The first reaction a lot of people had to the news that Shinsuke Nakamura would face John Cena in a number one contenders match on WWE SmackDown was anger. “Why are they fighting on free TV?” people asked.
It sounds silly—isn’t it better that it’s on cable (not free) instead of on the WWE Network?—but there’s some sense in that question: There was zero build for the match. Cena and Nakamura were just told they’d have a match, and so they had one. As someone who enjoys a good build to a match, it was disappointing we weren’t getting one.
But, hey, we at least got John Cena vs. Shinsuke Nakamura! And it was fine. It wasn’t great, it wasn’t bad, it was just there. But, because of the status of the two wrestlers in the match, it was pretty watchable. And the ending was bonkers.
As you can tell from the GIF above and the headline of this post, John Cena got dropped on his head at the end of the match. Nakamura reversed an Attitude Adjustment attempt into a back suplex and dropped Cena right on his head. (It’s not entirely clear this is Nakamura’s fault; Cena could’ve taken it incorrectly.)
It looked scary. And then John Cena got up, took Nakamura’s Kinshasa finisher and was pinned in the center of the ring. Nakamura will go to SummerSlam to face Jinder Mahal for the WWE championship. But look at what happened during the post-match conversation:
Nakamura apologizes, and Cena says “don’t be sorry.” John Cena really is The Nicest Man on The Planet.