Ryback Doesn't Have What It Takes to Be WWE's Next John Cena

At first glance, one can easily see a lot of John Cena in Ryback. He's jacked up, ox-strong and exudes an intensity befitting the WWE stage.

Ryback, though, is not the man to take Cena's place on the company's top rung. He has the tools to be a major player for WWE, but not its centerpiece, not a star on Cena's level. He trails too far behind Cena as both a talker and a wrestler to be his heir. 

The Big Guy thinks otherwise.

Ryback appeared on the Steve Austin Show and told "Stone Cold" that he has told Vince McMahon, "I'm the guy that can replace John Cena."

One can't blame Ryback for thinking that. Everyone on the roster should be gunning for that spot. But the powerhouse's succeeding Cena is a pipe dream.

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He told Austin that he realizes how key it is to stay healthy in order to be the top guy, but that's not the main blockade keeping Ryback from the WWE throne. A list of other factors instead create a glass ceiling above his head.

On Grantland, David Shoemaker broke down the potential candidates to "take Cena's spot over the next few months and into the future." He talked about how Roman Reigns has improved of late, Cesaro's rising popularity and Dean Ambrose's star power. Under the Ryback section, Shoemaker simply wrote, "Nope."

There's just too big of a gap between Ryback and Cena. 

That's most true when it comes to "it" factor. Cena's star power is undeniable. Kids adore him, showing their love by layering on Cena gear and roaring at his every entrance. 

When he steps onto the set of Jimmy Kimmel Live or SportsNation, he looks as if he belongs, a celebrity beyond the squared circle. 

Ryback doesn't possess that same quality. He can certainly be surprisingly charming but doesn't have that movie-star aura that propelled Hulk Hogan, The Rock and Cena. He's too stiff, too generic to be the company spokesman Cena has been for a decade-plus.

And it's not Cena he's competing with; his peers are blowing him out of the water in terms of charisma.

When he and Kevin Owens met face-to-face ahead of Night of Champions, it looked like the two men were competing in different leagues. Even in an awkward segment centered on a self-help book, Owens was a compelling force.

He was at ease with the mic in hand and the lights bright. 

Ryback, meanwhile, failed to display much of his personality. He too often sounds like he is simply plodding through memorized lines.

He hasn't been nearly consistent enough as a talker to warrant confidence from company officials and be a headliner. It certainly doesn't help his case that WWE is so stocked with potential megastars from Reigns to Seth Rollins, Owens to Dean Ambrose. 

Many fans would add Cesaro to that list, despite his underwhelming verbal skills. That's because The King of Swing is so incredible in the ring that one could argue it compensates for the part of the Superstar equation that he lacks.

Ryback can't say the same thing. He's an average in-ring performer in an era with a flood of wrestling artistes. 

Cena has held tight to a top position as much because of what he does in the ring as anything else. This year alone he has been a part of a series of Match of the Year candidates against Owens, Cesaro, Dolph Ziggler and Brock Lesnar.

Where are Ryback's classics? Where is the evidence that The Big Guy can fulfill the audience's expectations of a main event wrestler?

As the Pro Wrestling Mag Twitter account noted, Ryback hasn't had impressive chemistry against a variety of names: 

While Cena produced two stunners against Owens, Ryback struggled to produce anything memorable against him in two pay-per-view outings. 

Elton Jones of Heavy called Owens vs. Ryback at Night of Champions "an OK bout." That's too often the label his matches get. And here, the majority of the talk post-bout was about Owens' potential as champ, not anything Ryback did in his losing effort.

At the next PPV, he made even less of an impact.

The post-Hell in a Cell discussion essentially ignored Ryback. In James Montgomery's review of the event on Rolling Stone, he only mentioned The Big Guy in passing. 

That's happened too often in Ryback's career. 

WWE.com compiled its picks for the 25 best matches in 2013 and 2014. Ryback's name popped up only once in both lists. That one entry was for his part in the Team Cena vs. Team Authority match at Survivor Series last year.

Cena, by comparison, popped up five times in the former list and four times in the latter.

It's not fair, though, to compare Cena and Ryback. They exist on two wholly different tiers. And that will always be the case.

Ryback can't just morph into the big-match performer Cena is. He can make himself become more captivating or give off more or a top-star vibe. That's not saying that success won't come his way, but replacing Cena should be on his to-do list only as an unreachable goal designed to push him.

He told Austin, "I want to be my absolute best, and my best is going to end up being pretty damn good at the end of this." He's right. There's plenty of reason to believe he'll be "pretty damn good," but not the man to replace Cena.

"Good" just isn't sufficient in trying to overtake a man with a legacy of greatness.