John Cena has been at the top of the WWE for over a decade now has had a meteoric rise since his days as the “Doctor of Thuganomics” where he took the WWE Universe by storm as a white-boy rapper. As a 15-time world champion, Cena is definitely one of the greatest of all time, at least on paper.
WWE has tried to portray him as a white meat babyface since his transition from the rapper gimmick and even though a vocal section of the audience has turned against Cena in recent years given his superhuman booking, WWE won’t turn their golden goose heel – even though a Cena heel turn is sure to set the pro wrestling world alight like Hogan’s did in the mid-90’s.
As a five-time Wrestlemania main-eventer, a surefire future Hall of Famer and the face of the company, there are certain things in Cena’s past that WWE actively tried to hide about Cena’s past from fans. A character such as Cena, who has been a babyface for years and is an icon for kids, WWE want certain facts about Cena’s past as far away from WWE programming as possible.
Honourable Mentions
Comments on the Howard Stern Show – WWE wants fans to forget about his appearance on The Howard Stern show. Cena said some very controversial things during the interview that would definitely hurt his fan friendly squeaky clean image. Cena spoke about his opinions on steroids, his drinking habits and sexual intercourse with ‘fat girls’. Cena spoke about how his buddies once challenged him to sleep with a fat girl and Cena said he duly obliged, stating that he “took one for the team”.
John Cena buries The Nexus – Cena has been at the top of the WWE for over 10 years. In this time he’s been accused of ‘burying’ a number of talents by either not letting them go over or refusing to job clean on occasions. None of the instances was more apparent or damaging than the burial of The Nexus at SummerSlam 2010.
He’s tapped out – Despite Cena’s tagline “Never Give Up” and his claims of never taping out, that just isn’t the case. Cena has tapped twice in his career and to two of the best submission based wrestlers in wrestling history – Kurt Angle and Chris Benoit.
Had an affair with an adult film star? – John Cena’s ex-wife has claimed in the past that Cena cheated on her for over a year, while they were married, with adult film star Kendra Lust. The above photo has also done rounds on the internet further fueling speculation. Kendra, for her part, has denied these allegations but has also said that she’d gladly date John Cena if he were to pursue her.
5: Messy public divorce and numerous cheating allegations
John Cena married his high-school sweetheart Elizabeth Huberdeau in 2009. However, the pair were divorced by 2012. The divorce was a public and messy affair even though WWE and Cena did their best to keep matters as under the radar as possible. Elizabeth accused Cena of cheating on her and having multiple affairs.
Rumours of Cena’s affairs have been flying around for years with names likes adult film star Kendra Lust, Kelly Kelly and AJ Lee being linked to him.
The most notorious of these are the Mickie James rumours. Cena and James were in vignettes together on episodes of Raw in 2008 and the sexual tension between them was obvious as the two of them kissed on-screen with Cena even mentioning something about underwear. The duo allegedly had a short affair after which Cena politicked to get James, one of the top women in the company at the time, fired with WWE complying with Cena’s wishes.
4: He once took a dump under the ring during a match
No, a terrible botch or falling flat on your face during the entrance is not the most embarrassing thing that could happen to a wrestler. What is it? Well, one answer is – as Steve Austin and CM Punk would reiterate – crapping in your tights during a match.
Another famous name on this list is the one and only John Cena. Even though Cena beats most of his opponents, one which he couldn’t beat was food poisoning. Luckily for Cena, this event occurred at a house show and not on a televised program.
While Cena claims that the event occurred in Saskatchewan, Canada it seems to have taken place at a house show in Jacksonville, Florida with his opponent probably being Scott Steiner. Cena wrestled despite being ill as he often does and ended up going under the ring during the match to relieve himself.
3: He lost a match to Kevin Federline
Think of the illustrious and tiny list of names that have beaten John Cena – Kurt Angle, Brock Lesnar, Triple H and The Rock amongst others – and add to that list Kevin Federline.
Kevin who? Well, the Kevin Federline of Britney Spears fame, that’s who. During the mid-to-end 2000’s Raw became a place for B-grade celebrities to promote and shill their movies. There were real stars like Seth Green and Ken Jeong on occasion, there were also people like Kevin Federline on – the same Kevin Federline who’s most famous for being married to Britney Spears at one point.
Federline was on WWE Raw for a brief period in 2006 to promote his terrible rap album Playing With Fire and somehow ended up in a mini-feud with none other than John Cena. Federline even got himself into a one-on-one match with John Cena in 2007 and even beat him (so Kevin Federline can beat Cena but The Nexus needs to get buried?). The win was nowhere near clean but still, he lost to Kevin freaking Federline. No wonder I stopped watching WWE soon after.
2: Spanked Stephanie McMahon on air
It’s fair to say that Cena’s character was a lot for risqué during the Ruthless Aggression Era. The year was 2003 and Stephanie McMahon was both an on-air talent and transitioning into the role of a businesswoman.
Cena was in his ‘Doctor of Thuganomics’ character at the time and was involved in an in-ring segment rap with Stephanie McMahon on an episode of SmackDown. Cena asked Stephanie within the rap if he could spank her and an enraged Stephanie challenged him to do so if he had the guts and bent over and presented her posterior to the future advocate of Hustle, Loyalty, and Respect. Of course, Cena went through with it.
My question about this whole thing – what did Triple H think of this segment?
1: The Prototype
John Cena, ‘The face that runs the place’, would inarguably have been nowhere near the star he is today if WWE had gone through with his original gimmick. The original gimmick Cena was saddled with was a Terminator-esque half-human half-robot called The Prototype (yes, seriously).
A lot of WWE Superstars have overcome terrible early gimmicks like The Rock, Triple H and Kane overcame terrible early gimmicks to become household names, a half-human half-robot definitely sounds like a death knell to any career. Thankfully for Cena, his character got switched up to that of a rapper soon after his SmackDown debut and the rest, as they say, is history.
What makes Sting special? His first AEW opponent opens up RIGHT HERE.
