John Cena made history last year when he defeated Cody Rhodes to win his 17th world title at WrestleMania 41. While the moment sent shockwaves throughout the wrestling world it appears that Cena’s big win was originally supposed to happen a few years before.
While talking about the original plans for his match with Roman Reigns at SummerSlam in 2021 on the No Contest Wrestling podcast John Cena revealed that he was supposed to win and lose the championship that night. However, plans changed drastically when Brock Lesnar was booked for the show.
“That night was supposed to go very different. In the last moment, we had a surprise guest booked and he came out after the match was over. Brock. They didn’t secure Brock until 5:00 PM that day.
I was going to win 17. We were going to have someone come out and restart the match and Roman was going to take it back. The way we put together the match was we were going to give them a hell of a match, everything out the door, no rules, no nothing, tons of finishers, all this stuff because I was going to win and then Roman was going to take it back. So, you have this hard-fought battle and then through a nefarious set of rules the match is restarted.
Then we secure Brock and Talent Relations comes and said, ‘I need to see you. We’re switching the finish.’ ‘To what?’ ‘Roman over.’ ‘Yep.’ ‘Clean.’ Yep.’ ‘Okay, what do you want to do?’ ‘Let me just talk to Roman and Paul.’ I go in, they’re like, ‘You got the news?’ I said, ‘I got the news.’ ‘What do we do?’ I said, ‘One Spear, that’s it. Whatever match you want to have, that’s fine. You beat me with your finish once.’
I love Paul. Paul Heyman has been a great mentor. He gets it and he recognizes somebody who sees that it’s not about them, it’s about the story. This is going to make Roman better because they’re they’re having him win so he can go on to bigger and better things. And it switched right there.
It happens to everyone. It happens from the top of the card down to the bottom. They will switch. They will cut your time. They will give you different creative. It happens all the time.
So, I didn’t flip out. When Travis didn’t want to do it anymore, when Rock chose to go another way. It happens. I saw Steve Austin leave. I saw him get fired. I was there when they fired him in Atlanta. It happens all the time. But I was supposed to win 17 that night.”
John Cena kicked off his retirement tour back in January of 2025, and the tour concluded at Saturday Night’s Main Event on December 13th when Gunther made John Cena tap out. Cena has remained adamant that he will not be coming out of retirement at any point in the future.