ohn Cena’s final match isn’t a segment, an attraction, or a ceremonial handshake. It’s a battlefield selection process, and the shortlist has been violently trimmed down to two names: LA Knight and Gunther. The winner on the December 5th SmackDown — the “Last Time Is Now” tournament final — walks straight into the last chapter of a career that fed an entire era of WWE. Cena’s goodbye lands on December 13th at Saturday Night’s Main Event, and that opponent must represent more than match quality. He must embody what Cena spent twenty years preaching: defiance, perseverance, and legitimacy built through impact rather than entitlement.
Knight’s journey — from nearly cut in NXT to battling through the Max Dupri gimmick hellslide — has been a referendum on whether fan willpower can overpower corporate skepticism. Gunther, meanwhile, is already decorated like a Hall of Fame lock: the man who retired Goldberg, the longest-reigning Intercontinental Champion, a two-time world titleholder, and a cold monster forged for legacy killshots. But Cena’s final match is not merely about who looks strongest on paper.
It’s about narrative gravity. Organic uprising. Emotional payoff.
And the answer to a simple question that will echo every arena floor:
Who is worthy to shut the lights on John Cena?
Here are the seven reasons that answer is LA Knight.
1. A Career That Demands the Moment
If the question is “how old is LA Knight from WWE?”, the answer—43—is usually used as ammunition against him. And yet, that number is precisely why he needs this moment more than Gunther or anyone else. Knight’s career is the living antithesis of the curated “chosen one” pipeline: a guy WWE repeatedly tried to shelve, rename, soften, or forget. From being on the NXT cut list to the mis-branded Max Dupri relaunch, the company did everything except admit what the crowds already knew: he was made for the main stage.
Gunther already has his legacy codified. Two-time world champion, the longest IC reign ever, even handing Goldberg his final defeat long before people were Googling “did John Cena win tonight?” after PLEs. LA Knight doesn’t have that kind of permanent stamp yet. He has flashes—two U.S. title reigns, Slim Jim Battle Royal, championship pursuits—but nothing that screams forever.
Retiring Cena is that stamp. It’s the moment in time that elevates Knight past the “nearly factor”: losing Money in the Bank while the arena was molten for him, failing to break through the world title ceiling, and constantly getting booked like a gatekeeper who almost reached destiny. If he wins Cena’s final match—after beating Gunther on the December 5th SmackDown tournament final—it’s no longer hope, or chants, or faith. It becomes fact. Cena is the closest thing WWE has to mainstream royalty—from the Survivor Series 2025 headlines to “John Cena at the Oscars”—and the man who ends him inherits that gravity forever.
2. The Story is Already Written
WWE doesn’t often get clean narrative symmetry. They force stories, retro-fit logic, or ask fans to pretend history doesn’t exist. Not here. LA Knight versus John Cena has been simmering since Payback 2023, when Cena—acting as special guest referee—raised Knight’s arm and pointed to him like a man signaling the heir. It was a wordless, perfect “finish the story” moment long before Survivor Series fans asked whether Cena would ever get his own key chapter. Knight then pinned Jimmy Uso with the BFT at Fastlane as Cena’s partner, proving he could deliver in a marquee spotlight.
A Cena vs. Knight finale isn’t a cold build. It’s a continuation—one that feels like payoff rather than invention. Compare that to Cena vs. Gunther: zero history, no connective tissue, and no emotional thread tying them together. You could book it, sure. But it would feel like Cena’s retirement match was constructed in a lab rather than earned through time.
Cena already hinted at the coronation. The audiences felt it. Commentators signaled it. And Knight has fought for it the long way round, long after his original Eli Drake days and the LA Knight WWE debut that fans begged to see done right. The “YEAH!” chant sweeping arenas isn’t Rebel Spirit Marketing—it’s the organic momentum that forced WWE’s hand.
Ending Cena’s in-ring life with a man he once endorsed—tacitly, visually, narratively—makes the final bell feel poetic. It reads like Cena sealing a verdict he already gave once: this guy is the future because the fans chose him, not because the office did.
3. A Match Built for Mic Warfare
Cena’s last stand requires someone who can sell the gravity without needing Cena on TV weekly to carry the weight. And LA Knight is the best mic worker WWE has produced since the Ruthless Aggression era itself. When people compare his cadence and bite to The Rock or Austin, it’s not mimicry—it’s because he taps into the same cultural voltage. Gunther is elite in-ring, but his presentation leans on icy dominance rather than emotional electricity.
Knight was forged by promos. His exchanges with EC3 in Impact are still passed around as masterclasses. His self-assured trash talk revived SmackDown segments that were otherwise dead air. His catchphrases became so viral that WWE had no choice but to put him in real programs. If WWE wants Cena’s retirement build to feel like a zeitgeist event, that requires someone who can stand on the mic and elevate every face-off into a moment people replay years later.
Think of how fans still search “John Cena vs Dominik Mysterio Survivor Series 2025” just to re-live promos. Cena’s final opponent needs that same spark. Someone who can make every confrontation feel like history—whether Cena is present or phoning in a satellite message between commitments like tapings and awards circuits. (After all, John Cena at the Oscars wasn’t a costume gag—it’s proof he’s global. Knight versus Cena must sound global too.)
Knight’s voiceprint makes it feel monumental. He sells significance by existing in it. When Cena gave that sly hand-raise at Payback, it was more than endorsement—it was recognition from one promo legend to another that whoever replaces him must be able to talk with the gods.
4. The Needed Swerve
Gunther has been pencilled in by half the fanbase since Cena confirmed December 13th as his last match. The rumors, the fantasy cards, the editorial speculation—it’s been constant. Which means that if Knight beats Gunther on December 5th, the company instantly gets something wrestling almost never produces anymore: legitimate surprise.
This isn’t swerving for shock. It’s swerving for resonance. Gunther is the Ring General and already retired Goldberg; he doesn’t need to be the executioner of Cena too. If Cena’s retirement comes in a blizzard of chops and ring-general slaughter, the memory leans “clinical.” If LA Knight beats Cena, it leans “cathartic.”
Knight is a crowd babyface at a time when crowds are cynical. Them watching Cena lose isn’t cruelty—they’ll still weep, chant, salute, and ask “did John Cena win tonight?” before correcting themselves and realizing the loss was a gift. And unlike watching Cena fold to Dominik at Survivor Series or stare down Gunther like a cold tactical exercise, Knight’s win would feel emotional, not mechanical.
A predictable ending hurts Cena more than Knight. Fans want destiny, not strategy. Give them a man they begged to see elevated—the one who survived Max Dupri, survived the Wyatt Rumble burial, survived age skepticism—and the final bell lands like fulfillment. If Cena’s career ends by choice, it should end against someone who represents the victory of unfiltered fan will.
That’s not Gunther.
That’s the guy the audience dragged to the top with volume alone.
That’s Knight.
5. Two Men Cut From the Same Iron
Cena wasn’t built by corporate moulding. He was nearly fired until a locker-room freestyle saved his entire life. Knight wasn’t built by molded approval either. They both clawed their way upward from dismissals, doubts, and creative malpractice.
Knight’s worldview—that wrestling is a selfish business designed to break you unless you break it first—isn’t edgy branding. It’s lived experience from a man nearly erased multiple times, who still showed up, still talked, still stayed loud enough to echo even when booking tried to mute him. When fans Google “how old is LA Knight from WWE,” the implied insult is that his window is closing. Knight’s defiance turns that question into an anti-corporate rally cry: he lasted long enough to take Cena’s final match.
Cena spent a career valorising perseverance. “Never Give Up” wasn’t just a catchphrase—it was autobiography. He knows what it means when a man survives bad creative, rebranding purgatory, politicking, and the “he’s too old” whispers, then still ends up one match away from the spot of a lifetime.
Gunther is transcendent, but he doesn’t mirror Cena’s origin. Cena handing Knight his final match is Cena acknowledging a kindred path: a dude written off, disregarded, then chosen by popular revolt. The fact Knight’s rise has been entirely organic—from the “YEAH!” roar to his Slammy sweep—is Cena’s story told at a different age and in a colder business.
Cena’s last opponent shouldn’t be the man with the cleanest qualification sheet. It should be the man who had no sheet at all until the audience wrote it for him.
Cena versus LA Knight is survival saluting survival.
The GOAT giving his final bell to the guy who refused to die.
6. Ideology Versus Era
(Character over Workrate, Legacy over Star Ratings)
Cena’s legacy isn’t built on V-Trigger collages or 45-kick sequences. He is the face of the era that believed character, aura, story, and empathy were the true art of wrestling. Knight is the first megastar since Cena who openly aligns with that philosophy, loudly rejecting the modern fixation on match-rating pyro shows.
Knight’s toolkit is rooted in connection. His stomp-and-swagger rhythm, the reverse DDT, the timing of the BFT—these aren’t designed for GIF hunters. They’re designed to detonate inside a crowd. Cena represents that lineage. And Knight embodies it more than anyone active: the guy who pulls arenas into the palm of his hand with just a syllable—YEAH.
Gunther is one of the greatest in-ring technicians alive. But Cena doesn’t need a final technical epic. He needs a finale that reflects what made him immortal: charisma in motion. No one in WWE right now projects that better than the man who turned a failed Max Dupri experiment into a populist coup.
When people debate LA Knight vs Gunther, they’re really debating two visions of the industry’s soul. Cena validates the one that built him. The one that will be remembered long after people forget who hit the smoothest sequence.
When audiences search “LA Knight WWE debut” years from now, or replay his promos next to Cena’s final stare-down, they won’t talk about workrate. They’ll talk about presence.
Legend recognizes legend.
Knight is the first man since Cena whose charisma feels like destiny rather than scripting.
7. Cena’s Final Winner Must Leave the Fans Whole
Cena has been leaning harder toward “giver” than “taker.” Whether joking at the Oscars, or wrestling Dominik at Survivor Series, he’s been operating like a man doing victory laps that highlight others rather than protect himself. If the last chorus of his career is going to ring, the emotional math matters: fans shouldn’t walk away bitter.
Knight provides catharsis. Gunther provides awe. Only one fits a farewell.
Fans fought for Knight. They forced him back from Max Dupri. They stood behind him when critics torched the Bray Wyatt Rumble match. They raged when MITB slipped through him despite the pop that shook the briefcase hooks. And they watched him scratch toward the world title tier, only to stall at the glass ceiling each time. Cena—raising Knight’s arm once—already hinted at the ending Knight deserves.
Knight beating him in Cena’s final match becomes healing, not grief. It rewards the audience who demanded his push. It turns the question “did John Cena win tonight?” into a proud “no, he chose to go out making sure WWE’s future has a voice as loud as his was.”
A loss, meanwhile, finishes Knight’s story by re-writing him as the man who always fell one rung short. That shadow becomes permanent.
Cena’s greatest legacy is that he built the future instead of simply occupying the present.
Knight is that future.
And on December 13th, if he walks out from the Gunther match on SmackDown, stands across from Cena, and drops the BFT to close the book—then the GOAT leaves knowing he did what the industry asks of its legends:
He gave everything away so something greater could begin.
YEAH.
When the bell tolls for the final time on December 13th, John Cena’s legacy will not be measured by whether he stood tall or stayed down — but by the choice itself. It will be measured by who he deemed worthy of being the last man to test his resolve. Whether the post-show headlines debate result, whether fans are asking “did John Cena win tonight?”, or whether the historical archive lists a final BFT or an Attitude Adjustment, the truth beneath all of it is simple: Cena’s last dance doubles as a coronation.
LA Knight stands as the most fitting heir because his rise wasn’t planned. It was willed into existence by audiences who saw themselves in his scars, setbacks, and stubborn instinct to keep fighting. Knight embodies the same iron that forged Cena: charisma over choreography, grit over grooming, and the belief that star power is lived, not assigned.
If Knight beats Gunther on December 5th, and stands across from Cena in that final arena, the symbolism becomes too loud to ignore. Cena can go out with the man the people chose — the survivor, the self-believer, the voice that never needed permission.
And if that BFT lands and Knight closes the book, then Cena leaves knowing he gave the business one last gift:
a successor born from the same storm that once forged him.
The GOAT exits.
The Megastar rises.
And WWE begins its next era with a single word:
YEAH.
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