2 Ups & 6 Downs From Last Night's WWE SmackDown (Aug 15)

3. Cena Gets Dragged To Jinder's Level

John Cena is a tremendous big match performer, and a man who’ll always be underrated thanks to the colossal amount of unjust hatred he has received throughout his career. He’s a basic worker, sure, but his track record doesn’t lie. From AJ Styles and Roman Reigns to Daniel Bryan and CM Punk, ‘The Face That Runs The Place’ has had great bouts with a huge variety of opponents, but there’s one major problem with his work.

Cena never drags other wrestlers down, but he rarely elevates them either. Instead, he tends to work exactly to their level, and while it takes an unquestionably high level of skill to match the likes of Styles and Bryan, he has never been one to elevate lesser talent.

Unfortunately, Jinder Mahal falls into that category.

The duo wrestled in last night’s main event, and it stunk. A typical Jinder match, it was basic, plodding, and completely devoid of urgency or energy. WWE once again tried to mask Mahal’s deficiencies by filling it with Singh Brothers-related shenanigans, but the flaws were all too apparent, and it ended in a DQ when Baron Corbin attacked Cena.

A particularly bad match, this served only to further the feud between Cena and ‘The Lone Wolf.’ It did nothing for Mahal, who remains the least impressive WWE Champion in recent memory, and whose reign of error must now come to a sharp halt at SummerSlam.