Welcome to the WWE Podcast, the most passionate and authentic wrestling analysis on the
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We do too, so let's get this show underway. And that's the
bottom line. What costocoup? Hey guys, what is going on? And
welcome back to WWE Rivalries with your host, yours truly, Anthony DeMarco.
You can find me at a DeMarco twenty five on Twitter if you guys want
get in touch. And I hope you guys are doing well. We are
September tenth when I'm recording this Thursdays ten or tenth, but you will be
listening to it most likely on September eleventh. So back by popular demand,
or should I say brought to you by popular demand? We have this week's
feature rivalry of Edge versus John Cena, and I'm going to focus on there.
They're one that really ran through the better part of two thousand and six.
I don't want to make this huge storyline rivalry when it's spilled into the
World Heavyweight Championship picture leading up to wrestling in twenty five when they had the
triple Threat match with the Big Show that was mainly a part of SmackDown.
I'm going to focus mainly on the two thousand and six version of Edge versus
John Cena, because, as I've said before, I wasn't too in touch
with the product in the year two thousand and nine or two ten, whenever
that was. But to be quite honest, I think their rivalry in two
thousand and six was the best part of it, as it was a catapult
for Edge and it was one of the first big rivalries for John Cena as
a main event star. But before we get to that, I'm just gonna
give you a few of my thoughts on the current WWE product at hand.
So we'll start firstly with the talk of the Town, and that is a
heel Roman Rains, who was set to go one on one with his cousin
Ju Som. Look, there's no way Jos's gonna win. This is clearly
a means to an end type of storyline and program, and that end being
solidifying Roman Reins as a true top heel. Look, I think that it's
going to be a slow burn with Rains going to a full heel mode,
and I think there's no better way to start that off by make him go
up against his family member and a crowd favorite in one of the Uso brothers.
I'm interested to see how they play this out over the coming weeks,
how the interactions between Jay Usso and Roman Reigns are, because look, for
all intensive purposes, Juso has no business being in this match, has no
business, had no business being in the Number one Contenders match, just no
business being around the Universal Championship picture. Like, I don't even think he's
had a one on one opportunity for a singles title at all, including the
Interconnetal or United States Championships. So look, we're gonna throw logic to the
wayside and just look at it for the betterment of this program and this storyline,
which it is. To be quite honest, I can't think EVE of
a better first one on one guy to go up against the Roman Reigns then
a family member to really push home the narrative that he is a true top
heel. So I'm really looking forward to that, and, to be quite
honest, SmackDown as a whole I think has been doing very very well of
late. I love what they're doing with the Intercontinental Championship picture bringing back Sammy
Insane and you know he comes from the same place in Montreal that I do,
so I got a kick out of him speaking French. Just overly obnoxious
type of character. I really missed him on television and that to him involved
with Jeff Hardy and aj Styles. I just think it's a great mid card
type of feud for SmackDown right now, and I just think as a whole
they are doing very well. The Bailey turn on Sasha Banks, I didn't
know they were going to do it that fast. I thought they're gonna let
it drag on for a bit longer, but hey, they did it excellently.
I'm here for it. SmackDown as a whole is really doing well,
and I think I touched on it last week, but I'm enjoying it a
lot more than Monday Night Raw as of right now, and even the Tag
team division, like I know that we haven't really seen Czaro and Nakamoa engage
in any type of feud strictly on SmackDown. Obviously, they showed up on
Raw this week to come face to face with the Street Profits, but the
way that they've given Nakamura and Czarro screen time to kind of push home the
fact of, you know, the Champions Lounge and the Champions Champagne. I
think it's been really cool. I like Cesaro and Nakamura. I think they've
just fit like a glove with one another for a tag team. So as
a whole, I am really intrigued on what's going on on SmackDown. As
for Monday Night Raw hasn't been bad, but I'm starting to get a bit
tired. Like I'll just say it, Mysterial family cannot stand them, cannot
take any more of it. Dominick coming out there looking like Power Ranger beating
up Murphy, which I don't understand what the point of that was. I
think Murphy becoming a jobber to the Missiro family is a joke, quite honestly.
As for the main event feud, look, I'm still invested in Orton
versus McIntyre, but at the same time, I feel like the injection of
Keith Lee into that into that program has really hurt Randy Orton in particular.
It's always like he has two foes right now. I know that they had
Keith Lee say like that Drew Barnot interfere in his match again and whatnot.
But I just don't think that's where Keith Lee needed to be. And I
love Keith Lee, he has a bright future on the main roster, but
just any other type of program would have been better did for Keighley. I
thought they were doing an excellent job with pushing Randy Orton as the true top
heel in the company and in professional wrestling as a whole, maybe rivaled by
MJF in ae W, but they I don't know, they cool them off
the back to back losses in the same week by the roll up and then
the power bomb by Keith Lee or I forget what his version of the power
bomb is called. But I don't really like what they've done with Orton in
the past few weeks, even drew getting the three claim wars on him this
week. I just I feel like they've really halted the momentum of Randy Orton
and kind of disappointed there, to be quite honest. Then the biggest positive
though of Monday Night Raw is the herb business. I love it absolutely great.
They've taken three I would say obscure and random and insignificant guys in MVP
and Shelton Benjamin and Cedric Alexander. And we can't lump Bobby Lashly into that
mix because he did have a solid run going on even before the her business
showed up. But they have really taken Raw by the horns and in my
opinion, are the most entertaining part of the show right now. I really
love what they're doing. I really hope to God that on two of the
two of the members tag team together and take the Tag Team Championships away from
the street profits. I think that's what this faction needs. Hopefully it would
be Shelton and Cedric Alexander or MVP and Cedric Alexander. Just Cedric Alexander would
have to be involved. I love him joining the group, but I'm hoping
that they get more gold around their waist, as Bobby Lashley is already the
United States champion. So look, all positives across the board for SmackDown,
not so much for Monday Night Raw, but it isn't awful by any means.
I just think that for whatever reason, it's kind of become a bit
redundant on Monday Night Raw, especially the mysterio thing. And I don't mean
to keep coming back and rehashing and whatnot. But my god, I am
just so done with that whole mysterio set, the Rawlins thing and Dominic.
I don't know, there's something unlikable about them. Maybe it's the Power Ranger
costume. Not too sure there, but certainly has not been my cup of
tea. But look, let's get to the reason why you guys are here,
and that is WWE rivalries and brought to you by popular demand. I
know a lot of you guys email the Matt at Real WWE Podcast at gmail
dot com to express your interest in me taking a episode to focus on Edge
versus John Sina, And look, I had that one sitting in the back
pocket, and I was gonna do it anyway. No, I'm just kidding.
I know, I definitely thought about doing it for a couple weeks now,
but figured I might as well do it right now, seeing as though
so many of you wanted to hear about it. So, like I said,
I'm going to concentrate on their feud in two thousand and six that culminated
at the Unforgiven pay per view following SummerSlam. So to bring you back to
two thousand and five a bit to really set the stage for where these two
guys were coming from and how they led to be how they ended up being
against one another. Rather in two thousand and five WrestleMania twenty one. This
was a big pay per view for setting the stage as to where John Cena
and Edge were heading for the succeeding year, year and a half even two
years so at this time, John Cena was the number one contender for JBL's
WWE Championship over on SmackDown, And at this time SmackDown was really going through
a changing of the guard for who their top face was going to be and
their top heel for that matter. As you may have recalled, brock Lesner
had left the company the year before. They had just gone through the Eddie
Guerrero WWE Championship run that ended at the previous Great American Bash in June of
two thousand and four, and JBL was on a nine month run as WWE
champion, and he faced off against guys like Eddie Guerrero, Booker, t
Undertaker, Big Show, and he fought them all off and blow and behold
John Cena, who was fresh off of a year of being the US Champion
on and off, having a lengthy feud with Booker t the debut in Carlito
ended up losing it to the Chief of Staff to JBL Orlando Jordan and had
never been a champion other than the US Champion to this point in his career,
so following the No Way Out pay per view of two thousand and five,
John Cena faced off against or embarked on a program with John Bradshaw Layfield,
his first ever main event feud, which he ended up winning the ww
Championship from him at WrestleMania twenty one in two thousand and five. Meanwhile,
over on RAW, RAW was enjoying some of its best time during the Ruthless
Aggression era in my honest opinion, because at this time Batista and Triple H
were entering their inaugural feud in the main events scene, as Batista had just
turned on him and hence just ending evolution as we knew it for the time
being. But while they had a strong upper car a main event scene,
the other great part about RAW during this time was the fact that they just
had a such a strong mid card, and you saw guys in the mid
card like Shelton, Benjamin, Chris, Jericho, Christian, Chris ben Wah
and Edge and just other people who I'm missing, but Raw at this time,
Kane. They just had a very very very strong mid card. You
could even make the case that Randy Orton had slid back into the upper mid
card at this point as he faced off against the Undertaker at this WrestleMania.
So essentially what happened at WrestleMania twenty one was the inaugural Money in the Bank
ladder match. And at this time, if you guys remember, the Money
in the Bank Ladder match was held annually at WrestleMania did not yet have its
own pay per view, and at this WrestleMania it was a raw exclusive match.
So what we saw here was basically all the upper mid card guys get
thrown together in a ladder match for the money in the Bank contract. And
it was such a foreign concept. We didn't even know how this would work,
how you would cash it in. The match featured Edge, Christian,
Chris, Jericho, Chris Benwa, Kane, and Shelton Benjamin, who was
the Intercontinental Champion at that time. Throughout the match, very good match.
I suggest you guys go back and watch it. And it ended up with
Chris Benwa on the ladder seemingly ready to win the first ever money in the
Bank ladder match. But during the match he had really got his arm messed
up, so he's climbing the ladder very gingerly on one arm. Edge comes
in the ring, smashes him in the bad arm with a steel chair,
climbs the ladder and unhooks the first ever money in the bank briefcase. And
this set Edge on a very strong year as he really came into his own
in two thousand and five as a top heel, because in two thousand and
four he was a baby face for much of it. Had a program with
Randy Orton over the Intercontinal Championship in two thousand and four, So it was
clear that following wrestling at twenty one, giving him the money in the Bank
contract was a way to really push forward with Edge as a top heel.
Because you gotta remember, at this time on Monday Night Raw, Triple h
had reigned supreme atop the heel part of the mountain. At least of Monday
Night Raw for almost three years running. He had been the world heavyweight Champion.
I would say at least eighty percent of the time, save for a
few short brief runs by Ben Wall and Sean Michaels and Randy Orton, and
Batista had just won the World Heavyweight Championship at that same pay per view,
so they worked they had to start looking towards the future, and two thousand
and five was their first step in doing so in the main event, specifically
with Edge. Now, to be quite honest, it took Edge quite a
long time to get to the main event picture, even following that money in
the Bank, I keep saying championship. Sorry, guys, It's just it's
habit for me at following his money in the Bank contract victory. So following
this pay per view, he obviously had a short brief feud with Kane where
he aligned himself with Alita. Then he had the What I Love, one
of the most underrated feuds that I guess it kind of fell flat. But
his feud and program with Matt Hardy in the summer of two thousand and five
playing off real life events was pretty damn cool, even though it was kind
of lackluster in the end. So while Edge was on the ascent in two
thousand and five, John Cena was doing much of the same He closed out
his program with John Aghall Layfield on SmackDown, and then he was drafted over
to Raw as him and Batista swap swapped places, both world championships, swapped
the brands, and it was a pretty big shift in the landscape of w
WE. Personally, I think it's because Vince McMann and company saw John Cena
as the top guy ahead of Batista. That's why they've made him switch to
the flagship show, Monday Night Raw, and right out of the gate he
engaged in a feud with Chris Jericho. I believe. He defended the WWE
Championship at Vengeance two thousand and five in a triple threat batch with Christian and
Chris Jericho, his first title defense as part of Monday Night Raw. Then
he embarked on a program with Jericho just up until Summer Slammed. Jericho ended
up getting fired AKA pursuing his fossy career and he was away from WWWE for
about two years after that, and then afterwards he had a had a program
with Curt Angle which lasted much of the fall of two thousand and five,
culminated at Survivors Series, and he ended up defending his WWE Championship in an
elimination chamber match at New Year's Resolution two thousand and six, and this match
included the likes of Chris Masters, Carlito, Kane, Sean Michaels, and
Curt Angle along with John Cena. And if you guys don't remember, Carlato
and Chris Masters were really kind of getting pushed as as top young guys on
one in a Raw. They were part of Team Raw in the inaugural Raw
Versus SmackDown Survivor Series match. Then I think I'm gonna do a Rivalries edition
on that as well, Raw Versus SmackDown in two thousand and five, because
it's not kind of like the forced version as we see in today's WWE.
It's more so it was more of an organic program. But nonetheless, so
we saw Kane in that match, who was one half of the World Tag
Team Champions with Big Show, Sean Michaels and Kurt Angle. So what we
saw in this one is Kurt Angle went out first, Shawn Michaels and Kane
followed, and it came down to Carlito Masters and John Cena. And John
Cena started this match with Sean Michaels. So he was a bloody mess and
he was just getting double team by Carlito and Chris Masters. Carlito turned on
Chris Masters, got the pin, and then John Cena pinned Carlito for the
roll ups, seemingly closing out the night as WWE champion, overcoming the odds.
And by this point, John Cena was well, he was ww champion
for going on ten months at this point, you know, he had won
it back in I believe it was in March that year, WrestleMania or April,
so it was almost a year. It was coming up on a year
of John Cena being the WWE champion. But while we thought that John Ceno
is gonna walk away from that pay per view as w w E champion,
and just when we thought the show was over and John Cena would live to
fight another day as w w E Champion, Vince McMahon appeared. This individual
is cashing in. There's money in the bank, privilege already earned in WrestleMania
championship match. We'll take place right here, right now. My defense again,
well, I thought, and I said it earlier tonight. Are you
kidding me that he would use it a WrestleMania. Chia get in big time
with just Sena. Get that his weakent. Oh, turn around to any
boy, turn around. It's over. Edges just waiting on the wu Wu
eat Chimp. It's waiting on him. Chick out hit the spindle. Two.
Did he get it? No, he didn't towel in the world to
just Sena kick out him. That wasn't a three or two. It was
a two. It was a two and Edges and total disbelief. I don't
think Edge is the only one in disbelief after all that Seena's gone through.
Look at Edge now, he can't believe it. But disbelief now turned into
frustration and anger. You can see the face of Edge changing. Oh no,
not another spirit that But I guess that's figures. That's what it's gonna
take. Edge was spirit j We're gonna oh my god, what has happened
here tonight? Are you? I can't believe it. I can't believe it.
This was a data his cardinal nights. He had stuck the world.
So there you have it. Edge, with the inaugural money in the bank,
Cashion takes the championship away from John Cena the first time the WBE Championship
had changed hands and close to ten months, as I just said, And
fun fact, and I believe you guys already knew this. Uh. Matt
was in the crowd for that, for that uh, for that match and
that pay per view. So a pretty cool bit of info there. I'm
pretty sure Matt did a whole wrestling nostalgia based on this. So this was
the kickoff to the Edge Verse John Cena feud. But while it was the
kickoff, it didn't really last long. The following night on Raw, Edge
had the infamous live sex celebration, which, man, you want to talk
about rated our superstar that is just about as rated R as it gets.
John Cena interrupted, and they embarked on a program that led to Royal Rumble
two thousand and six and Love and Behold. John Cena won back the WWB
Championship less than a month later. And I guess if I look back at
this objectively, I understand why they put the belt back on Cina right away,
because if you think about it, I know we think of John Cena
now as being forced down our throats for the better part of ten years and
never losing paper matches and just basically a WWE version of Superman. There was
still a lot of juice to be squeezed from the initial John Cena push at
this time. And I know that may be crazy to say, because he
had just been on a near year long run as WWE champion. Why put
the belt back on him right away? But there was still a lot of
runway to go with John Cita because even though he had only been in the
main event picture, or that he had already been in the main event picture
for a year, they really hadn't gotten him involved in very high level feuds
to this point. Like I said, on SmackDown, it was a four
month long program with John Bradshaw Layfield, he came over to Rob, he
had a two month long program with Chris Jericho, who was no longer on
the Monday Night Rob Brand. Then he went tote toe with Curt Angel for
three months, who by this time in January two thousand and six, had
jumped back over to SmackDown and once again had reclaimed the World Heavyweight Championship.
So John Cena had yet to really engage in a few that stuck. It
was all kind of one and duns, and you saw what they did following
him regaining the w Championship at the Royal Rumble, as he went into a
pretty good and underrated program with Triple H leading into WrestleMania twenty two, and
maybe they thought it was premature to put the strap on edge. If I
had to give an objective take on it, I think it's because they saw
the potential by booking John Cena versus Triple H at WrestleMania twenty two. And
at this time, not to say that that Triple H had little runway left
because he competed as a full time competitor for about four years after this,
but he wasn't a spring chicken, so you only had so many years left
of Triple H in his absolute prime to go one on one with John Cena
and main event a WrestleMania. And even more so, it's clear that they
had plans to bring back Degeneration X in the summer of two thousand and six,
which we saw succeeding the WrestleMania in two thousand and six. So look,
they clearly wanted to strike while the iron was hot, and they put
the strap back on John Cena to go into a feud with Triple H heading
into Mania twenty two, and while this was also the case, I'm sure
that there was still a bit of hesitation to push forward with Edge as the
top heel and arguably the top guy on Monday Night Raw. And you know,
I think by this time Edge had done more than enough to prove that
he was by and large a main event player on Monday Night Raw and in
the WWE. But I could see the hesitation possibly so they made him engage
in a feud with Mick Foley heading into WrestleMania twenty two. And I feel
that the feud with Mick Foley and the match in particular at wrestle At twenty
two with Mick Foley was the final test for Edge to see if he could
actually be a legitimate main event player for Monday and a Raw and the WE,
because like I said before, there was there was a spot at the
top of the mountain for Edge to take. You know, Randy Orn had
made the jump to SmackDown by this point, Curt Angele was on SmackDown as
well, Ray Mysterio, the Undertaker all on SmackDown. When you looked at
the raw side of things, it was John Cena Triple H. I guess
you could make the case Shawn Michaels, but he was never really involved in
the title picture at this time, had just started a feud with Vince McMahon.
After that, there was a whole lot of nothing. You know,
Ben Wall had gone back to SmackDown as well, so Jericho had just retired.
So when you looked at Raw, it was just a whole lot of
nothing in the mid card. And as we had seen in as I just
talked about in two thousand and five, that Raw had a very strong mid
card that really evaporated for numerous reasons by the time two thousand and six rolled
around. So it was there for the taking for Edge because after Sena and
Triple H there was not a lot of big time players there. So he
had the match with Mick Foley, which match also reviewed on Wrestling Nostalgia,
and that was just what a gory and just crazy hardcore match that was go
back and watch it one that Edge ultimately won, and at this point he
still had a perfect record at WrestleMania. So John c and An Edge really
stayed apart from one another for quite a few months after they started the ECW
relaunching as a permanent brand, fore in the late spring of two thousand and
six, which ended up with Rob Vandam challenging John Cena in June. I
believe it was June eleventh, two thousand and six. At the One Night
Stand pay per view, Rob Vandam had won the second ever money in the
bank briefcase. I want to say championship. I'm sorry, guys. He
had won the second ever money in the bank briefcase at wrestling at twenty two,
and unlike Edge and unlike the majority of money in the bank winners,
he booked a date foreign advance to challenge Sena for the wf WWE Championship.
We saw Van Dam win at the One Night Stand pay per view against John
Cena at the Bingo Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and I remember there were
signs saying that if Sina wins, we ride. And by this time we
really started to see the everyday crowd go against John Cena. I know this
was a special special case scenario with the ECW Championship or the ECW pay per
view, so it was a very ANTIWWE crowd, but just on the regular
it became kind of common place to boo John Cena out of the building for
even when he was against full fledged heels. So Rob van Dam walked out
of the One Night Stamp pay per view as WWE champion and taking that title
belt to the ECW brand. At that same pay per view, Edge was
tagging with Mick Foley to go in a hardcore match versus Terry Funk and Tommy
Dreamer, one of which him and Mick Foley won. And this is again
a reason why he was the rated R superstar. He actually speared Buella,
mckilla Cutty and Pinnder in the most offensive way possible to win that match because
right before the match started they actually made it a six man hardcore match,
adding Bulah and Leda into the match. So go back and watch that.
That was a gruesome match as well. Mcfoley got laid on fire, Terry
Funk had his eye almost got gouged out by the barbed wire. It was
just a a that was a great match. That was a great pay per
view all in all. I remember Sabu and Raymondsteo had a really intense extreme
rules match for the World Heavyweight Championship as well. So while it seemed that
Rob Vandam was going to get the push to be potentially the face of the
company. Although he was on the ECW that recently relaunched ECW brand, some
personal things happened. I believe he got stopped for a duy and w W
quickly pulled the shoot, pulled the plug on that. So ultimately what happened
is that they had a triple threat match between Edge, John Cena, and
Rob Vandam on a Monday night raw for the w W Championship. And I'm
reading this off of the WWE dot COM's title history page, so if you
think you've heard this before, I am reading this verbatim, so full disclosure
there. John Cena was able to hit RVD with an attitude adjustment, but
before he could make the cover, Edge came from out of nowhere and leveled
Sina with the championship. With both men already knocked out, Edge covered RVD
and stole the w W Championship from John Cena. So once the belt got
put back on Edge at the beginning of July, this is when we got
the first real program with Sina and Edge for a lengthy period of time.
And I know that they had a month long program at the beginning of the
of the year after Edge cashed in and then they had the match at the
Roal Rumble. But like I said, that seemed almost premature. It seemed
like w W back pedaled on their original plans because how often do you see
a guy win the championship, his first ever Watch championship win and lose it
at the succeeding pay per view. We never see it. We never see
that, so I felt like they weren't quite sure if Edge was ready,
but by the time this ruled around, they were ready to run with Edge.
They brought the championship back to Monday Night Raw from ECW Raw vand m
also lost the ECW Championship shortly thereafter to the Big Show, so his push,
or seemingly seemingly main event push, was completely halted due to personal reasons.
So then we saw Edge and John Cena basically main event Raw for the
whole summer. They had a match at SummerSlam which Edge won and hitting John
Cena in the back of the head with brass knocks, retaining the championship.
And on a side note, this was a very very good summer for wrestling.
It was obviously the return of Degeneration X and they had that lengthy program
with the mcmah ends which ended up culminating at Unforgiven two thousand and five,
which coincidentally was the culmination of John Cena Versus Edges program. So to give
you a bit of a backstory here, or a bit of a setup rather,
is that Unforgiven was held in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, which,
as most of you probably know, is the hometown of one Edge, So
you could be sure, like between the hometown of Edge and just almost the
universal hate for John Cena at this point that the ground would be strongly behind
the heel and vastly against the top baby face in John Cena. And to
make matters worse for John Cena, the match for the WWE Championship was held
in a t LC format, which is the bread and butter of Edge and
always has been. And just some of the things leading up to this match,
like there was John Cena throwing Edge into the Long Island sound. Edge
actually rebranded the w Championship because it was the strim the Spinner at that time
instead of the w w elogo in the middle. He had the rated Our
Superstar logo that spun in the middle. So Edge was really playing the heel
character well and was really coming into his own at this point. So they
go into unforgiven. The big blowoff to this feud, the w W E
Championship match in a TLC match in Edge's hometown, all of all of the
momentum swinging in Edge's favor, and let's take a listen to how that match
ended. He did grab a thing right now the water and when the doing
I took the camere for John the Kingdom winder. Do we love to see
a pleasing that ladder Rother. This is the smartest thing that seeing the new
It's this history. When this thing staying wrong, they find gonna come.
Wait a minute and wait a minute, there's a w W champion Edge Edge
back in the prey. Here came back in the equation the champion ladder.
I don't gather about to go cola co the coble the ladder. The danger
stare is the real danger for murder. This is step the fine career ending
both men bridging with the w W. I don't who got it, but
there's something Oh my god, don't do this job the cold clean yeah tonight.
So as you heard, John Cena reclaims the w W Championship, handing
Edge his first ever loss in a TLC ladder match. And if you guys
couldn't make it out over just the audio, John Cena stacked a table,
two tables, one on top of each other. They both climbed the ladder
and John Cena was able to beat Edge at his own match in Toronto in
his home crowd to claim his third WWWE Championship on route to getting a total
sixty. And if you combine that and the World Heavyweight Championship, so following
this rivalry, John Cena went on to have a short program with The Big
Show. He also had a relatively short program with Umauga faced him at that
following Royal Rumble and then Main Event did Wrestle me at twenty three with Shawn
Michaels, while Edge aligned himself with Randy Jorton and formed the inaugural version of
Rated RKO as they went on a lengthy program with Degeneration X for the remainder
of two thousand and six. And look, it took Edge about just about
another ten months, I would say maybe a bit shorter to get back into
the main event title picture, because even though he at least in my mind,
proved himself to be one main event player during the summer of two thousand
and six with his great program with John Cena. It still took a little
less than a year for WWE to further fully pull the trigger on him.
And what ended up happening is that he took the Money in the Bank briefcase
away from mister Kennedy. He cashed in on The Undertaker in June of two
thousand and seven and became the World Heavyweight Champion for the first time in his
career and made the jump over to SmackDown. And that's when Edge really kind
of caught fire as a true main event player when he went over to the
Blue Brand as the World Heavyweight Champion. Obviously, he main evented Wrestling at
twenty four with The Undertaker. The following WrestleMania, he was in the triple
threat match with the Big Show in John Cena, which surrounded the whole Vicky
Guerrero La Familia angle. But this, this story and this program between Edge
and John Cina, it was important for a lot of ways. And first
off, I think it was very important for John Cena because it was the
first true main event personal rivalry for Sina. I know originally it was John
Bradshaw late Field, but that always kind of just seemed a bit forced for
me, like John Cena was the only top baby face left on the SmackDown
roster at that time, and SmackDown lacked a lot of true top heels.
In late two thousand and four early two thousand and five they had already gone
down that road with curt Angle. Then through the summer of two thousand and
five he had various rivalries with Jericho and curd Angle and whatnot. Had that
short program with Triple H building up to Man two thousand and six. Mind
you wrestle me at twenty two, but the one with Edge that started at
New Year's Resolution, the cash In, they put on the back burner on
the bit and then revisited it in the summer of six. I truly believe
was John Cena's first top feud because if you look back at John Cena,
obviously you think of Randy Orton more recently ag Styles the Rock, but you
rarely think of Triple H and JBL. The first big rivalry you think of
when you think of John Cen as a main event player is against Edge,
and as we know they revisited it several times in the following few years.
And as for Edge, it was his first program as a main event guy.
I think we could argue that his best main event run and his best
program in a main event scene was with The Undertaker. They had many classics
with one another. Also, him and Chris Jericho had a few good matches.
But again, John Cena and Edge I really feel used each other to
propel one another as into true main event players. Obviously, John Cena was
much more of the main event player beforehand, and Edge was the much more
beneficiary of the rivalry. But you can't diminish what Edge meant for the John
Cena character either as legitimizing him as a top baby face in WWWE for the
succeeding decade. I know a lot of people don't like John Cena. I'm
not the biggest fan of John Cena. I don't hate him as much as
most do, but you have to admit that he is one of, if
not the biggest star the company has ever seen, especially when you consider since
two thousand and five. So listen, guys, that's just about it for
rivalries this week. Be sure to send in your request to Matt at REALWWE
Podcast at gmail dot com, or you can hit him up on Instagram,
or you can follow me on Twitter and send me at DM like a few
of you have already had at a DeMarco twenty five. So I hope you
guys enjoyed it. Feel free to reach out and I'll catch you next week.
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