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JOHN CENA ON THE POSSIBILITY OF A RETURN TO THE RING, THE JOHN CENA CLASSIC

John Cena was interviewed by US Weekly about a number of topics.

When asked about the possibility of a return to the ring down the line, Cena said, "I hate speaking in absolutes … “Never” is a strong word. It would be financial suicide for someone to court me in a position where I would have another match, and I truly mean that. So if you’re in the business of torching currency, that’s the only way to get me back in the ring. Aside from that, the reason “one more match” resonated so well for me, first of all, I got to express to the fans of how fulfilled I felt when I retired. Second of all, the interest of an audience being like, “We want to see you again!” gets me excited for the new idea of the John Cena Classic. We can do this again. I’ll be there. It’ll be fan-forward and fan-first. I won’t be so focused on, “Man, this match means everything to me. I’ve got to make sure I give all I have when the music plays and I’m under the lights.” I get to watch other performers, so I can kind of be the ambassador for the event, and I can get out there and meet with people that matter most in my life, the fans. I really can’t wait for this thing to find its legs, for us to get a city and a date and move forward. And I can’t wait for it to happen. So when I hear “one more match,” I hear [that] there’s still interest, the heart still beats. I’m trying to think in my head, How can we gear this to where I can be there, be active and be included but allow others to do the thing I can no longer do. I hope we have it with the John Cena Classic."

On the planning for the Cena Classic and where they are now, Cena said, "It’s still a work in progress. What I want to see is a night of exhibition matches. I always try to say to young talent, “Tell me who you are in one sentence.” The John Cena Classic is WWE’s All Star game. That’s the sentence. And then we branch out from that. I envision a world … where it’s exhibition matches, WWE superstars competing with NXT superstars. … Maybe they’re on the same team, maybe they face off at each other. … I think the bracketology is interesting. I love a world where I personally invite the talent to participate so they know how much it means to me. That means more trips to Raw, more trips to SmackDown, more trips to NXT. We have reveals of all this stuff. We tell everybody where it is when it is. … We’re going to debut a new championship. So I’d love the audience to see that. I’d love the participants to see that before. I’d love to do a card reveal where you realize the event, and these are the matchups. We’ve got to figure out the fan vote. I do not want it sabotaged. I do not want it hijacked. I know there’s a lot of burner accounts out there and there’s a lot of bots out there. Audience participation is what I want, like fair audience participation, because I’m the success story. I’m trying to encompass my journey in an evening. I was the WWE last pick. I was going to be fired. I was given a second chance, and not a main-event second chance. I started on the minor league shows. I started on the weekend shows, live events, winning over one fan at a time. This is a night where you can put down your business card and say you’re going to remember this name. And if you’re already a champ and you participate in the event, you can say that’s why I am. It’s truly just an exhibition of our best and brightest of today and tomorrow, and you never know what’s going to happen."

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