On Saturday, John Cena will end his 26-year wrestling career. An undeniable WWE legend, Cena has competed in over 2,000 matches and has main evented dozens of pay-per-view and premium live events.
In honor of his retirement, I wanted to dig a little deeper into the crates and find some hidden gems – great matches that most people haven’t seen, crazy gimmick brawls, classic tags and lengthy world title matches. The match truly showcased the 17-time WWE Champion’s various skills that have made him an all-time great.
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Without further ado, let’s get started.
1. John Cena VS Eddie Guerrero
WWE SmackDown: September 11, 2003
The parking lot brawl here is great fun, with Eddie Guerrero and Cena surrounded by parked cars. This was Cena at his most visible, a loud-mouthed Southern punk who wore Brian Urlacher jerseys and Timberlands like a street thug from Gone Baby Gone.
There were a number of big near misses that made the entire match feel extra dangerous, including one where Cena grabbed a shovel from the trunk of a car and swung it at Guerrero so hard that Guerrero gouged the hood of a nearby car. Both wrestlers experienced some nasty bumps – arms on the hood, a cracked windshield, both men going headfirst through a window.
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It was a bad ending when Guerrero hit a frog off the top of the truck and splashed Cena who was lying on the hood of the car. A great use of unconventional space – and a surprisingly violent brawl for a televised match.
2. John Cena/Eddie Guerrero VS Brock Lesnar/Big Show
WWE SmackDown: February 12, 2004
A televised main event tag team match prior to the 2004 pay-per-view No Way Out, it was a classic Southern tag team match that pitted the all-star babyfaces of Cena and Guerrero against perhaps the most formidable tag team of all time.
It was a big show when he had the perfect combination of huge size and agility – about 100 pounds heavier than during his WCW tenure, but he could still move.
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The Brock Lesnar of 2004 was an amazing athletic talent. He’s like looking at Zion Williamson in his Duke days, or Jadeveon Clowney in his South Carolina days—the athleticism seems alien.
A master at selling damage and captivating the crowd, Cena’s ribs were popcorned by Lesnar’s body scissors before The Big Show fell on him. They created a hot tag – there’s nothing more exciting in wrestling than a fiery Eddie Guerrero cleaning the house.
The match ended with Kurt Angle tussling with Eddie and getting a chain assist, all to set up the next weekend’s pay-per-view match. The whole thing is a great job of television industry wrestling – a nail-biting contest that makes you want to pull out your wallet and watch the next show.
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3. John Cena VS Sabu
WWE Revenge: June 25, 2006
Cena’s One Night Stand match with Rob Van Dam is undoubtedly the most famous match in Cena’s feud with ECW, but it was the most fanatical one.
Sabu and Cena seem like two guys who shouldn’t be sharing a ring, and watching them do it feels like one of those Twitter posts from Patrick Ewing in a Magic jersey or Pete Rose in the Expos. Cena is a major league professional wrestling icon, a talk show guest, and the Guinness World Record holder for the most wishes granted. Sabu, by contrast, belonged to the shadows—a scarred, violent monster who created his own legend in bingo halls and VFW halls, surrounded by barbed wire, fire, and tables.
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It was an Extreme Rules Lumberjack match, and the ring was surrounded by a strange platter of ECW expats like Balls Mahoney and Amish Roadkill, as well as forgotten “Raw” footnotes like Lance Cade, Rob Conway, and Viscera. Cena had been thrown through a table by Sabu on a previous episode of “Raw” and was shown a nasty glow, adding to the chaotic atmosphere.
The match was filled with chairs to the skull, lumberjack brawls, and a nasty ending where Cena F-U’d Sabu over the top rope through a table, seemingly breaking Sabu’s tailbone. It wasn’t an all-time great match in either man’s Hall of Fame career, but it was still an amazing thing nonetheless.
4. John Cena vs. The Great Khali
WWE One Night Stand: June 3, 2007
One of the things that truly makes a great professional wrestler is the ability to solve problems. The mark of greatness isn’t how well you can compete comfortably against skilled opponents, but rather – what can you do when you’re in an uncomfortable position?
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Maha Kali is a very big (literal and metaphorical) problem. He’s a spectacle — 7-foot-4, bodybuilder’s frame, menacing aura — but he can’t really move or collide, and his offense doesn’t always look good. However, Cena perfectly maximized Khali’s strengths and minimized his weaknesses.
Cena produced several big, spectacular moments in the match – a chop that sent him flying off the top rope to the floor, and a FU surface where Cena landed off a forklift onto the concrete (obviously landing on the cushion, but they did a good job with the magic). Everything else was Cena’s fault, making every shot Cali fired like a cannonball to the skull. Incredible spectacle abounds, and Cena has a real feather in his cap.
5. John Cena VS Rey Mysterio
WWE Raw: July 25, 2011
The album comes from Raw, a week after Cena lost the WWE Championship to CM Punk at Money in the Bank 2011. Rey Mysterio captured the title earlier in the show, and Punk will return after the match for a rematch. The entire story felt like a speedrun, and it would have been better if WWE had delayed Punk’s exit for more than a week and given Mysterio more than two hours as world champion before losing the belt.
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Despite the booking issues, it was still a great game.
Cena isn’t really a villain, but he’s a bit morally gray – he’s crossing the line, going after a friend who already had a grueling title match earlier that night, and doing so more aggressively than you might think. Cena sizzled more with each attack, and Mysterio took some hard, hard hits that put him in real danger while chopping at Cena’s legs for most of the match in an attempt to even the score a bit.
Mysterio is the greatest David in wrestling history, and it’s cool to see Cena play the misfit Goliath.
6. John Cena vs. CM Punk
WWE Live Show: February 22, 2013
Punk is arguably Cena’s biggest rival and this is a chance to watch them go against each other in a house show match and see the difference between a match designed for the cameras and posterity versus a match designed for a live crowd and just that crowd.
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The match came out of Qatar and was one of the last between the two – they had a match in Turkey the next night, a “Raw” match the following week and finally last year’s match. But here they have the comfort of long-term dance partners.
Punk did break through some old school heels early on. The eye pokes, the stalling, the heartbreaking handshakes – it all played out in the back row in true ’80s fashion, including Cena’s spectacular all-punch comeback, imitating Jerry Lawler in 1986.
We get the traditional near fall and comeback finishing run, but it all builds on the hype that preceded it, which makes the final victory all the more satisfying.
7. John Cena/Daniel Bryan/Sheamus VS The Shield
WWE Raw: January 27, 2014
A six-man tag team match with The Shield in the mid-2010s yielded an incredible number of hits. You could put these three against just about anyone and the matchup would be very compelling.
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Sheamus, Daniel Bryan, and Cena are truly tailor-made foils for The Shield formula. Sheamus was the perfect round eater early in the match, hitting everything in the match with such strong bass that it kept you invested in the build. Then, Cena, one of the greatest tag teams in history, was put in danger, leading to an explosive explosion of Daniel Bryan into a hot tag team boom.
Then comes the final section, where all the fireworks are set off at the same time. These six guys are nothing if not good at setting off fireworks.
8. John Cena vs. AJ Styles
WWE Live Show: July 16, 2016
In the latter half of the 2010s, the narrative that Cena “showed he could wrestle” continued to circulate during his feuds with Styles and Kevin Owens, as the matches were more oriented towards big impact moves and near falls.
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This is always a ridiculous topic based on a very limited way of defining a great wrestler.
The matches were certainly exciting, with Styles and Cena facing off in the main event of a house show at Madison Square Garden. It was the perfect combination of Cena’s traditional babyface work (against the interference from The Good Brothers) and the big bomb-dropping style that Styles brought to the table.