John Cena Classic Highlights WWE's Growing Problem With Wins and Losses

WWE has a host of problems right now. We could run them down: Ticket prices, creative meddling, horrendous celebrity involvement, targeting non-wrestling fans for a show that has minimal wrestling. Etc. 

But one quietly hangs above most near the top of, let's say, WWE problems power rankings: 

Winning and losing doesn't matter. 

The knee-jerk reaction is probably to laugh at such a suggestion. This is pro wrestling, after all. Brock Lesnar could walk back in the door tomorrow and demand a title shot despite a recent loss to Oba Femi and we would all probably shrug collective shoulders and be cool with it. 

But big outlying exceptions don't make the point any less true. 

The upcoming, strange John Cena Classic thing is the exclamation point on all this. 

After Cena made his latest big announcement (this is going to become as repetitive as Triple H calling everything a new era, isn't it…) about the tournament, confusion trumped hype more than anything. 

After all, the very obviously slapped-together-at-the-last-second idea suggested a sort of tournament that enabled fan involvement. Sounds good…but the idea suggested that "losers" of a match can still "win" via fan vote. 

So, a new title, where fans determine the winner via polling. Which means, unless WWE is faking the fan engagement and cooking the books, wins and losses won't matter. 

Which…matters. Wins and losses are a huge part of pro wrestling. It's a big part of what can get fans invested in characters and stories. If a fan doesn't care about those things or what even happens on the screen because they will vote for a certain wrestler no matter what, then what are we even doing here? 

This win-loss problem expands to the totality of WWE right now. The AJ Lee-Becky Lynch feud was a good example of this. And so is the ongoing stuff with Roman Reigns and Jacob Fatu. 

In that latter point, Fatu stressed how badly he needed to win. At Backlash, he didn't, then is right back in the title scene anyway. Reigns is making him look like a million bucks for the long-term, but losses not mattering is still a pain point. 

That might be nitpicking a little bit. But lack of meaning behind the win-loss column has long been a problem. Look no further than the endless Money in the Bank "winners" who flop. What has Gunther winning over Cena, retiring him, really done for his stock? How many "wins" will Femi rack up in squash matches before the rub from the victory over Lesnar fades and we're bemoaning WWE botching lightning in a bottle?

Obviously, a big factor in this is planned storytelling. If there's not even light groundwork put down before matches and events, everything falls apart. 

This is also a big factor in why AEW rose to prominence as actual competition while WWE flailed its arms, off-balance. The storytelling was far more focused, and would you look at that, the promotion even highlighted win-loss records for a time. 

Granted, AEW spotlighting a wrestler's win-loss record had an expiration date. It wasn't feasible to keep it going. But there's a reason the wins and losses in that promotion largely still feel more meaningful than those in WWE. 

Proper storytelling and planning that is heavily baked into results matters. This is…pro wrestling 101, but WWE seems intent on being more sports entertainment with celebrities in the front row and normal fans priced out of the experience and more advertisements than wrestling…it goes on and on. 

Nobody is saying WCW-Goldberg this for someone like Bron Breakker. One hundred wins in a row isn't going to make it any less obvious that his character needs careful work and meaningful stories while other people do the talking on the mic for him. 

Everyone is in on the joke of pro wrestling in 2026. It's scripted entertainment. The dirtsheets said this and that. The stuff going on behind the scenes is more up front than ever. 

But that doesn't mean wins and losses shouldn't matter. And John Cena coming back again with a confusing tournament and title that is already feeling half-baked and suffering because it wasn't thought out, isn't aimed at actual pro wrestling fans and has no direction is a pretty good example of why WWE is in a rut right now with the year-round fans who kept things alive at its lowest lows. 

Unfortunate, but considering WWE doesn't even seem to know how or when the Cena Classic will even happen, there's time to hear the feedback and, actually, you know, properly book it. 

Maybe, just maybe, the Cena Classic will end up being a chance for WWE to get back on track a little bit. If not, the year-round fans will vote all right, but with disinterest, not attending, nor viewing.