What if Brock Lesnar never left WWE in 2004?

Brock Lesnar was on top of WWE for the better part of two years. He was built as an unstoppable monster from the moment he debuted, and he defeated both Hulk Hogan and The Rock within his first three months. He would’ve also defeated ‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin in that time period had Austin not had problems with WWE’s creative department.

But for every success Lesnar enjoyed, he also suffered in some way as well. Lesnar was never a people person and didn’t appear comfortable talking to people. Worse, WWE’s intense travel schedule took a severe toll on Lesnar, leading him to develop substance abuse problems at a young age.

These problems were catalysts in Lesnar’s first WWE run being so short. Lesnar left WWE after only two years, before returning in 2012, albeit on a part-timers schedule. Although the landscape of WWE had changed immensely in that eight-year period during which Lesnar was elsewhere, he quickly re-established himself as the most dangerous force on the roster.

But what if he never left in the first place? What if Lesnar stayed with WWE full-time and never developed the personal problems that behooved him to depart WWE after WrestleMania XX?

Below we’ll look at what WWE would’ve looked like if Lesnar was still the top superstar in the entire company.

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JBL wouldn’t have become WWE Champion

As Paul Heyman once said, the only reason JBL was ever WWE Champion was that ‘Triple H didn’t want to work Tuesdays.’ But there was more to it than that: the only reason Triple H would’ve worked Tuesdays in the first place was that SmackDown was dangerously low on top heels after Lesnar had left.

With Lesnar gone and Kurt Angle recovering from another surgery, there was no one left to fill the role of the top heel on the blue brand. This led to JBL – previously a career midcarder – becoming the main champion on SmackDown. Although his gimmick transition was very successful, JBL’s WWE title reign left a lot to be desired.

His matches weren’t really setting the world on fire, which is why many of his title matches were gimmicked and required stipulations to draw more attention. If Brock Lesnar never left WWE, he would’ve remained in the WWE title picture, or at least been a fixture of main-event feuds.

Lesnar could’ve continued his feud with Eddie Guerrero, he could’ve reignited his old feud with Kurt Angle once Angle was feeling better, or he could’ve started a new program with a recently-returned Deadman Undertaker. Lesnar could’ve also worked against other rising stars on SmackDown like John Cena, which would’ve led to some truly interesting match-ups.

And speaking of Cena…

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There’s a good chance Cena wouldn’t have become the big star he is now

Although Cena has become a megastar in WWE, there is something he lacks that Lesnar possesses: natural grappling skill. Lesnar is very much a once-in-a-century athlete: he has a freakish combination of strength and agility that makes him both a formidable force and a believable and credible athlete. That’s why Lesnar as an unstoppable force is so ‘realistic’: he’s like Kurt Angle with John Cena’s physique.

Cena, meanwhile, took a very long time to become a great wrestler. His matches during the early 2000s were average at best, and he only had good matches when working with workhorse wrestlers like Angle and Chris Jericho. This was a big reason why he was booed so much in the early days: he wasn’t that good of a wrestler, even when compared to fellow powerhouse Brock Lesnar.

If Brock Lesnar had stayed with WWE, there’s a good chance it would’ve been him in all those main-event feuds and not John Cena. Lesnar would’ve run roughshod through the entire WWE locker room, having exciting matches with different opponents. The reason Lesnar’s matches were better was that WWE pushed him as a more complete performer.

Not only did he have the F-5 as his finisher, but he also had a submission move in the Brock Lock, which gained instant credibility because he tapped out Chris Benoit the first time he used it. Cena, meanwhile, still can’t seem to put on a believable STF.

This isn’t to say that Cena wouldn’t have reached his peak; he definitely would have. After all, he had the disposition to be WWE’s biggest star, whereas Lesnar hated WWE’s grueling schedule.

But because Brock was such a ‘once-in-a-lifetime athlete’, he would’ve stayed at the top much longer, which meant that Cena’s rise to the top would’ve taken longer to occur. If Brock Lesnar never left WWE, he would’ve been ‘the guy’ for much longer, while Cena’s rise would’ve taken longer to occur.

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Lesnar would’ve demolished everyone

The mid-2000s was a period during which WWE tried to push as many top guys as possible. Not only were John Cena and Randy Orton some of Vince’s pet projects, but there were many other stars that were pushed as well.

These included the likes of Batista, Edge, Chris Jericho, The Great Khali, Umaga, Bobby Lashley, and to a lesser extent, CM Punk, Rob Van Dam, Ken Kennedy and Rey Mysterio. Some of these wrestlers actually reached the top, as WWE was desperate in finding the next ‘next big thing’.

But if Lesnar was still around in WWE when any and all of these wrestlers were being pushed, all of them would’ve been fed to Lesnar eventually.

Vince saw Lesnar as the ultimate wrestling machine, and rightfully so. He was like Kurt Angle without the nagging neck problems. To this end, if Lesnar was committed to WWE, and was meant to be the long-term champion that Cena became, WWE would’ve been fed one rising star after another.

It would’ve been exactly as how Lesnar has been booked as Universal Champion: someone is given a degree of strong booking, only to be destroyed by Lesnar in the big title match.

In the end, the only real difference between Brock Lesnar now and Brock Lesnar never leaving is that Lesnar would’ve probably used more than five moves if he stuck around after 2004. He only adopted ‘five move syndrome’ after he returned and after realizing that Cena can do the same things in every match and still make a fortune.