10 WWE Superstars John Cena Has Put Over
They're not all Wade Barrett, you know...
Big Match John is regularly panned for being the death knell on the careers of many rising superstars. Him being the franchise of WWE for so long meant that the company always had a reluctance to let superstars get over at his expense, which naturally drew ire from many fans who were wanting to see something new.
Even though we cannot deny that feuds with Cena have proved catastrophic for many wrestlers, claiming this to be the only outcome of a Cena feud is a false narrative which should not be promoted.
John Cena, over the past few years, has changed his role from the franchise to the measuring stick and been put in more and more feuds with the up-and-comers. A John Cena rub has always been valuable, precisely because it was so rare. Now that he is slowing down as he prepares for life beyond the squared circle, let's analyse his attempts at guaranteeing a bright future by looking at 10 wrestlers who beat him.
10. Dolph Ziggler
Dolph Ziggler had been part of the WWE for seven years when he started feuding with John Cena in 2012. The heel tandem of Vickie Guerrero and Dolph were going up against the biggest superstar in recent memory. The two hadn't had a lot of success and people had written off Ziggler as just another WWE missed opportunity. That changed when he went up against John Cena in 2012.
Ziggler and Cena feuded through the end of 2012 to the start of 2013, which saw a bizarre relationship angle added to it with AJ Lee and Vickie Guererro involved. That didn't take away from the fact that Dolph beat Cena at TLC 2012 to defend his Money in the Bank briefcase. Ziggler had held his own against the biggest star in WWE and that image went a long way for him, as he went on to became World Heavyweight Champion eventually.
Cena helped Ziggler later in his babyface resurgence in 2014, as Dolph was the sole survivor of Team Cena in one of the best traditional five-on-five Survivor Series matches of the modern era. This saw Cena put over Ziggler in multiple promos, making The Showoff a pivotal part of WWE programming.