10 Wrestlers Who Brought WWE Careers Back From The DEAD
6. John Cena
Who could've known that dressing up as Vanilla Ice for a SmackDown Halloween party would save someone's skin? John Cena had fire and obvious potential from the off, but his generic boots n' tights look didn't do anything to help him stand out in 2002. So, rather sadly, the dude was sinking rather than swimming.
Enter that costume gig, and a surprise ability to rap. Almost overnight, Cena went from some scrub wearing garish green/purple/red/blue/yellow gear to a bad boy rapper who was like Eminem with muscles. His rhymes were so witty that fans eventually turned John babyface and his star kept rising.
He'd been on shortlists for the exit door pre-Halloween '02, which is a bit mad.
Cena is someone WWE calls "The Greatest Of All Time" these days, and he's successfully crossed over to Hollywood. Would any of that success have followed without the Vanilla Ice moment? It's a dizzying thought. Cena revived his fortunes by making the right people laugh.