John Cena is one of the defining stars of WWE history who reigned as not only a sixteen-time world champion, but the face of the company for roughly a decade. WWE doesn’t hesitate to remind fans of his impact and accomplishments, not least of all when he hits an anniversary or gears up for a comeback.
Related: How Many Of John Cena’s Title Reigns Actually Mattered?However, for all of his victories and big moments, Cena nonetheless does also have a few chapters from his career that WWE would prefer to strike from the record, ranging from how he was booked early on to choices he made on his own.
10 John Cena Rapped About Wanting A One-Night Stand With Sable
Fall 2003 saw John Cena really start to breakout with a babyface turn that would lead him to the top of WWE. The turn came in the build to Survivor Series, when Cena rejected an invitation to join Brock Lesnar’s team, and wound up wrestling opposite him. Cena got to open the PPV with an entrance rap. The Doctor of Thuganomics gimmick hasn't aged so well, and Cena was in rare form that night, expressing his confidence in victory by asking if he could trade in his tag team partners “for a one-night stand with Sable?”
The line was more provocative than WWE would prefer these days, not to mention invoking Sable who is purportedly off limits to mention on air (besides which, there’s a fuzzy timeline, but this may or may not have been a reference to the real life relationship between Lesnar and Sable that came together around this time).
9 John Cena Had Already Put Over Roman Reigns Well Before Their SummerSlam Showdown
John Cena vs. Roman Reigns was a dream match to main event SummerSlam 2021, pitting an unbeatable heel champion against the face of the previous generation of WWE Superstars. One unfortunate subtext to this feud was that WWE had already run it four years earlier, when a part-time Cena returned to challenge the new face of WWE, Reigns.
Related: John Cena vs. Roman Reigns Was Actually A Disappointing Feud
They were both babyfaces for the 2017 version, and the results were not as strong—particularly for the match itself—but WWE didn’t want fans to remember this was far from a first-time match when they featured it in 2021.
8 John Cena Played The Bully Against John Laurinaitis
Over The Limit 2012 saw John Cena face an unlikely opponent in John Laurinaitis. Big Johnny had been retired from the ring for years by that point, and was better known to fans for his both kayfabe and real life role as an executive. While there’s some tradition and satisfaction even in watching cowardly heel get his comeuppance, this match—positioned in the PPV main event spot—was uncomfortable to watch as Cena delivered a prolonged beating designed to punish and humiliate Laurinaitis.
The beating went well past the point of catharsis to point of Cena just looking like a bully. That meant that, when The Big Show interfered to gift Big Johnny the win, there was actually some reason for fans to cheer.
7 Vince McMahon Assumed John Cena Was On Steroids
Bruce Prichard has commented on his podcast about Vince McMahon’s first impressions when initially met John Cena. McMahon was purportedly curt, quickly mentioning that the eventual face of the company needed “get off the gas” before he was on his way.
He assumed Cena was on steroids, which Cena apparently took real offense to, given what pride he took in being a natural bodybuilder en route to his pro wrestling career.
6 John Cena Dressed Up As Nikki Bella
Halloween 2016 saw an awkward scene develop when John Cena and Nikki Bella put together a video of the two of them dressing up in each other’s gear. This may have been cute, harmless enough fun, and Bella did pull off the Cena look fine.
The image of Cena squeezed into Bella’s gear has haunted viewers ever since then, though, and the whole scene aged particularly poorly after the couple broke up.
5 The Original Names Of John Cena’s Signature Moves
John Cena is widely known for hi so-called Five Moves of Doom. Looking back, it’s a bit uncomfortable that, in the earlier, edgier days of the Ruthless Aggression Era, Cena’s moves had not-so-PG names. That includes the Attitude Adjustment originally being called “The FU” (both a reference to profanity, and a response to Brock Lesnar’s F5, which started from a similar fireman’s carry position).
Correspondingly, his STF was known as the STFU. Only his fist drop has maintained a name with offensive underpinnings—the Five-Knuckle Shuffle reportedly originally conceived as a reference to, um, well you can take a guess.
4 John Cena Made Some Less Than PG Comments, Doing Press With Nikki Bella
The most public of John Cena's relationships was undoubtedly the one he shared with Nikki Bella. The coupling was often helpful to WWE, including offering a WrestleMania moment for the proposal between them in 2017, as well as plenty of fodder for Total Divas and Total Bellas.
However, there were moments when they appeared to become a little too comfortable with each other. In a public appearance, October 2016, a young fan asked Cena what his favorite food was, and he responded with a wildly inappropriate sexual innuendo about Bella.
3 A Continuity Error For One Of John Cena’s Biggest Moments On Total Divas
The first two episodes of season two of Total Divas feature John Cena and Nikki Bella in conflict, related to Cena’s longstanding resistance to marriage or starting a family. One of the more iconic scenes of the show features Cena waiting at the end of a pier to romantically reconcile with her. However, a continuity error revealed that, despite fans learning some things from Total Divas, the show also could be quite contrived, including this artificially constructed scene.
A quick cut at the end of the episode “New Diva on the Block” shows Cena waiting to make a romantic gesture with a bottle of wine and two wine glasses. For the rest of the shots, the wine and glasses have mysteriously disappeared as he instead holds a bouquet of flowers.
2 John Cena Cheated To Win His First WrestleMania Match
One year after John Cena was intended to have a rap battle with Jay-Z, he made his proper debut at the Showcase of the Immortals. The fact that John Cena’s first WrestleMania match saw him beat The Big Show in Madison Square Garden, and in so doing Cena won his first title on the main roster—becoming United States Champion—is a great story.
Related: Why The United States Championship Is So Important To John Cena's WWE Career
However, an unfortunate footnote is that the win was far from clean, as Cena punched Show with brass knuckles to incapacitate him before hitting the Attitude Adjustment. The choice fit Cena’s edgier character and the style of the time, besides protecting Show in defeat. Nonetheless, if WWE could do it over, they’d probably rather have the up and comer win that match clean before winning his first world title one year later.
1 John Cena Spent Nearly A Month Relegated To Velocity
WWE has been open in multiple documentaries that John Cena was once on the chopping block, at risk of being released when he struggled to find his footing on the main roster, before landing on the Doctor of Thuganomics gimmick.
One part they leave out is that he actually didn’t even appear on SmackDown for a period of weeks in fall 2002, relegated instead to the little-watched Velocity show. Fortunately, he did find his way, dressed as Vanilla Ice for a Halloween episode of SmackDown that set up his rap gimmick. He never looked back from there.
