Where do you rank John Cena historically?
- Thread starter puppetmaster
- Start date
Top 5.
Behind guys like Austin, Hogan, Flair ahead of guys like Rocky, Macho, Sting
Behind guys like Austin, Hogan, Flair ahead of guys like Rocky, Macho, Sting
No one carried the biggest wrestling company in the entire world for as long as he did, or even NEARLY as long as he did.
We're talking like 12 years as main event, drawing fans, selling merch, putting on great matches.
In that way he was more important than Hogan, Austin or anyone else EVER.
But his impact was not as big as guys like Hogan, Austin, as while they didn't do it as long, they grew the product bigger.
Cena carried the company for a decade +, he helped build the Netowork era
Top 15 tops
He's not fukking with my top ten, but I approve of his GOATjesty
He's not fukking with my top ten, but I approve of his GOATjesty
All time great on the mic
Good draw
Good worker
Longevity
Some great moments, but not as many as he should have for his position and push.
I'll say top 20, at absolute best I'd say low top 10. Guys like Bret, Shawn, Eddie, I can't definitely say are better than him. Their real life importance is very overrated among hardcore wrestling fans.
Good draw
Good worker
Longevity
Some great moments, but not as many as he should have for his position and push.
I'll say top 20, at absolute best I'd say low top 10. Guys like Bret, Shawn, Eddie, I can't definitely say are better than him. Their real life importance is very overrated among hardcore wrestling fans.
Golayitdown
Veteran
Good discussion. Especially considering I'm avoiding writing a 20 page case study that's due next week. This will be fairly long because of my excellent procrastination skills.
This is probably one of the toughest questions to objectively answer because of the circumstances surrounding him. From a resume standpoint, he's one of the few who have debuted in the past 15 years that actually has a legit case for being in a "top" anything discussion, especially if you only consider guys who didn't have a big career in the indies.
If we're grading on potential, he's a superstar that frustratingly coasted his way out of being a megastar. His natural charisma and natural mic skills should have him ranked with the Tier 0 guys in history. The problem is he doesn't have many classic moments or promos to his name (even if you think every rap battle is classic) and he only seems to truly "bring it" when he's doing worked shoots nowadays. It's more frustrating than tragic because dude obviously knows how to engage a crowd and can easily do much better than most of the stuff we see. When compared to guys of yesteryear who seemingly made every moment count, he doesn't match up.
He has very few all time great moments, which is damn near unforgivable as "the guy" in the company. If you consider the amount of time he's been on the screen in relation to the number of classic moments we've seen from him, it's hard to justify how he's stayed the same for so fukking long. In 10-15 years, I doubt anybody will revisit much of his work. He will be in danger of becoming an afterthought when he retires unless he gets that WWE stimulus package. Even with the "he's been a heel for 10 years" excuse that is always used, he never changed his character. It's fun to watch him troll sometimes, but without ever reinventing his character in the slightest, he hasn't shown any kind of range, depth or growth at all. You can literally watch a Cena promo from 2007 or 2017 and see the same exact guy. Nobody in history has been this ehh for this long without a change.
I must say though, his longevity is astounding, especially when you consider how many miles on him. From a time standpoint, he's basically matched the top two eras (Hogan + Austin/Rock) combined.
All in all, he's cool in my book. I don't hate him like most around here, and like some of his work. The problem is that he's been consistently good or passable or even justifiable in his role, but rarely great. Objectively, I can't put him above many elite guys even though he accomplished WAY more than them on paper. I've been much more entertained over the years by Booker/Jericho/Foley/Perfect/Rude/Jake in and out of the ring and there's nothing on his resume touching the likes of the upper echelon guys like Rock/Austin/Savage. He *may* crack the top 25 on my personal list of WWE guys if I had to list them but it'll be largely based on his resume.
This is probably one of the toughest questions to objectively answer because of the circumstances surrounding him. From a resume standpoint, he's one of the few who have debuted in the past 15 years that actually has a legit case for being in a "top" anything discussion, especially if you only consider guys who didn't have a big career in the indies.
If we're grading on potential, he's a superstar that frustratingly coasted his way out of being a megastar. His natural charisma and natural mic skills should have him ranked with the Tier 0 guys in history. The problem is he doesn't have many classic moments or promos to his name (even if you think every rap battle is classic) and he only seems to truly "bring it" when he's doing worked shoots nowadays. It's more frustrating than tragic because dude obviously knows how to engage a crowd and can easily do much better than most of the stuff we see. When compared to guys of yesteryear who seemingly made every moment count, he doesn't match up.
He has very few all time great moments, which is damn near unforgivable as "the guy" in the company. If you consider the amount of time he's been on the screen in relation to the number of classic moments we've seen from him, it's hard to justify how he's stayed the same for so fukking long. In 10-15 years, I doubt anybody will revisit much of his work. He will be in danger of becoming an afterthought when he retires unless he gets that WWE stimulus package. Even with the "he's been a heel for 10 years" excuse that is always used, he never changed his character. It's fun to watch him troll sometimes, but without ever reinventing his character in the slightest, he hasn't shown any kind of range, depth or growth at all. You can literally watch a Cena promo from 2007 or 2017 and see the same exact guy. Nobody in history has been this ehh for this long without a change.
I must say though, his longevity is astounding, especially when you consider how many miles on him. From a time standpoint, he's basically matched the top two eras (Hogan + Austin/Rock) combined.
All in all, he's cool in my book. I don't hate him like most around here, and like some of his work. The problem is that he's been consistently good or passable or even justifiable in his role, but rarely great. Objectively, I can't put him above many elite guys even though he accomplished WAY more than them on paper. I've been much more entertained over the years by Booker/Jericho/Foley/Perfect/Rude/Jake in and out of the ring and there's nothing on his resume touching the likes of the upper echelon guys like Rock/Austin/Savage. He *may* crack the top 25 on my personal list of WWE guys if I had to list them but it'll be largely based on his resume.
Discounting his match quality, it's hard to argue against him as a top 10 guy all time. An absurdly long reign on top, with multiple record breaking years.
For comparison sake, here are the amount of televised matches after winning the title the first time that Hogan, Austin, and Rock had as leaders of the company:
Steve Austin: 158
Hulk Hogan: 212
The Rock: 320
John Cena has 557. While working a more demanding style, working more house shows, doing more media appearances and charity work than any talent in any company. Literally the most Make A Wish wishes granted of ANYONE in the history of the charity. John Cena has more matches in just WWE than Steve Austin and The Rock have COMBINED for their entire careers. He also has more matches than Hogan's 30+ year career. In 17 years. And for 12 of those 17, he was the undisputed top guy of WWE, leading to a few years bigger than what Hogan, Austin, or Rock did.
He's for sure on WWE's Mount Rushmore.
For comparison sake, here are the amount of televised matches after winning the title the first time that Hogan, Austin, and Rock had as leaders of the company:
Steve Austin: 158
Hulk Hogan: 212
The Rock: 320
John Cena has 557. While working a more demanding style, working more house shows, doing more media appearances and charity work than any talent in any company. Literally the most Make A Wish wishes granted of ANYONE in the history of the charity. John Cena has more matches in just WWE than Steve Austin and The Rock have COMBINED for their entire careers. He also has more matches than Hogan's 30+ year career. In 17 years. And for 12 of those 17, he was the undisputed top guy of WWE, leading to a few years bigger than what Hogan, Austin, or Rock did.
He's for sure on WWE's Mount Rushmore.
Dog Based Gremlin
Veteran
I dont know about greatest of all time in the whole history of Pro Wrestling but he made the "Mount Rushmore" of WWE exclusively
its goes....
Hogan
Austin
HBK
Cena
(I believe Cena passed up Rock on the mountain solely because of longevity on top and Rock was always viewed as 1b to Austin)
its goes....
Hogan
Austin
HBK
Cena
(I believe Cena passed up Rock on the mountain solely because of longevity on top and Rock was always viewed as 1b to Austin)
Mikael Blowpiff
#LosIngobernabrehs
It’s amazing how little I’m vested in anything that Cena does despite how good he obviously is. Maddening, even.
g-ice
aka #DiamondNightmare
I'll be honest when I say that I like him more than many in this forum but overall (considering every talent there has been) he's probably between the range of top 18-25 at best for me.
Wasn't more demanding for him. He did the beatdown and won with a simple come back for like two years str8. Only match style he did. It was embarrssing really. Batista had more variety.
Mount Rushmore as most Pushed? Definitely not legendary or as impactful as Andre, Rock, Hogan, Austin, Savage, Undertaker.
JerseyBoy23
Veteran
Can't put him in my top 10 but he might make my top 20 or 30.
Off the top I put these guys over him:
Austin
Rock
HHH
Angle
Jericho
Taker
Hogan (Hollywood alone)
Eddie Guerrero
Sting
HBK
Dusty
Punk
Off the top I put these guys over him:
Austin
Rock
HHH
Angle
Jericho
Taker
Hogan (Hollywood alone)
Eddie Guerrero
Sting
HBK
Dusty
Punk
Good? In what? Repetitive promo style and ultra predictable matches? Lol. This guy has been a bust since 2005.
The big problem with Cena is that his class of guys didnt get good reactions by a lot of fans early on, and that led to madddd people not watching wrestling anymore.
I remember tuning in and I was like I dont like these guys, Orton Batista, Cena... Then I stopped watching wrestling for 13 years. It coincides with the ratings being less than half of what they used to be. Thing is those guys at that time just were not 'my guys.' And they didnt do much to fit into the puzzle. Its hard to establish new stars, and to me they failed.
Fast forward to whenever the spinner belt came out, I hated his existence and it cemented to me that wrestling is dead. (even though looking back this may be a silly reason, but to a teenager who was a hip hop head, a spinning belt was blasphemous.)
Its funny cause now come 2017, you cant help but respect Cena. But looking at it objectively, dude was and is super wack compared to the GOATs, and the fact that hes so much better on the mic than the current guys shows how horrible these newer guys are at talking.
I remember tuning in and I was like I dont like these guys, Orton Batista, Cena... Then I stopped watching wrestling for 13 years. It coincides with the ratings being less than half of what they used to be. Thing is those guys at that time just were not 'my guys.' And they didnt do much to fit into the puzzle. Its hard to establish new stars, and to me they failed.
Fast forward to whenever the spinner belt came out, I hated his existence and it cemented to me that wrestling is dead. (even though looking back this may be a silly reason, but to a teenager who was a hip hop head, a spinning belt was blasphemous.)
Its funny cause now come 2017, you cant help but respect Cena. But looking at it objectively, dude was and is super wack compared to the GOATs, and the fact that hes so much better on the mic than the current guys shows how horrible these newer guys are at talking.