John Cena vs Brock Lesnar (WWE, 8-17-2014)

WWE SummerSlam, Los Angeles, CA

Cena and Lesnar already had a good history against one another dating way back, and notably including Lesnar’s WWE return after the lengthy absence in a great match. But this was a whole other deal.

Lesnar comes in here on the run of a killer, breaking limbs, ending The Streak, all this shit. Cena is WWE champion and Lesnar wants it. The idea is that as fearsome and brutal as Lesnar is, Cena is historically proven to be the great hero who can dig deep, who always finds a way to overcome, a superhero.

Everything starts fast, with the two men brawling, and Lesnar just manhandling Cena, hitting him with an F5 within 30 seconds or so. Cena does kick out, because he’s the superhero, but all it does is make Lesnar grin sadistically. “That was your chance, John! I will kill you!”

Crowd is white hot alternating the pro- and anti-Cena chants.

German suplex (1). Lesnar hovers over Cena, then pulls him up violently by the chin. German suplex (2). As Cena holds his skull, Lesnar hops around. “It’s been almost, I dare say, easy for Brock Lesnar so far.”

Lesnar drives a knee into Cena’s ribs. Cena, coughing with pain, tries to throw a punch back, but it means nothing. The crowd is already dying down into a weird hum. Lesnar with a vertical suplex, gets to his knees, knows he can finish. Doesn’t want to yet.

Cena gets up and charges Lesnar, driving him to the corner. Right hands. Lesnar covers up, knees Cena again, and then knees Cena again, taking his wind.

Lawler refuses to write Cena off, but Cole is losing faith, noting that Cena’s done absolutely nothing in five minutes. More and more knees from Lesnar leave Cena gasping to breathe.

Lesnar: “You screwed up big time!” He could’ve been done in 30 seconds, remember. He kicked out. He’s the hero.

Again, Cena desperately tries to muster some offense, and again Lesnar swats him like a gnat. Lesnar, just to be a dick, steps on Cena’s hand when he tries to stand up. German suplex (3). German suplex (4). German suplex (5), coming in rapid fire now. German suplex (6). He’s just brutalizing him. He’s doing whatever he wants with a 15-time world champion. This is becoming Holmes against Ali, but Holmes wasn’t a mean spirited man. Lesnar is.

Lesnar with a nonchalant cover. Cena rolls a shoulder. He shouldn’t have. So Lesnar knees the kidney again. After a moment, German suplex (7).

Cena, sitting up, looks positively bewildered and vacant. Lesnar asks the referee to check on John. If Cena won’t quit, maybe he can force it some other way. But Cena gets up. German suplex (8).

Lesnar goes for a ninth German, but Cena hits some back elbows and rattles Lesnar. Cena hits the ropes, nails him, hits the ropes, F5, countered into the AA! Cena the hero has done it — except he hasn’t. Lesnar kicks out at two, and that was Cena’s last gasp. He can’t further capitalize.

Lesnar sits up and laughs, sticking his tongue out at John and shaking his head at the champion’s nerve to try to fight back. Lesnar bouncing on light feet. Puts his fist up to call Cena in, while Cena sits in the corner out of ideas. Cena charges, so Lesnar takes him down and pummels him with rights and lefts, like a bully older brother baiting and then toying with his younger sibling.

“I’m just getting started!”

Now it’s rolling Germans, four of them, bringing us to 12 total. “John! John!” Lesnar looks down at Cena in a heap and shakes his head. There is something approaching respect behind his eyes, against all odds.

German suplex (13), rolling again — 14, 15. I missed one at some point because the official total was 16. Lesnar tells Charles Robinson to stop the match. Robinson wants to, but doesn’t out of respect for Cena’s history. With Lesnar distracted arguing with Robinson, Cena trips him down and gets the STF on. Lesnar struggles for a moment, then powerfully rolls out and hammerfists Cena again.

F5. 1, 2, 3. New champion. The hero dies.

“That was the most dominating performance I’ve ever seen in a WWE championship match in my life!”

“It wasn’t even close!”

Rating: 5/5. This could have been a truly great story overall for WWE, but they got cold feet on doing anything interesting — Cena as a broken man, for the first time truly doubting himself in the face of being utterly manhandled — but instead they took about a month and had them do a rematch at Night of Champions where Cena would have won if not for Seth Rollins. This was a great opportunity to do something great with Cena for the first time in a while, but they couldn’t pull the trigger. But in a vacuum, standing alone, this match is incredible, one of the best and most unique in WWE history.

This is a 16-minute squash of not just anyone, but arguably the GOAT. This wasn’t the Road Warriors running over a couple nerds in four seconds on WTBS, this was a true menace dismantling a legend, a reigning world champion. There were (and are) people who didn’t dig this, because they need wrestling to be a 50/50 showcase of movesets or whatever, and hey, everyone has their tastes. Nothing is loved by everyone. For instance, some people kept routinely liking Triple H matches after the year 2003, which to me is bizarre.

But I love this match. There’s really no other WWE championship match quite like this. Even Diesel smashing Backlund in mere seconds is nothing like this. You can get someone early in kind of a fluke. This is no fluke. It’s genuine domination, presenting Lesnar as Cena’s clear superior.