John Cena is at a very interesting point in his career. He has been the face of the company ever since Wrestlemania 21, where he defeated JBL to win his first ever WWE championship. 11 years later, he is now a fifteen-time world champion and still remains to be the face of the company.
Since his mega push of 2005, Cena has garnered the most polarizing reactions in the history of WWE, but a guaranteed full house reaction every time.
Also, Cena has sold more merchandise than any superstar in WWE history. But being the face of the company is not simply just being booked as the top star constantly and holding multiple championships, but so much more. It is representing the company, going for media tours, press conferences all around the world. It is granting hundreds of “Make-A-Wish” requests, it is going to late night talk shows, and so much more.
In order to be the face of the company, you need to live and breathe the WWE.
Ultimately, there have been only 4 real faces of the WWE: Hulk Hogan, Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock and John Cena, and Cena has been the longest tenured face of the company among all of them. For that, he deserves tremendous respect. However, in the last couple of years, there is no doubt that even the fans who disliked Cena have warmed up considerably to him.
For all times that come, time must end as well. And Cena’s career looks to be winding down quite a bit, if not completely ending. He is still the face of the company, but there must be a time where he won’t be anymore. WWE looked to make Roman Reigns the successor to John Cena in 2015, but their plans backfired as the crowd rejected Reigns and started booing him heavily from Royal Rumble 2015 onwards.
We all know what the story has been for Reigns, and it looks like WWE are stopping Reigns’ push as the top guy for the time being. On the latest edition of Talking Smack, Renee Young asked Cena if AJ could take his spot, to which Cena said, “I’m openly waiting for someone to step up and do that”.
When Cena was asked by Bryan what it would take to do that, Cena said “Absolute consistency”. In the meanwhile, John Cena faces AJ Styles at Summerslam in what is expected to be the culmination of their feud.
After his match against AJ Styles at SummerSlam, Cena is likely to take a break from WWE and will miss SmackDown Live’s first PPV, Backlash.
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