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John Cena Explains Why He Never Faced The Undertaker At WrestleMania, Comments On His Retirement

John Cena

During a recent appearance on E&C’s Pod Of Awesomeness, 16 time WWE World Heavyweight Champion John Cena talked about never facing The Undertaker at WrestleMania, his retirement from WWE & more. Below are the highlights:

On never having a WrestleMania feud with The Undertaker:

“We have to do the best for WrestleMania, period. That event is completely the fiscal future of the company and every single year, there were plans to do the right thing for WrestleMania and that match was not in the plans. And that’s the best I can say. So many guys complain about not being in the last match, or a main event match, or with a certain partner. Man, if it was only work with people you’re comfortable with, I would’ve had another 10,000 matches with you (referring to Edge). Like that’s the easy part. The difficult part as a professional is to take what they need you to do and make it creative.

In a perfect world, would I want to face The Undertaker at WrestleMania? That’s every pro wrestler’s dream! That’s any WWE Superstar’s dream, to work pretty much the maestro of WrestleMania at WrestleMania. That’s it! But if our company’s success depends on me doing something else, then my job is to do that something else. And I think the way all that went, I don’t have any regrets on the way any of that went. I think it was completely put together the right way. Would I have loved to do it? Yes! But I show up to work to do work.”

For those who don’t know, John Cena taking on The Undertaker in a “Battle of Legends” match was planned for WrestleMania 32, but it didn’t happen due to Cena getting injured.

On if he’ll retire from WWE soon:

“Well, I have a different perspective and, like I said, everybody that listens to this will want me strung up from the tallest tree, but I don’t see things from my own looking glass. Full disclosure, if I had nothing else going on outside, I don’t know physically if I can do a full schedule anymore. And if you look at the backlog of Superstars before, I don’t think that’s a deterrent to anyone who’s staring down the barrel of 41 years old.

Chris Jericho is the only Cal Ripken I know, and Glenn Jacobs (a.k.a Kane), they’re the only two Cal Ripkens I know. And Glenn is a big M.F. and he does a lot of his work bruising. And Chris does take a lot of time to perform as a musician, so every time he’s booked, he shows up. And, believe it or not, The Miz is another one too that doesn’t get hurt and performs all the time.

But when you look at that timeline and I’m just looking at the pure numbers, when you crack that 40 year old threshold, you can count on one hand guys that continue to work the day-by-day hustle that is WWE. And that is maybe not even on an elite level. That’s being a part of the show, not being the show. So when you ask me if it’s time to retire, the partisan rumblings between myself and Roman Reigns, it’s the initial response of the audience telling me that it’s time. Like, I’d be ignorant if I didn’t. I’ve made my living off of listening to the audience and it has been 15 years.

Like, the WWE audience has been the most gracious, kind, faithful group of people to me in the world. And I know half of them boo me and all that stuff, but they’ve continued to show up for so long and I think I’m doing them a disservice by trying to extend it. I’m already way passed, so when is too much enough? And I don’t know. I don’t know. I’ve had injuries just like everybody else, but, like, man, I’ve got miles on me. It has been a long, long, long, long, long, long run.”


        
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