Backstage News on The Rock vs. John Cena

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The verbal battle between The Rock and John Cena on Monday's RAW Supershow from Portland was designed for Cena to get the upper-hand this time around. This was achieved by having Cena point out that Rock had notes for his promo written on his wrist. Some in WWE claim that Cena pointing this out was unscripted.

WWE officials are determined to get a 50/50 reaction for both men at WrestleMania 28 in Miami

Hard to get a 50/50 reaction in Dwayne's home town...

it was achieved by cena being class last week and dwayne sucking pretty bad this week. Cena's face to face burning was merely delicious icing on the cake.

Mackem wrote:

Hard to get a 50/50 reaction in Dwayne's home town...

If Cena keeps up what he's been doing it will be no problem, don't forget this is Wrestlemania, not a local show, yes some people from Miami will be there, but a lot if not most the crowd won't be. So if Cena keeps one upping Rock it will be easy

Partial Source: The Wrestling Observer

There had been much speculation regarding John Cena calling out The Rock for having notes on his wrist during a recent promo on RAW. While some had stated that Cena mentioning the notes were part of the script, those reports appear to be incorrect. It now appears that Rock had the notes as a reference point, incase he needed them during his lengthy live promo.

A source close to the situation mentions a promo from last year, when John Cena made reference of being able to the see the teleprompter The Rock was reading off of in the reflection. It is not believed that the improvised comments by Cena, which are revealing some of the tricks The Rock uses to perform his promos, is am example of the real animosity between the men.

Also, the WWE Youtube page does not have footage posted of that segment from RAW anymore. This is a surprising move, since WWE has been posting most of the Raw segments to the page, and also that the episode was promoted big time as Rock's return to the show for the first time since the build to Survivor Series. Finally, all other segments involving the two men are available on the Youtube archive.

There have been other versions of the video uploaded by people not affiliated with WWE, and have not been uploaded with the permission of WWE. There have also been other versions of the video posed by certain international television networks where it appears the notes on The Rock's wrist are blocked out via a block that is the matching color of The Rock's arm. Since WWE airs at different times and days in various markets, it would seem that the segment had been edited.

Some now feel that this is evidence of the reports that there are true dislike and competitiveness between the two.

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Word is that The Rock and John Cena will not have any physical contact until the March 26th RAW Supershow, the final show before WrestleMania 28.

I'm thinking Rock will start it, can't see Cena throwing the first punch

so what are they going to do about Cena purposely writing on his arm this week and reading it out?

I don't think there's genuine dislike between the two at all - there's so much about Cena that Rocky could tear him a new one for, these reports are just buliding the hype for the match. like last year, when suddenly reports about Michael Cole being a dick backstage suddenly surfaced... and then disappeared straight after Mania.

apart from being a failed vanilla ice impersonator is there that much to rip into about cena? His character sure, but cena isn't ripping into a character, he's doing it soley about dwayne's life outside of wwe. I don't think there's genuine hatred but cena makes it seem like there is, proving he gets emotion across in promos. But I do think he's a little disappointed that he chose early retirement in favour of making the millions.. and millions. Or that now he's minted he can't give a little more time to what made him when he's physically capable to do so.

things to rip into about Cena...:

rock's already mentioned 2, changing his jorts to camoflage is his idea of updating his image, and thr Doctor of Thuganomics being privately educated.

Chuck in to that...

That Cena cannot sell a move to save his life.
His submission finisher is the least convincing submission hold ever.
He has a stupidly square head.
His movies bomb.
That after 10+ plus of WWE, he still can't wrestle.
He's not added any new moves in years.
Business with Cena headlining the brand has plummeted Rocky left

it's still mainly wrestling related and rock was saying how he's shoved down peoples throats etc. But as I say, I don't think there is real hatred, just a little dissapointment and maybe the rock privately just thinks "yes, i'm better than him"

Grecian wrote:

things to rip into about Cena...:

rock's already mentioned 2, changing his jorts to camoflage is his idea of updating his image, and thr Doctor of Thuganomics being privately educated.

Chuck in to that...

That Cena cannot sell a move to save his life.
His submission finisher is the least convincing submission hold ever.
He has a stupidly square head.
His movies bomb.
That after 10+ plus of WWE, he still can't wrestle.
He's not added any new moves in years.
Business with Cena headlining the brand has plummeted Rocky left

How many of those have been done before as well? Cena has said in promos they don't affect him and he's said it for years.

What I'm trying to say (badly!) is that Cena's main problems are being completely ignored. If Rocky just tore into him for any of the stuff I mentioned - even if it was as simple as Cena's over-exposure is killing the business he loves and was raised in - it would be so much more effective than teasing him for changing his outfit.

Cena's attacking Dwayne on a personal level - all Rock can do is mention stuff about Cena looking stupid and calling him after some dumbass cereal. It's almost on a par with Mr Ziggles.

And Sexton, I don't think there's ny hatred on either side at all.

but he did mention them being sick of the superman being forced onto them in the boston show, just those things got a little lost with all the "cool" stuff he says

Rock is appealing to his twitter crowd more than the die hard wrestling fans, there lies one problem.

I think Cena has been smart in appealing to wrestling fans, I mean when he did the "sorry vince, PROFESSIONAL WRESTLERS" rant, he was clearly trying to appeal to a certain type.

Doubt Vince would want The Rock to completely destroy Cena anyway (which is probably the point) I think Cena would welcome it though just to have a new challenge to rise to in promos.

But is Rocky referring to Superman as in Cena is the all-round good guy who can do no wrong and does all the personal appearances, or Superman as in he's beats everyone on the card, never submits, and is permanently around the WWE title?

Cena's loving the challenge of the promo's, shame Rock has been largely disappointing in them.

what cena (or wwe) needs after the rock is for someone else to step up

Maybe eventually they will have a jericho cena feud because in the past few years he has been the only real big name and he's had people like Miz as competition

Cena Vs Edge was one of my favourite rivalries and after that I lost interest, only keeping up on who the new stars were, and being largely dissapointed with everything they came up with, until punk was semi interesting (even then I didn't get back into raw at all) only now in the wrestlemania build up has it got to a top top level (that Cena can work with)

Punk tries too hard to make everyone love him, and he acts like a heel. I've gone off him quite a lot. His smarky comments fall flat, and he's coming across as a big of a twat.

Beyond Punk, Orton looked like he'd be The Man, but he needs someone near his status to work with on Smackdown.

After those two, there's no-one. There's no real defining, nasty-as-fuck heel for these guys to work with, not since they started jobbing Mark Henry and booked every other heel as a chickenshit, doesn't want to fight heel.

What i wouldn't give for Triple H in his heel, early 2000's peak right now...

hence jericho

I assume he will beat Punk eventually for the title and Cena will want the title again at some point

Punk could then go after bryan and sheamus and orton will no doubt meet if randy turns

Grecian wrote:

Punk tries too hard to make everyone love him, and he acts like a heel. I've gone off him quite a lot. His smarky comments fall flat, and he's coming across as a big of a twat..

I agree, I think real life interviews he still comes across as a nice, grounded guy but his promos have been so cheesy of late that it just isn't working for him. They wanted Stone Cold mark II but it's not as simple as they thought it would be.

As far as the top guys go, Cena needs to beat Rock at Mania and then if Rock is sticking around for a few PPVs make him work with someone else, a Rhodes, Barrett or Ziggler could gain so much credibility from hanging with, if not beating The Rock.

The next top level, bad ass heel for me would be Barrett. In his feud with Orton he never really backed down and has the stature of a menacing, beat the shit out of you guy. I think also, that Ziggler may never make it to the top as much as a shame as that will be. The talent in FCW at the moment is top notch and with them being bled into the main roster midcarders will struggle to fight them off.

Seth Rollins (Tyler Black) has the moves and the selling to really get people behind him as a face, Dean Ambrose (Jon Moxley) is a suberb mix of arrogance and mentalist that I think could work as both heel and face characters. Behind them there is Antonio Cesaro (Claudio Castagnoli) who I believe with his look and charisma will get over as a good anti-American heel. These guys have much more about them than the current crop of bland midcarders but without many top level wrestlers to put them over how would they make it?

I would bring back some older guys like Batista on a short term deal and get him to put over one of the heels as he still has main event credibility and they wouldn't tarnish him by doing so.