John Cena Turns Heel and Sells Out to the Rock, The Hobby Impact
With the road and hype to WWE’s biggest of the year, Wrestlemania, ramping up the WWE hosted their Elimination Chamber PLE at the Rogers Centre in Toronto, Ontario Canada. The event did not disappoint and although it’s a cliche thrown out far too often in wrestling, history truly was made at the Rogers Centre.
Leading up to the event several storylines for the men's division were set for a collision course in the main event involving CM Punk, Seth Rollins, Logan Paul, and Drew McIntyre among others. However, the two biggests ones involved John Cena’s last chance to win the Chamber and headline Wrestlemania one last time before retirement and The Rock making a Godfather offer to WWE Champion Cody Rhodes to sell out with the answer coming after the main event.
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The main event was solid and ended with Cena, the favorite both sentimentally and otherwise, winning the match and earning a title shot at Wrestlemania. It was after the match where things took an unexpected turn. The Rock with Travis Scott entered the ring after Cody Rhodes came out to celebrate with John Cena to get his answer. Cody Rhodes not so politely declined, embraced the Cena only for Cena’s face to turn dark and then low blow Cody Rhodes. Scott, The Rock, and Cena all took turns beating down Rhodes, leaving him bloody and defeated in the middle of the ring.
I’m not exaggerating or being hyperbolic when I say that this was one the most, if not the most shocking moment in wrestling history, specifically Cena’s villainous turn. The WWE had long resisted turning Cena heel (the term for bad guy in wrestling) even when he started getting mixed responses during his last full time run with the company. The reason for that was that while older wrestling fans who came of age during the Attitude Era were tired of his super hero act, Cena was still massively popular among children. Having Cena as the bad guy had the potential to kill his merchandise sales at the time so to preserve that revenue stream Cena remained booked as a fan favorite despite those mixed reactions.
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The question now that Cena has made a turn to the dark side is how will this affect his standing in the collectibles market. The short answer is that I’m not sure. One reason for the lack of clarity is that this is truly unprecedented in the world of professional wrestling. Some have made the parallel to when Hulk Hogan became the villain and formed the NWO. That moment happened in the mid 90s and predated the collectibles market we have now. Also Hulk Hogan was working for a company different from where he made his reputation as the all American Hero (WCW vs WWF) compared to Cena who has only worked for the WWE during his career.
My educated guess is that because this move generated a significant amount of buzz we may see a bump in Cena card values going forward. That momentum could carry past Wrestlemania especially if Cena wins the WWE title to break Ric Flair’s record for most recognized world championship reigns. As of now though it’s too early to tell where the market will go. Also so far Topps has yet to release a Topps Now card or autograph from last night. However, after being called out on social media for not having one they did reply saying to stayed tuned to their socials above a picture of Cena, Scott and the Rock in the ring. I would expect that card to be massively popular, especially if its autographed, amongst fans and a top chase for any wrestling collector.
