The different faces of The Rock

#6 Rock vs Cena Trilogy (2011-2013)

"Once in a lifetime"

By 2011, The Rock was one of the biggest names in Hollywood and John Cena was the face of the wrestling business. So, naturally, the rumors about a possible rivalry between the two created a lot of hype when Rock was announced as the guest host of Wrestlemania 27.

WWE saw it as a big opportunity and booked the match for Wrestlemania 28 a year in advance. They promoted it as a "Once in a Lifetime" match and attracted lots of casual fans. The match itself felt special and The Rock prevailed at the end.

Writers should have left this feud here, but they decided to bank on the success of the first match a year later when they again booked the match between the two at Wrestlemania 29. By that point, Rock had overstayed his welcome and fans were not happy to see CM Punk getting buried due to this rivalry, who at that time was doing wonders with the WWE Championship.

His promos for the first time in his career felt repetitive and their match was not even half as enjoyable as the first one.

It has, however, been viewed by many as a passing of the torch setup similar to what happened before with Hogan and The Rock.