As a matter of fact, Cena used to have a few more weapons in his arsenal than he regularly uses today. He occasionally dusts off his legdrop from the top rope, but his bulldog, dropkick, and fisherman suplex seem to have been more or less retired from service. I’m beginning to wonder whether this modification was made by Cena or by his bosses. When the WWE focused a few years ago on drawing a younger demographic of viewers, the perception has been that they wouldn’t be interested in "technical" wrestling. Also, the fewer moves a wrestler has, it stands to reason that it’s more likely that he’ll master them all. Maybe that’s a contributing factor to why a lot of the guys I consider to be truly innovative (e.g. Shawn Michaels, Rey Mysterio, Edge) have missed an inordinate amount of time due to injuries. I think there’s at least a good chance that Cena’s relatively unimaginative offense was mandated by corporate.
The only thing John Cena sells is merchandise. If you value the psychological aspect of wrestling matches, you probably find yourself infuriated when Cena takes a brutal beating for ten minutes, and then all of a sudden he’s back at 100% and hitting finishing moves on anyone who comes within a five-foot radius of him. I think that’s a terrible way to plan a match, but I also think I’ve been wrongly placing the blame for this on Cena himself. I doubt that Cena pitched to WWE’s creative team that he should be booked as a mix of Superman and the ’80s Hulk Hogan. In fact, as someone who spends an unfortunate amount of time reading wrestler biographies and dirt sheets, it’s sort of surprising to me how rarely Cena’s name comes up at all. I don’t get the impression that Cena is working overtime lobbying behind the scenes to maintain his current status. I’m not naive enough to think that there are no politics involved, but I also think that Cena may actually be a more benevolent force than I’ve given him credit for.
In the past few months, I’ve seen him lose the belt to Sheamus, a guy who wasn’t even a mid-carder six months ago. He’s been squashed by Batista. He got beaten down by a succession of jobbers a couple of weeks ago, including one guy (Vladimir Kozlov) whom I wasn’t even certain was on the roster when he appeared. Last week, he went down via (almost) clean pin to Big Show, who hasn’t been relevant to the solo wrestling hierarchy in months. And those of you who are in the industry may have some insight here, but getting powerbombed onto a set of ring steps is exactly the sort of thing I’d try to talk Creative out of doing if I were a headliner.
My point is that Cena’s "hulking up" act is painful for me to watch, but I think overall he’s been a team player here.
John Cena is a sanctimonious prick. There’s no way for me to sugarcoat the fact that I hate his current persona more than almost anything else in sports entertainment. I just find it galling to hear a guy that rich telling me that I should hate Vince for being in it "for the money." I admire Loyalty and Respect, but I’m not entirely sure what "Hustle" is. Regardless, there’s only one way I can make myself tolerate Cena’s do-gooder gimmick: my faith in Mr. McMahon.
