• John Cena Reveals Original Plan For His Retirement Tour
During his appearance on The Bill Simmons Podcast, John Cena revealed that he originally wanted to work 220 dates on his WWE retirement tour this year.
Here’s what the 17-time World Champion said:
“‘Hey man, 36 dates must have been easy this year.’ I did too many jobs. I was in Budapest, flying to Indy, do Indy, fly back, land, go film. Doing that until post-WrestleMania. Back and forth to Morocco, Budapest, all these crazy places that weren’t easy commutes.
You think you can do it, ‘I’ll sleep on the plane.’ You don’t. It doesn’t happen. Then, you get upside down and you’re super fatigued. I threaded the needle just enough.
The plan, originally, was to do a full year. This goes to show my ignorance of the business. I wanted to do 220 dates.
Just take the year off from everything, hop on a bus, do a full WWE calendar, and totally say goodbye.
Thank goodness the business isn’t like that anymore. I’d be done. They only needed me for 36.”
Also Read: Absent Top WWE Star Will Be In Attendance For John Cena’s Final Match
• Netflix To Buy Warner Bros. & HBO Max: Puts WWE & AEW Under One Streaming Roof
The biggest media news of the year is set to shake up the professional wrestling world after Netflix won the bidding war to buy the film and television studio assets of Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) in a deal valued at $82.7 billion. This massive acquisition brings the two largest pro-wrestling companies (WWE and AEW), which are fierce competitors, under one media umbrella for the first time.
Notably, WBD’s cable channels, such as CNN, TNT, and TBS, will be spun off into a new company called Discovery Global before the sale is finalized.
This merger creates a very interesting situation for both WWE and AEW, who are direct rivals in the wrestling industry. WWE signed a massive ten-year, $5 billion deal that makes Netflix the exclusive home for its main show, Monday Night RAW, in the United States. SmackDown, NXT, and PLEs air on Netflix as well, but outside the United States.
However, their competitor, AEW, has its main shows, Dynamite and Collision, broadcast on WBD channels TBS and TNT. Crucially, AEW also has its pay-per-views and weekly shows available to stream on HBO Max, the very service Netflix is buying.
While the deal is not expected to close until 2026 and must first clear major hurdles with regulators, the merger means that Netflix – WWE’s biggest streaming partner – will soon own a platform that streams content from All Elite Wrestling – WWE’s biggest wrestling rival.
This is the first time the two companies have shared a streaming owner, raising big questions about the future of AEW’s presence on HBO Max once Netflix takes over.
