More important to WWEs history Cena or Undertaker?

[ChitownKnight]

Probably the two most important long term main eventers in the company’s history. Which star is more important to the history though? Like who can you remove and everything would be more different?

[psychokiller]

Undertaker in my opinion. He was around 12 years longer & has had so many more memorable moments compared to Cena. When Taker stopped wrestling full time I noticed the loss of him not being around on a regular basis any longer. I never felt that with Cena. Whenever Cena is gone I barely even notice. If Taker wasn’t around there would be no Kane, no Hell in a Cell matches, no Mania streak to name a few things. Without Cena I don’t know how much actually changes. I personally never got a larger than life star appeal with Cena like I do with Hogan, Rock, Austin & Taker to name a few.

[Push R Truth]

The History of the WWE would have to be altered quite a bit to account for the lack of Cena, not so much the Undertaker. He was important, but the company never seemed to become 100% focused on him and molded around him as a whole. UT had a lot of moments but not that much that altered everything around him like Cena has. Hell, Cena has an entire era named after him. Probably 2 depending on your point of view.

Cena also has more crossover appeal outside of the sport which is huge. Although quite a few people also know UT, he's not appeared in movies and commercials on a regular basis.


I think Undertaker and Orton fall into the same category with Macho Man and HBK. They have all the tools of being #1 Guys that the company could have been shaped around long-term but for reasons just lacked a little something. Sometimes it was as simple as the politics of others. Sometimes it was just bad timing, poor storylines, injury, attitude, father time or just overall who they are.

[Legion]

Cena probably made them more money, but the Undertaker IS WWE.

His contributions over the years are above and beyond anything Cena has done

[OVO 40 hunched over like he 80]

Cena actually was the man for more than a decade, Taker was just another wrestler.

[rnrk supports BLM]

Even though he's never really been the #1 headliner, Undertaker's such an iconic part of WWE that I'd give him the edge over Cena.

That said, even if we're using "long term" to disqualify Austin and Rock, I'd rank Hogan as significantly more important to the company than 'Taker or Cena.

[GuyOfOwnage]

Undertaker was their next big attraction after Andre The Giant. To me, it's a no contest if we're talking about the overall history of the company and not just money made.

[TWERKIN' MAGGLE]

Undertaker and it's not even close.

[Deputy Muscle]

Cena was face of the company for a decade. Taker has never been 'the man' so to speak.
Agree with the earlier post likening him to Orton and Macho Man and would probably throw Foley in there too.
Great longevity, great company man and an iconic figure but Cena was the embodiment of WWE for years (whether viewed as positive or negative is up to you).

[Chainsaw]

Undertaker, by far.

[Hit Girl]

Undertaker.

[stevec484]

You couldn't describe the history of the WWF/WWE from 1985 on without Hogan, Austin, Rock, Vince and Cena. You could leave out everyone else and still have an accurate brief summary. I cant imagine explaining 2005 -current day without using Cena.

[Deleted]

I think if you're writing a book on WWE's history, Cena would branch out into multiple sections in terms of big matches and moments while Undertaker would get a chapter, but wouldn't be as recurring a character throughout the whole story. Undertaker is definitely the heart and soul of WWE for his longevity and the respect he has of his peers, but on paper John Cena has far more talking points.

[timelimitdraw]

Cena probably made the company more money, but I have to go with the Undertaker. Cena's incredibly important, but the Undertaker was one of the few big stars the WWF had in the mid-90s when they were taping Raw in smaller arenas and the occasional high school gym. Undertaker's a big piece of the engine that kept them alive.

[Allie Kitsune]

I'm going with Taker just out of how many eras he bridged.

[Bub (BLM)]

Undertaker. Never has a character endured so long through so many incarnations without ever dipping in popularity. Cena is a modern legend, but he's a lot more replaceable than Taker in the grand scheme of things.

[celtics543]

It's got to be the Undertaker. Just look at his Wrestlemania opponents and you can see all the generations he's bridged. The guy wrestled Andre the Giant and is still putting in work today, he's been doing his thing for over 25 years. He won his first world title from Hulk Hogan and his last from CM Punk 18 years later. Cena has been the man for 15 years but just on sheer length of main eventing this has to be the Undertaker.

Cena may have peaked higher but Undertaker is more important to the overall history of the WWE.

["Gizzark" Mike Wronglevenay]

Depends what you mean by being more important.

Cena was a proven draw, the only one WWE had, for a decade. Undertaker was only ever 'the' draw on a few occasions, long past his prime. During his prime, he was basically a 'hell of a hand,' booking-wise, getting relatively few runs with world titles (how long was it between his reigns? Six years, then two years, then three years, then another four years, then a few in a row, then none for about a decade?) and never being 'the' guy.

Stuff like this is like comparing Savage to Hogan. However much better the creative may have been for Savage, without Hogan, Savage doesn't have that big of an arena to get over in.

Admittedly, Undertaker came before Cena, but Undertaker stuck with WWF through a lot of fallow years, main eventing shows that nobody was going to.

Creatively, I personally prefer Cena, but you just can't argue against Taker's track record. He barely had a good match for his first fifteen years as Taker, but he had so many moments during that time that by the time most of his storylines got less wacky and moment-filled he was having great matches to make up for it, which is kind of the opposite direction you would think things like that would go.

[horseface]

Undertaker by a mile. Cena's only quality that couldn't have easily been replaced by someone else was his ability to handle WWE's grueling schedule demands. Other than that, he's just some dude.

[Starshine]

Census. Dude could draw crowd and viewer numbers and made WWE quite a lot of money.

By comparison, Undertaker’s biggest claim to fame is being there a long time and winning matches on what was ultimately a self drawing show.