8 WWE Superstars Who Could Have Surpassed John Cena As “The Guy”
5. Batista
John Cena and Batista rose in the ranks right around the same time. Both men made their main roster debuts in 2002, excelled on their respective brands, and won their first world titles at WrestleMania 21. From there, it was merely a matter of who WWE would go with as the face of the company.
Batista appeared to be destined for that spot, when he swapped shows with Cena and became the biggest star on SmackDown. Unfortunately for 'The Animal', SmackDown was, is and always will be the B-show in WWE's eyes. As a result, Cena became the man on Monday nights and was synonymous with the flagship show for the next decade.
Batista was every bit as popular (if not more so) than Cena at the end of the Ruthless Aggression era, could hold his own in the ring, and looked like he was chiseled out of stone. There wasn't a real reason why WWE went with Cena over Batista except for the age difference, but even then, WWE could have ran with Batista as the franchise player before retiring from the ring years later.