WWE News: John Cena's Money in the Bank Decision Ruins Golden Opportunity

It is no secret that there is a large legion of WWE fans that has grown tired of John Cena's perpetual super hero antics. After he won Money in the Bank, the WWE brass had a chance to add some depth to his stale character, but the company let that golden opportunity slip away as usual.

It was pretty much a foregone conclusion that Cena was going to win the WWE Championship contract Money in the Bank ladder match on Sunday and that is precisely what happened. There was some uncertainty with regard to when Cena would choose to cash in that contract, but that was solved on Monday.

As Big Show assaulted WWE Champion CM Punk after their match on RAW, it became quite obvious that Cena would make the save. The creative team tried to manufacture the illusion that Cena was going to cash in on a vulnerable Punk, but he said that he would give Punk a week to prepare and exercise his title shot on the 1,000th episode of RAW.

There is no question that the WWE Championship match should be great and it is certainly fitting for the historic 1,000th episode of RAW, but the company squandered yet another chance to do something interesting with Cena. Next week's RAW is going to be big regardless of the title match, so while it is certainly going to be a spectacle, it isn't necessary in the least.

Fans have seen Cena do the honorable thing so many times that it has gone way past boring. I tried to convince myself that Cena would surprise me and do something shocking with the briefcase, but I should have known that wasn't going to happen. Cena is a role model and I guess that role models are always supposed to be fair and aren't supposed to take advantage of favorable situations.

Cena will become only the second Money in the Bank winner to cash in his contract with a pre-determined match, with Rob Van Dam being the other. That makes Cena's cash-in different to some degree, but it was the obvious, Cena-esque thing to do. If the WWE really wanted to make his cash-in special, then he should have done it after Punk's match at SummerSlam.

Punk could have very easily had another match with Daniel Bryan at SummerSlam, after which Cena would have been able to utilize the Money in the Bank contract like so many before him have. I understand that Cena is supposed to be special and larger-than-life, but having him take the easy route to the WWE Championship would have humanized him and made him much more intriguing.

Every single time the WWE has a chance to do something interesting with Cena, it doesn't happen. When Cena was forced into Nexus he could have developed into a willing participant, but he vanquished the group instead. When he lost to The Rock at WrestleMania he could have gone on a losing streak and fallen into a downward spiral, but he promptly defeated Brock Lesnar at the very next pay-per-view.

Even during the "embrace the hate" storyline between Cena and Kane, Cena could have added some edge to his character. That feud ended like the rest of them, though, as he ignored Kane's diabolical advances and beat him into oblivion. This Money in the Bank debacle is just the latest decision that centers more on ratings and preserving Cena's image than creating a compelling storyline.

Few believe that Cena will ever turn heel or deviate from his gimmick in any way, but I have always been optimistic that something would happen eventually. The more things continue in this manner, however, the more pessimistic I become. I'm not saying that Cena cashing in on Punk at SummerSlam would have made him a full-fledged heel, but it could have been the start of something.

Cena always preaches hustle, loyalty and respect, so having him cut corners to win the title would have been a huge deal that might have turned the tide toward making Cena more of a tweener and eventually a heel.

That clearly doesn't appear to be in the cards right now, however. The best we can hope for at this point is that Cena becomes the first Money in the Bank winner to cash in unsuccessfully when Punk beats him on RAW.

That would be a Pyrrhic victory, since the damage has already been done with regards to the WWE botching an angle with so much potential, but it seems likely that Cena will close the biggest RAW ever as the new WWE Champion and things will go from bad to worse.

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