Cena was in the Rumble match itself in 2011, but was back in the main event at Elimination Chamber, winning a chamber match against CM Punk, Sheamus, John Morrison, Randy Orton, and R-Truth to see who would challenge Miz for the WWE title at Wrestlemania. The show did 216,000 PPV buys, down just over 26% from the inaugural Elimination Chamber the year before. 

Mania XXVII, headlined by Cena challenging the Miz for the WWE title, did the second most PPV buys in the history of the promotion at the time, only trailing Mania XXIII (Vince’s hair vs. Donald Trump’s hair). While that sounds incredible on paper, the lion’s share of the credit must go to The Rock, who hosted the show and was figured into the Cena-Miz storyline. His regular appearance on WWE TV leading up to the event breathed life into the company. 

Extreme Rules 2011 (replacing Backlash as the post-Mania event saw another Cena main event, this time challenging the Miz for the WWE title, along with John Morrison in a three-way cage match. Without the Rock’s involvement, the show was down to 216,000 PPV buys, but that was also the highest the traditional post-Mania PPV did since the 2006 version with Cena vs. Triple H vs. Edge. 

Over the Limit 2011 featured the blow off to Cena vs. Miz – a WWE title I Quit match. The show did a paltry 146,000 PPV buys worldwide and only 72,000 in the U.S. The domestic number is significant because the only other show to sell fewer PPVs in the States than The Wrestling Classic (with minimal distribution) was the ECW-branded December to Dismember. Reasons like these are also why WWE likely never brought Miz back as the company’s regular top guy. 

Capital Punishment featured Cena vs. someone making their one and only PPV main event in any company – Ron Killings. Cena vs. R-Truth did 176,000 buys worldwide and 85,000 domestically. While not as bad a draw as the Miz match before it, this didn’t do well in business. As they were developing heels for Cena to work, there were some transparent misses. But to be fair, it’s not like Cena had much success against the more established guys. 

While we just mentioned the misses, let’s talk about a hit for the company. Money in the Bank 2011 featured the first-ever John Cena vs. CM Punk PPV main event, where Punk threatened to win the title and leave the company because his contract had expired. The program also got a ton of mainstream buzz due to Punk’s infamous pipe bomb promo on an episode of Monday Night Raw. 

The show did 205,000 PPV buys, up 20% from 2010’s inaugural MITB PPV (main evented by Cena vs. Sheamus in a cage). It was also good for third in B PPVs for 2011, trailing only Elimination Chamber and Extreme Rules. These are very respectable numbers, but also probably not quite what they were hoping for after the aforementioned buzz. Summerslam featured a rematch between the two for the WWE title, where the show did 311,000 PPV buys and 180,000 in the States. For context, that was the lowest amount of buys stateside in the event’s history, outside of Shawn Michaels vs. Vader in 1996 (157k), so the program had no legs after a hot start.

Cena wasn’t back on top again until Hell in a Cell in October, defending the WWE title against Punk and Alberto Del Rio in a HIAC match. The show only did 182,000 buys, which would remain the lowest-ever for the five HIAC events held from 2009 to 2013. He followed that by main-eventing Vengeance 2011, challenging Del Rio in a Last Man Standing Match, which drew an abysmal 121,000 PPV buys and 65,000 domestic purchases. This was worse than Cena vs. Miz at Over the Limit earlier in the year and provided numbers eerily close to the December to Dismember debacle in 2006. 

Survivor Series 2011 is now infamous for the decision to team Cena with his WrestleMania opponent, The Rock. Not only did that illogical pairing take place, but they also worked Miz and Killings, both of whom had produced some poor PPV numbers already. I’m not sure if the decision was made because that year’s Mania drew so well with Rock just involved in Cena vs. Miz, and this time he was actually working, but the show only did 312,000 PPV buys. While that was the highest figure for a Survivor Series since 2008, that’s also 75% lower than the first Rock vs. Cena match at Mania in six months. TLC was headlined by Punk vs. Del Rio, so there are no PPVs on the card. 

We’ll have the fifth and final part next, covering the final PPVs before the launch of the WWE Network.