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Post by rnrk supports BLM on Jan 20, 2022 18:02:16 GMT -5
In his last few years, when it was obvious he was winding down as a full-timer, they absolutely failed to capitalize on him. They could've gotten a serious Wrestlemania main event out of Cena vs Undertaker instead of a joke squash. They could've gotten a serious Wrestlemania main event out of Cena vs Roman instead of hotshotting and blowing it off in a single month on some nothing fall PPV. They could've made Cena vs Rusev feel like a big deal and a step up for Rusev instead of playing it like "lol, is Cena such a washed-up loser he can't even beat RUSEV for the US title now?"
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Post by Clash, Never a Meter Maid on Jan 20, 2022 18:10:22 GMT -5
Not till 2017.
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Bo Rida
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Post by Bo Rida on Jan 20, 2022 18:10:56 GMT -5
No but they could have got more from him, not purely just from a heel turn either although some if these might have led to it.
1. Money match against 'Taker at wm when it would have meant something.
2. Never beat the world title record, especially weird as he's so safe compared to Flair. Of course he still might.
3. Nexus. Just nexus. He got genuine kayfabe support with "never give up chants" and they ruined it.
4. Spent the us title run talking about giving younger wrestlers chances. Instead of this leading to him making an upcoming wrestler he somehow lost to Del Rio.
The later years in particular just feel like an incomplete story.
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Post by The Dark Order Inferno on Jan 20, 2022 18:12:03 GMT -5
I don't think so, they got all the value they could from him given the level of writing the company was producing. Turning him heel wouldn't have fixed the problem with Vince's nbooking, he would have been protected like he was a face the way Triple H, Shawn Michaels and Roman were as heels, and the person who eventually defeats him almost certainly wouldn't be the one the fans wanted.
Cena would have been a bigger star if there was more of an undercard and better booking across the board, a rising tide raises all boats after all, but here we are.
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Post by Zombie Mod is not a ghoul. on Jan 20, 2022 18:22:11 GMT -5
not really, they got as much money out of face cena as they could. as others have said a cena heel turn would have taken a sizeable chunk of that money away and lets face it thats all wwe currently (and pretty much always have) care about, maximum profits.
cena could have done with a fresh angle for his character long before his shift to part time/hollywood as has been said on these boards for years but wwe saw dollar signs in keeping him as he was.
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Post by "Gizzark" Mike Wronglevenay on Jan 20, 2022 18:25:01 GMT -5
Have to say I agree with this, although the first Roman feud in 2015 was godawful too. |
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Post by sportatorium on Jan 20, 2022 19:26:19 GMT -5
Wouldn't say they wasted him, but they certainly overexposed him and frankly watered down their own title through that overexposure. Turning him heel would have been interesting, but not sure who would have been that babyface to get the rub in going up against him. Punk or Bryan maybe, but the company was never really on board with them. Possibly Ryback, but we've seen what a clown he turned out to be.
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Post by Ozman on Jan 20, 2022 19:39:49 GMT -5
Cena might end up being the last mainstream star that wrestling will have.
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Post by King Devitt on Jan 20, 2022 20:22:34 GMT -5
As other have said, financially no. But creatively yes.
And I don't mean "turn him heel" as the reason.
He was a poorly written one-dimensional character. He was a horrible "good guy".
He could have been written much better as a face. And he could have evolved as a face, but he never did.
But obviously that's on Vince and Co. and not him.
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Post by Hit Girl on Jan 21, 2022 12:28:30 GMT -5
They were right to not turn him heel, because Cena didn't want to do it, and there's no point forcing him to play a character he is uncomfortable with, especially with all the Make A Wish stuff.
What they should have done is turn him face, because a real well booked face wouldn't have been hated by half the crowd and drove millions of viewers away forever.
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Post by Clash, Never a Meter Maid on Jan 21, 2022 14:17:24 GMT -5
What they should have done is turn him face, because a real well booked face wouldn't have been hated by half the crowd and drove millions of viewers away forever. Only the viewers who don’t know what’s actually good for them. 😎 |
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Post by robferatu on Jan 21, 2022 22:59:55 GMT -5
I do wonder how different John Cena’s career may have been if Jeff Hardy wouldn’t have left the company in two-thousand and nine.
I ponder this, if only because Hardy was gaining considerable ground on Cena in terms of being over while not suffering from internet wrestling community hate that John did.
I know there were others that came along post-Hardy’s exodus like Punk and Bryan that got considerably over with the crowd wanting to be “the guy,” but neither of them were WWE guys or creations like the Charismatic Enigma was.
So, it makes me wonder if Hardy stuck around and didn’t have had his demons if they would of completely pulled the trigger on him being “the guy” and by proxy pulled the trigger on John Cena getting a heel run.
With that said, I don’t think the WWE wasted John Cena by him never having a main event heel run, but I think people would certainly look back at his time on top more favorably if he’d gotten one.
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