deliver in the main event when needed, and loses matches (sometimes cleanly) more than Hogan ever did as top face.
That said, he's done some pretty shitty things as a character over the years and if people don't like him because of his character, more power to them.
Originally posted by Kevintripod “Cena instantly sorta latches onto whatever’s increasingly popular and siphons it for himself.” A move that Cena absolutely learned from Triple H.
Who learned it from Hart, who learned it from Hogan, who learned it from Verne, who learned it from Gorgeous George.
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Originally posted by Kevintripod “Cena instantly sorta latches onto whatever’s increasingly popular and siphons it for himself.” A move that Cena absolutely learned from Triple H.
Who learned it from Hart, who learned it from Hogan, who learned it from Verne, who learned it from Gorgeous George.
Couldn't agree more. It would be stupid not to do this.
Originally posted by Kevintripod “Cena instantly sorta latches onto whatever’s increasingly popular and siphons it for himself.” A move that Cena absolutely learned from Triple H.
Who learned it from Hart, who learned it from Hogan, who learned it from Verne, who learned it from Gorgeous George.
Couldn't agree more. It would be stupid not to do this.
For the wrestler maybe. For the company, I don't think its always a good idea. Sometimes, if you let a hot angle play it with the wrestlers it has, it turns out better. I am not sure if I would throw Bret into that camp.
Originally posted by Kevintripod “Cena instantly sorta latches onto whatever’s increasingly popular and siphons it for himself.” A move that Cena absolutely learned from Triple H.
Who learned it from Hart, who learned it from Hogan, who learned it from Verne, who learned it from Gorgeous George.
Who learned it from Hackenschmidt. The business is cyclical :D
I am far from white but at no point before the announcement of Koko in the HoF did I ever think, "boy there sure are a lot of hicks in there this year".
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