The WWE was dealt a major blow ahead of the Royal Rumble at Amway Center. John Cena will miss the event after undergoing shoulder surgery this week.
The WWE took a major hit Wednesday night as the face of the WWE, John Cena, will have surgery Thursday to repair a shoulder injury. It will cause Cena to miss the Royal Rumble and could mean he misses WrestleMania 32 in April.
Rather upside down start to 2016 as tomorrow I will head to Birmingham for shoulder surgery. Life's full of set backs but #nevergiveup
— John Cena (@JohnCena) January 7, 2016
WWE acknowledged the injury on its web site but did not include any information about its severity or when Cena could return.
PWInsider.com is reporting Cena will have surgery for a torn rotator cuff. The injury will cause Cena to miss the Royal Rumble where possibly Cena would have faced Alberto Del Rio for the United States Title.
Cena also possibly would have been part of the 30-man Royal Rumble match which will be for the WWE Title as announced on Monday Night Raw as current WWE Champion Roman Reigns will have to defend his title in the Rumble match itself.
The only other time the WWE title was at stake at the Royal Rumble match itself was in 1992 when Ric Flair won the vacant WWE title. Had Cena, who has won the Rumble on two other occasions (2008 and 2013) won the Rumble this year, Cena would have tied Flair’s record of 16 world titles won which is to wrestling what the home run record is to Baseball or the scoring record to the NBA.
It was certainly possible the promotion would book its biggest hero to take the title to WrestleMania.
But more then likely Cena was not going to win the Rumble or even the U.S. Title as many have speculated. PWInsider is reporting Cena was on track to face The Undertaker at WrestleMania 32 which is scheduled to take place April 3 at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas.
The WWE is hopeful of attracting a record crowd of more than 100,000 for the event with the belief Cena-Undertaker would be the main attraction of the show considering Cena and Undertaker have not wrestled against each other since 2004 and the possibility of being it Undertaker’s last match in his career.
Cena returned to Raw just a week ago after taking a two-month absence to film the upcoming Fox reality show “American Grit.”
The injury is another hit to a WWE roster that has been hit by injuries over the past few months.
Randy Orton and Cesaro have also been sidelined with shoulder injuries. Daniel Bryan has still not been cleared to return to the ring after suffering a concussion last May and former WWE Champion Seth Rollins blew out his knee in November. That caused Rollins to drop the WWE title prior to the Survivor Series where he was scheduled to face Roman Reigns. It has left a pretty large hole at the top of the company that they have tried to fill with the often criticized Reigns.
This will be the first Royal Rumble show Cena will not be a part of since 2003. Cena has had many memorable moments at the Royal Rumble including a shocking return in 2008 from a torn pectoral muscle to win the Rumble which set him up to be in a Triple Threat WWE title match against HHH and Randy Orton at WrestleMania 24 held at the Citrus Bowl in front of 74,635 fans.
The question now is what the injury means for the Royal Rumble here in Orlando at the Amway Center on Jan. 24 and what changes will the WWE make with Cena out of the Rumble and possibly WrestleMania?
