10 Wrestlers Whose WWE Careers Were Derailed By John Cena
9. Kevin Owens
KO is perhaps the only wrestler to ever make a full recovery from the Cena burial. The then-NXT Champion made his Raw debut in May, 2015, answering Cena’s US Championship open challenge. Instead of fighting for the title, however, Owens beat Cena down and literally trod all over his belt, setting-up a non-title clash between the two that, shockingly, ended in Cena losing cleanly via pinfall.
Owens’ WWE career as off to a flying start, but things started going awry shortly after. KO would suffer consecutive losses to Cena at Money In The Bank and Battleground, effectively ending their feud, and condemning Owens to several directionless months in the midcard mire.
As with Rusev, WWE could’ve created a bona fide star of Kevin Owens there and then had they just put Owens over Cena in their feud-ending Battleground match. Currently one of the most reliably-entertaining performers on WWE television, Owens’ career could’ve panned-out very differently had he not recovered from those two big losses.