5 Ups & 8 Downs From John Cena's WWE Retirement Tour

3. Why Brock?

WWE brass would have everyone believe that there is a deeper purpose to every baffling decision they make, and that it will reveal itself at some point down the line. It could be a month or a year, but we’ll get the rationale eventually.

While we’re waiting for the masterstroke to explain it, there’s nothing to do other than to rage about the inexplicable decision to bring Brock Lesnar back to WWE, and worse, to have him squash a freshly turned babyface John Cena at Wrestlepalooza.

Lesnar made a shock return at the end of SummerSlam, dropping Cena moments after he lost the WWE title back to Cody Rhodes (more on that later). He then would return to the ring for the first time in two years to thrash Cena in a nine-minute extended squash that ultimately ended up being his sixth-to-final match.

This came in the middle of a resurgent babyface run, battling Sami Zayn for the United States Championship (Brock interfered and caused a DQ to set up their PLE match), and then having a tribute act-style match with AJ Styles the month after the Lesnar match (more on that later).

Lesnar’s own problematic situation and the negative PR that accompanies him is one thing. But bringing him back for a nonsensical squash in the middle of the feel-good third act of this retirement tour was entirely out of place. It wasn’t even a good match, nixing any attempt to just shrug everything off by raving about the action.