10 Wrestlers Who Didn't Peak In The WrestleMania Main Event

4. John Cena

WrestleMania main event:

He's had a few. He peaked as a drawing card at WrestleMania XXVIII in the best match you'd only ever want to watch once. Flabby and glacial, it was an experience for the fan, in the moment, and not the critic nor the obsessive. The occasion and spectacle carried it. Beyond that, Cena was comprehensively outclassed at 'Mania 23, lived down to every fierce criticism levelled at him at 'Mania XXVII, and couldn't rekindle the magic at 'Mania 29 in what was a better but far less memorable sequel.

REALLY peaked as a performer at:

Royal Rumble 2017. This was a literal peak - John Cena will never again return to this level - but what a peak. Cena by that point had mastered, improbably, a hybrid of the WWE Big Match and the back-and-forth Indie-indebted style that has come to redefine it. He and AJ Styles went at one another full pelt in an accelerating, heated banger that retained - and was settled by - the core of Cena's character. He rolled through to deliver a second AA to Styles because he wasn't (just) cosplaying. He was the stronger man, and looked like a total beast.