[Mikey]

It's a Parvini special, as everyone's favorite wrestler John Cena faces "Million Dollar Man" Ted Dibiase. It's the spinner belt vs. the Million Dollar Belt. The Chain Gang vs. Money Inc. Freestyle vs. the Gospel. Real recognizes real in this mofo, ya heard?






Poll closes Wednesday, February 13 at 11:59 EST.

[The Jewish Cunthead]

I'll just vote character on this one - DiBiase was on Lifestyles Of The Rich & Famous for fuck's sake. Best cackle in the business.

[Batman]

Fuck, I'm not even going to try.

Cena should advance here.

[Lucky]

Cena bores me to shit at the moment. He's a quality wrestler with great charisma who became one of the biggest stars in years. I'm young and my memory of Dibiase is his silly stable with Austin, Tatanka, Kolof, and Zanta Clause. And managing the fucking Steiners vs the nWo which was horrible. I've gone back and watched Dibiase and I own WM IV. Just meh to me.

[creepy]

Ehhhhh........ Don't think I care either way.

[williamssl]

Cena: You can't see me
DiBiase: Everybody has a price...


Fact: I can see Cena, even in storylines
Fact: People did have a price

DiBiase wins.

In all seriousness, DiBiase was one of the few heels that the E did a great job of making me just hate the guy back in the day. And he played the part very well.

[gooker]

Dibiase is one of the best heels ever. And, I know it's hard to believe and nobody else on the Internets shares this viewpoint but..I hate Cena.

[Mikey]

You people are failing to realize the obvious rationalization of choosing DiBiase over Cena:

Cena = $
DiBiase = $$$$$$$$$$$

End of story.

[Batman]

You're all wrong (all but two of you.)

But I guess it doesn't really matter. Austin isn't likely to give up a vote to either guy next round, anyway.

[Lucky]

I might have voted Cena over Austin.

[The Canadian Content]

I don't hate Cena. I think in the present environment he isn't too bad, and I think he's better with the belt than without it.

That said, I was willing to vote for him deep. Against the right matchups, he would've had my support. Against DiBiase? No.

[Courtney]

Ditto Psycho.

[Stu]

psychofish said:

I don't hate Cena. I think in the present environment he isn't too bad, and I think he's better with the belt than without it.

Based on what? Since he first won the world championship, he hasn't ever had a proper feud that didn't revolve around either defending or chasing the title. It's a big part of why I'm sick of him. I wouldn't mind him being Superman so much if there was a proper break from him being involved in the main event title scene. It just strikes me that WWE thinks he doesn't have enough appeal to feud over something else.

[Batman]

stu said:

It just strikes me that WWE thinks he doesn't have enough appeal to feud over something else.

Oh, come on. I don't disagree with the first part of what you said. I don't think it would hurt for him to move on to some non-title grudge feuds. (And I get where you're coming from; there are some guys like Undertaker who don't need to be involved in a title feud for years and still be considered top guys.)

But really, the WWE have kept Cena involved in the title picture for longer than anyone else in years because they lack confidence in his appeal?

Really?

[Lucky]

I don't think its a ridiculous opinion. They're confident in HBK, HHH, Undertaker, Jericho, and a bunch of other guys' basic ability to draw and be of value without being in the title picture. But with Batista and Cena they never leave the picture. Why? Is it because WWE views them as better than those other guys? I don't think its unreasonable to question whether WWE basically wonders if they are over enough to go off and have a secondary feud and still have it be a headliner.

Which in Cena's case I think is crazy, because he clearly is. And I think the title hurts him more than helps him at this stage (same with Batista). But I really am stuck trying to figure out why the fuck WWE handles the two of them the way they do when they don't do that with ANYONE else. And when Rick even showed that even HHH's infamous run wasn't as one dimensional as Cena's. WWE is either retarded and selectively choosing to have these relative newcomers carry the company when they don't trust guys like HHH or Taker. Or there's a logical question of whether they basically fear their stars falling without the titles. Again, I think its a stupid opinion if its there's, but I don't think its a ridiculous question for us to ask of their thought process.

[Batman]

OK, I see what you're saying, but . . .

1) Jericho does not belong on that list. Sure he can draw in a grudge feud, so can lots of upper-midcarders. This does not mean that they aren't giving him a run with the title because he doesn't "need" it.

2) Those other guys, yeah, they don't "need" the title. That's because they've had huge, legendary careers where they've had plenty of title runs to build them up to that point.

Sure, maybe they are relying on title feuds too much to build up Cena and Batista, but they are doing it because they believe they are worth building up, more so than other guys with a comparable tenure.

I think a fairer question than "do they have less confidence in Cena and Batista than in guys who are already legends?" would be "do they have more confidence in Cena and Batista than other guys who have been on the scene for an equally brief amount of time?"

I think the answer is clearly yes.

[Stu]

What I mean is that with Title Feuds you always have the safety net of whatever other reason the two guys are competing, if all else fails there's always the belt being on the line. You don't usually need to justify a main event being a particular match as long as it's for the World Title.
I remember when Randy Orton kicked Cena's dad in the head, the OO reaction was a rare bit of praise for Randy! No sympathy for "John Cena's Father" at all. The fact that Orton was challenging Cena for the title was the only reason no one was outright rooting for him, I think.

[Batman]

OO readers are not exactly Cena's chain gang. I'm sure the 10-13 year old set felt plenty of sympathy for Cena, Sr.

[National Champion Chris Cole]

I hate Cena now. I hated Dibiase then. The difference was now I'm 25 and Cena is supposed to be a face anbd I still hate him. I was 5 years old when I hated Dibiase for bribing Andre to beat Hogan and then wrestling Macho Man in the finals of Wrestlemania IV. As I got older and figured out that heels are awesome I realized how great The Million Dollar Man was. Easy choice.