100 Worst WWE Matches Ever - 80 - John Cena vs. The Miz
WWE Championship - Wrestlemania 27
Let’s get the positives out the way first. The video package for Miz is an all timer and is rightly remembered as such. It deserves its place in the pantheon of incredible WWE video packages and is one of the few that deserve to be in that “My Way” tier. The bubble text for Miz makes its debut here, and is also very cool. The entrances are befitting of the build up to this match - Miz carrying the workload of the build, while Cena is looking past him to the real star, The Rock.
Speaking of entrances, the cynic in me has to bring up John Cena’s entrance. It features a very out-of-character and out of place choir that is definitely not to pander to the Atlanta audience. Also the debut of his red shirt, which came along with it an entrance titantron that looked conspicuously like the confederate flag. Probably one of the oddest entrances in Wrestlemania history.
Before the match even starts, this has an uphill task due to the booking going into the show. With the Rock as the guest host, everyone knew there would be shenanigans. Unless of course you thought that his guest host appearance would be limited to an atrocious 20 minute promo to start the show, and a series of unfunny comedy backstage segments. Whenever you know some kind of interference is inevitable, I feel that the majority of the time the rest of the match suffers as there’s less drama. How can we buy any false finish when we all know nothing can end until the Rock comes out? In that regard, they were almost doomed from the start, however I’ve seen enough similar situations where the wrestlers have worked through an obvious finish to produce a compelling match (Eddie vs Brock from No Way Out 2004 comes to mind).
Another issue is that this is a four hour show, which live fans struggle with at the best of times. Not only was it a four hour show, but it was a bad four hour show with one major peak in terms of fan reaction (Undertaker vs Triple H). Much like Wrestlemania 18 and 25, the fans in attendance were agitated and unenthusiastic going into the main event.
Above all else, the more pressing issue here is that John Cena very clearly doesn’t have his working boots on for this match. If I could describe his performance it would be lethargic and apathetic. He’s overselling everything - not in a Shawn Michaels kind of way - but he’ll take a punch and just fall down and stay down. The commentators even reference this by saying he got rattled and knocked loopy by a Miz punch early in the match (ironic knowing how the match would end). He’ll get whipped into the turnbuckle and fall to the ground. It disrupts any attempt at building a flow to the match. Any offence he does have, in a match dominated for about 90% of it by the Miz, looks terrible. In short, he doesn’t seem to have a great deal of energy, urgency or intensity. I can understand to an extent the lack of motivation. He’s wrestling a match he’s due to lose, and a match that solely exists to set up the match next year. But at the same time, I can’t give him a pass as this is the most important match of the year, in theory. This is the sort of phoned in performance you could forgive a wrestler for on Raw or SmackDown, but this is a main event match in the biggest show of the year.
Miz works hard, but he’s not good enough to compensate for an un-cooperative opponent. Again, this is where the booking doesn’t help. Miz was never presented as a main event talent that could fairly compete with an opponent of Cena’s calibre. Yet, this match tries to present them as equals, which doesn’t work because that hasn’t been established that way. He should have either been built up stronger to give him that needed credibility, or should have used underhanded tactics and intelligence to gain advantage instead of beating up Cena, which nobody could believe. Despite the WWE main event formula being an almost fool proof concept, it doesn’t work if the wrestlers are not perceived as equals.
The first finish was a stupid idea on so many levels. For starters, that isn’t a bump I would trust most wrestlers taking. When you do a spot, you have to think about what the reaction you are going to get and is it worth the danger of the spot. The crowd is fairly lukewarm to the spot, either because they didn’t think it looked good, or because the Rock still hadn’t returned so they knew it wasn’t a likely finish. Plus, who would want a Wrestlemania main event to end like this? What is this, Wrestlemania 8? The second fault is that the finish 100% justified Miz getting counted out, that much is apparent. But Cena should not have been counted out based on the bump he takes, which makes that double count out spot feel contrived. Production almost miss the spot entirely by showing another replay and only just cut back to the full picture in time to see Miz’s concussion.
Anyway, this brings out The Rock, who restarts the match (taking his sweet ass time with it, just more timing issues for this whole show). He Rock Bottoms John Cena, and helps a clearly dazed and confused Miz pick up a win that he’ll never remember. Poor guy. The result itself I think is a shocker. Not only the aforementioned fact that Miz was not booked as a main event wrestler. But while we’ve seen heels such as Seth Rollins, Roman Reigns (x3), and Brock Lesnar win in the main event of Wrestlemania in recent years, back in 2011 it was a much rarer occurrence. Up to this point, the only two heels that left the final match with victory were Triple H at Wrestlemania 2000, and if you want to count him, Stone Cold Steve Austin at Wrestlemania 17.
Even still, the Miz is truly the luckiest man in the world. Not only does he have incredible success, a beautiful loving wife and a lovely family, a stable dream job, and is by all accounts an all round good guy, but he also has the benefit of completely forgetting of this match unlike the rest of us.
Up Next - The Elimination Chamber is WWE’s most reliable stipulation for good matches. It’s almost entirely idiot proof. And yet even that is not immune to the list.
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