John Cena is arguably the most prominent superstar in modern wrestling history. His career spanned multiple decades, and he has faced almost every big name there is. A lot of those names work for AEW now.
The rise of All Elite Wrestling has given wrestlers a chance to showcase their abilities on the national stage without having to rely on WWE. Some huge names have jumped ship to Tony Khan's company over the last few years, like Jon Moxley, Bryan Danielson, Chris Jericho, Adam Cole etc, while CM Punk made an unexpected return to professional wrestling to join AEW.
A number of stars on the AEW roster have locked horns with the Leader of Cenation during his heyday as a regular performer in the Stamford-based promotion. Today we will look at 3 AEW stars who have defeated Cena. For simplicity's sake, we will only be counting singles matches on televised shows. Hence, house shows and dark matches will not be included.
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Honorable Mention: CM Punk has defeated John Cena multiple times
CM Punk has faced the Cenation leader 14 times in televised singles action. Up until their iconic match at Money in the Bank in 2011, they had squared off seven times in singles matches. The Second City Saint picked up a win in 4 of those matches, two of them coming via disqualification.
CM Punk won their first two pay-per-view matches, including the era-defining world title match at Money in the Bank 2011. After winning their rematch at SummerSlam 2011, the Voice of the Voiceless never won against his storied rival again.
As CM Punk's current status with AEW is unclear at best, we have placed him in as an honorable mention.
#3. Three-time AEW World Champion Jon Moxley holds two victories over John Cena
Jon Moxley is probably the biggest star in AEW right now. But before becoming the ace of his current company, he was tearing it up in WWE as Dean Ambrose.
The former Shield member shared the ring with John Cena numerous times, but only three of those occasions were singles matches. Their first singles match came on RAW in 2014 in a No Holds Barred Contract On A Pole match that was won by the then Lunatic Fringe.
Cena won their next singles contest, which took place in 2015. It was for the United States Championship, but the former GCW World Champion failed to dethrone the champion. Their last singles match came in 2016 on SmackDown, and Dean Ambrose won the rubber match to achieve the rare feat of having a positive record against the Hollywood star.
#2. Bryan Danielson defeated John Cena to become the WWE Champion
Daniel Bryan is arguably the greatest WWE babyface of the 21st century. His rise to prominence was so rapid and gigantic that the company did the unthinkable by letting him defeat their franchise star clean on pay-per-view.
Cena was the world champion heading into SummerSlam 2013. The American Dragon challenged him to a title match, with Triple H serving as the special guest referee. Daniel Bryan won after a sensational match to become the new champion. This match was also significant because the YES Man introduced his finisher, the Busaiku Knee, for the first time in this match.
#1. Chris Jericho has a terrible record against John Cena
Chris Jericho is one of the greatest wrestling legends in history. However, the Ocho has an embarrassing win-loss record against John Cena. His record reads 1 win, 11 losses and 1 no-contest in 13 televised singles matches.
The former Y2J's solitary win came in their first-ever singles match on television on SmackDown way back in 2002. Since then, Cena has won all their matches. They have feuded with each other over the world title on multiple occasions, and Jericho has come up short every time.