Could John Cena have made it in WCW?

[MrMojoRisin]

Really? So Steve Austin didn't get over anyways and become one of the biggest stars the business has ever seen? Yes, actually, he did. And that was even after being given the Ringmaster gimmick.

So, like I said, superstars aren't made by the company, they make themselves. And, yes, you are more than welcome to ask Austin or any other wrestler who was successful and they will tell you the same thing. Many of them are on record saying the same thing. Hell, it's obviously one of Jim Ross's biggest pet peeves if you watch the Legends of Wrestling series.
No, I'm not. He has been the top draw in the wrestling business for close to 10 years. And not only has he been the top draw for nearly 10 years, he's done it during the national TV era, when he's on TV every week has a PPV every month.

There is not another professional wrestler in history who can make the same claim.

You're obviously a dumbass if you truly believe this.

Cena has had great matches with many different workers, working many different types of matches. Anyone who knows anything about pro wrestling knows how great Cena is. Obviously you don't know much about wrestling.



Buff Bagwell was over in WCW. Lex Luger was over in WCW. Goldberg was over in WCW. John Cena is far better than any of those three.

Nonsense. Again, you obviously don't understand pro wrestling.

Why is it laughable? Because you don't know what the hell you're talking about? What's laughable is when morons who don't understand wrestling make stupidly outrageous claims in a snide manner.



You mean, besides Austin, the guys who were there for a brief cup of coffee when they were incredibly green and inexperienced workers? We're supposed to use THAT to determine how good Cena would have been?

That's just stupid.

Because he was a very good worker. I mean, good God, the man was given the character of an UNDERTAKER. What a fucking awful gimmick, but he was so good and had such an ability to make fans care about him, he made the awful gimmick work.
Yes, why not? He is great on the mic, has a great look and is a tremendous worker. John Cena would have been successful in WCW.

Is that Steve Austin during his Ringmaster days? Is that Chris Jericho in the WWF when, after debuting in a dueling promo with the Rock, he spent years working the midcard, including a feud against a woman?

These guys weren't superstars in the WWF right away. It's not like their star power was there, just untapped. No, they needed to learn how to become a superstar. And they did. Just like DDP did. Just like Cena would.

Cena was misused in the WWE, didn't seem to hurt him. "Misused" is a phrase reserved for wrestlers resigned to the "he's a good hand" status, not a phrase reserved for superstars. Superstars draw money and wrestling companies want to make money.

Like Sting was fed?

The fact is Cena would have been a superstar. A true superstar can never "be fed" to someone, they will always overcome a loss to remain a superstar. How many times has Cena lost a match in the WWE? He loses all the time. But it doesn't affect his drawing power because he's a superstar.

Maybe, if you conveniently forget that whole NWO thing...

What else would a professional wrestler ever want but to draw heat?

The premise here is if John Cena would have made it in WCW, so we can throw out examples of people like Austin who made it in another company. They don't apply to the adage of "talent always gets over in the end".

However, someone like Austin is a great case study for what would have happened to a John Cena in that era, in that company.

Austin had a good run for a while as Stunning Steve Austin. US champ when that was actually important. Good spot in the companies main heel faction at the time. Good tag run with Pillman. He was a guy getting built to go to the next level in WCW.

This was all before Hogan and the ex-WWF guys showed up though, because once that happened, everything in WCW was different.

The guys that had been featured in the WWF were treated better than WCW's home grown talent, who were for the most part, all pushed down the card. Austin for example, went from being a guy that looked primed to be a top heel, to a guy that was jobbed out to Hacksaw Duggan in less than a minute.

If Cena comes into that company before the WWF guys, he'd have started off pretty good for himself and got built up. Once Hogan and friends showed up though, he would have had a harder time. Just like he did with so many others in that company, Hogan would have held Cena back to further both himself, and his friends... and just like they did so many times, WCW executives would have listened because he was Hulk Hogan.

If Cena comes into WCW after the NWO starts though... then I think he has a harder time. The backstage politics were worse and the roster was so deep that people were just having a ridiculously hard time standing out.

I just don't see it where John Cena is able to get the same opportunity that he got in the WWF to break through. The big thing going for him in real life was that the WWF at the time had a good roster of main event players, and thus were more willing to take the time to let new characters like a John Cena get over properly. In WCW, their were too many guys desperately trying to keep their own spots at the top who were holding others back.

In the end, Cena would have gotten to where he is like he did anyways... but he would have had to leave WCW to do it. Just like Austin, Foley, Taker, Jericho, Guerrero, Benoit, ect had to do.

 

[WBL]

Concerning WCW's penchant for goofy film-related gimmicks, like bringing Chucky and Robocop to life... and concerning how John Cena was originally known as The Prototype... I almost wonder what WCW would have done with him had they decided to use the Terminator license. Maybe he's a prototype for the upcoming wave of terminators sent to obliterate humanity. Maybe little John Conner is a member of the Cenation right now...

Of course, they probably could have just afforded Ahnuld.

So... no.

Not unless he really came into his own in Misfits in Action, with the later pseudo-military gimmick. He might have fit in there. But then again, MIA didn't really fit in all that much themselves.

 

[Slyfox696]

The premise here is if John Cena would have made it in WCW, so we can throw out examples of people like Austin who made it in another company. They don't apply to the adage of "talent always gets over in the end".

Except you completely missed the point (both of them, actually) I was making with Austin.

However, someone like Austin is a great case study for what would have happened to a John Cena in that era, in that company.

Austin had a good run for a while as Stunning Steve Austin. US champ when that was actually important. Good spot in the companies main heel faction at the time. Good tag run with Pillman. He was a guy getting built to go to the next level in WCW.

This was all before Hogan and the ex-WWF guys showed up though, because once that happened, everything in WCW was different.

It was. And if Austin was still in WCW, he would have been just as talented as he turned out to be in the WWF.

What so many people don't understand is that professional wrestlers get better as they get more experienced. Too many fans think a wrestler has the same level of ability their entire career, and that's just plain false.

 

[THTRobtaylor]

The whole thread is pointless in one sense... WCW was folded by the time Cena was active/ready for the main roster so you can't just transplant his character of today into a different era and expect it to work.

Look at the guys who DID go to the Power Plant while WCW was near to folding like Jindrak, O'Haire, Palumbo and then the ones who didn't get in like Batista... there was a different style of training there, they were less focused on look but about being "tough" where as OVW's class of '01-02 were all taught far differently. It's telling how many Power Plant alumni actually went on to WWE careers when compared to those in OVW in the 2 years before WCW folded. Indeed the only one to really succeed on any level long term was Shane Helms, and arguably his grounding came more from his time in OMEGA with the Hardyz rather than direct input from Sarge and the WCW crew.

Now... had Cena gone to WCW in 2000 for example, to the Power Plant at that time. I realistically can't see him ever being more than low tier fodder for the awful wastes of talent that topped the roster at that time. He would have been Kwee Wee or The Stro or a poor imitation of early 90's Sting...

So would Batista, Randy Orton, Brock Lesnar, Shelton Benajmin...be at that level... any of that class of 02 would have struggled in WCW. None were ready for the big time until WCW was in the ground and had it been rushed, as WCW would have done (see Goldberg) then you may have got lucky with one... Lesnar was pretty hard to screw up... but most would have been also rans rather than this generations mega-stars.

Cena grew as he did directly because of the group he grew around in OVW, they all benefitted from knowing each others work THAT well before they got to the roster, then only had to spend time refining and "not doing the same thing" or keeping it fresh... How many times since the day they started OVW have Cena and Orton headlined a show? in the hundreds or potentially thousands by now... Cena wouldn't have gotten that from WCW in era... It's why this past lot of NXT graduates are also doing so well like the Shield, Wyatt...

WCW never had the machine to create new stars, Goldberg only worked because Hogan was a friend of his brothers...not cos of anything the Powerplant or WCW did or even a "gift"...If Hogan was gonna lose to someone, may as well be an old buddy... The cruisers only worked cos they had all worked together in ECW or Japan or Mexico... WCW didn't create that out of Rey, Benoit, Malenko, Jericho and Juvi...

The best way to describe it is I can remember watching Cena's debut with my younger brother, the match with Angle and more notably the segment with Vince... I said to my bro then "That's the next Hogan"... in WCW he wouldn't have gotten NEAR that opportunity off the bat or even after 5 years on the roster.

Character wise, it needed the rapper in him to come out, WCW wouldn't have given him a mic in any era, much less allowed him the freedom he got in those early days, especially when Nash, Hall and Hogan were around. It needed time to also bed in to popular culture... to become acceptable... too early and he is Snow or the punchline in the "Rap is Crap" video... in 2000 it's too Eminem rip off or too controversial still... but by 2003/4 it was far more accepted to have not only a white rapper on TV running down opponents from a TV network perspective but parents were more comfortable with the concept of a face doing it... WWE was the only place that could ever happen.

 

[I Heart Cena]

John Cena is one of the greatest professional wrestlers in history and is one of the hardest working pro wrestlers in history. It wouldn't matter when John Cena came through, he would have been a star.

Contrary to popular belief, stars are not made by companies, but rather make themselves. John Cena has made himself a star and it doesn't matter what time period you discuss, Cena would have been a star.

No he wouldn't have, cena is a joke. He would have been Johnny the Bull status, as mentioned above. The guy can't wrestle or cut promos.

He was never a legit star after 2005. Vince kept him at the top because cena is a kissass.

 

[rbv13]

Who gives a crap about what Cena the blue chipper would have done. Lets talk about the Dr. of Thuganomics running with the Public Enemy or Konnan and gang.

John Cena of today would have just as success then as he does today. The nature of the industry back then was much different and the fans would have seen a much edgier Cena. However to answer the question at hand that success most likely would not have come in WCW. He would have joined the many other defectors and found a nice home with the WWF.

 

[Slyfox696]

No he wouldn't have, cena is a joke. He would have been Johnny the Bull status, as mentioned above. The guy can't wrestle or cut promos.

He was never a legit star after 2005. Vince kept him at the top because cena is a kissass.

Do you ever get tired of saying stupid things? Cena is clearly one of the greatest pro wrestlers ever. Go troll somewhere else.

 

[RKO920]

Back in the WCW glory days, he would have been a mid carder who when his contract was up went to WWE and became a superstar. Jericho, Guerrero, Benoit, Big Show, and Mysterio, all great wrestlers in WCW with 2 of them being world champion in WCW. But none of them achieved the stardom they did in WWE in WCW. With the creative control guys like Hogan, Hall and Nash had a young John Cena would have wrestled his way to the WWE and then more than likely still became the guy we know today.