50 Absolute Worst Things WWE Has Done In The 21st Century

The Retribution faction studied earlier wanted to be an even edgier Nexus, but it failed. In the summer of 2010, NXT "rookies" banded together to take the fight to established stars in one of the biggest holy sh** moments in WWE Raw history. Wade Barrett led the charge, and the group carved out a respectable spot on cards for guys like Heath Slater, Justin Gabriel and David Otunga. It also threatened to turn the well-spoken Barrett into a headline WWE name.

John Cena said 'screw that'.

Cena's biggest fans won't want to talk about this now, but John reportedly used his backstage influence to smash the Nexus threat into smithereens at SummerSlam 2010. Both Edge and Chris Jericho spoke out against it, but Cena thought the heel team should do the honours for 'Team WWE' and like it. Fair enough, but there was a better way to go about that than making them look like outgunned enhancement workers lucky to main event on pay-per-view. 

Daniel Bryan, who had been legit fired then brought back following a controversial choking angle with ring announcer Justin Roberts, was a surprise member on the babyface side. That got a big pop. The match started hot, but Nexus members Darren Young and Michael Tarver were gone within minutes. Things settled into a back and forth groove of eliminations before Cena's ego ran wild...brother.

He pinned Gabriel and submitted Barrett within 30 seconds to close out the match later on. Nexus was soundly thrashed when they needed to look dominant and like a real threat. Edge and Jericho were right. This was thick and shortsighted from Cena and WWE; months of potential matches were flushed down the drain.