Written by Jeremy Maes, The DEJ Experience

So who did you have in your Royal Rumble office pool? Yes I understand no one has an office pool for the Royal Rumble so just play along. Bet none of you had John Cena. I’ll bet that no one, not one person, fan and wrestling media member had a one thought that the last man entering the Rumble would be John Cena. On top of that I’ll guarantee you no one had his name penciled in as the winner of the match. Sure there will be “that guy” who will claim he knew all along and will try and mock anyone who says otherwise. Consider this a permission slip to berate them for being a terrible person and then ban them from you life. Its ok, people have done worse because of much less.

Everyone was surprised when that clock ran down, the crowd of course ending a good two seconds before the clock actually hit zero but they had been good about that all night. Just moments earlier Triple H had come in the ring and cemented his dominance over everyone in the ring. He tossed out men much larger than himself that other mere mortals had not been able to dispatch. He did so with ease as he eliminated Big Daddy V by simply shoving him over the top rope. He also eliminated Mick Foley, Cody Rhodes, Elijah Burke, Kane (with help he didn’t need from Batista) and then Batista himself.

When the first sound from Cena’s entrance music emanated from the MSG sound system the place exploded. Finally something big had happened. Hell, I took notice and jumped up off the floor and sat up straight. There was no way this was going to turn out to be real. Still, even with the long shot of a man standing in the entrance way, arms crossed, head down, the possibility of it being a ruse were great. Once Cena lifted his head and they cut to Triple H in the ring looking shocked, WWE creative had to have felt proud.

They pulled the wool over everyone’s eyes. No one knew he was coming back outside of the inner circle. No one on the Torch staff called it, no one on other sites and newsletters predicted it and no one on any message board predicted it. In this current climate of message boards, moles and endless other forms of information a surprise in the wrestling industry is rare.

The only other notable surprise recently was Kurt Angle’s appearance on TNA PPV, even if in the poorly orchestrated video form. The difference though is that Kurt was a free agent and most understood he would return to one company after a short lived sabbatical to get, cough, healthy. Cena is a totally different story.

Cena was an injured wrestler. His injury was fully disclosed and a timetable fully set by doctors and then reported by WWE. Sure this is the fundamental flaw of his injury’s disclosure but what can you do. They also had other stars, Batista and Edge most notably that had similar tears of a muscle, Edge being specifically linked to a torn pectoral muscle. Both men took a significant amount of time off so the idea was that Cena was out for a comparable amount of time.

His appearance Sunday night is going to raise a lot of questions. Some have already backhandedly accused him of being juiced on first glance. His chest looks noticeably smaller to me as does the rest of his frame. I admit to doing no photographic research on this yet so this opinion can change. Some other questions will be the idea of misinformation by WWE as to the severity of his injury, Cena possibly enhancing his return to the ring but one thing that cannot be ignored is the fact that WWE pulled a massive cover up operation. This should be a large topic of discussion and no doubt will be discussed. If they can cover up the return of their top wrestler and the information surrounding his return it is possible they are covering even more information.

Not information based on the return of a wrestler but much grander things. It is all a conspiracy with WWE after all. What kind of message is being sent by John Cena’s early return? Is this another message from McMahon? Was Cena forced back? Was hunter behind this all along to make it appear he isn’t the bully behind the scenes? Was Cena injured at all? Was this all a way to give him some time off from the road to get “clean?” What the hell did Bobby Lashley do so wrong? Was the entire bobby Lashley situation related to john Cena coming back early? Were certain things overlooked with John Cena and not Bobby Lashley?

In the end does it all matter? WWE finally delivered on PPV even if it took two and a half hours to accomplish it. No one predicted Cena’s return and WWE played everything to perfection.

Jeremy Maes is the "J" in the DEJ Audio Experience, found at PWTorch.com. He has been doing this for some time now, long enough that he can’t remember the start date. His famous words for all listeners have never changed “Don’t follow my path son. Don’t follow my path.” Find him on the PWTorch.com VIP Message Board, or shoot him an e-mail at theaudioexperience@gmail.com

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