10 Big Mistakes WWE Have Made With Bray Wyatt

John Cena’s burial days appear to be behind him. WWE’s most marketable star is settling into a reduced role during his career’s final stages, and while he’ll always be featured prominently, he’s no longer the roadblock to main event stardom he used to be. Cena’s recent work with AJ Styles and Dean Ambrose proves this, and while this change is ultimately positive for WWE, it’ll be of little consolation to Bray Wyatt.

The duo first ran into one another at the 2014 Royal Rumble. The Wyatt Family interfered in Cena’s World Heavyweight Championship match with Randy Orton, costing him the belt, and leaving him beaten down after. Driven by the goal of tearing down John Cena’s squeaky clean image, Wyatt’s attacks continued over the ensuing weeks, but his actions were greatly undersold by Cena.

John would show fear every now and then, but he often resulted to pure mockery, and that essentially buried Wyatt’s entire character. Resorting to crude Photoshopped images and poking fun at Wyatt’s sketchy appearance, Cena poured corrosive acid over Wyatt’s mystique, and his value was all but stripped away.

As for the matches? You can probably tell how they went. Cena “overcame the odds” to defeat Wyatt at WrestleMania despite interference from Harper and Rowan. The feud continued at Extreme Rules, where Wyatt picked up a tainted “win” through repeated interference from his henchmen and a demonic child (because Bray Wyatt), but that was his sole victory. Wyatt was defeated by Cena in a Last Man Standing match at Payback, and that was that.

The WrestleMania match was particularly egregious, and did more damage to The Wyatt Family’s reputation than any other singular event. John Cena effectively defeated all three of them single-handedly, when he had the perfect opportunity to put Bray over and cement him as a main event star.