Topics: John Cena, The Rock, Vince McMahon, WWE, WrestleMania, Wrestling
A WWE broadcast's running order was once hastily rearranged after John Cena purposefully wasted time to give another wrestler their moment to shine at WrestleMania as a reward after they snitched on The Rock.
Cena is retiring from wrestling this weekend after 26 years in the ring with his last match being against Gunther at Saturday Night's Main Event this evening.
The 48-year-old has held the WWE Championship on a record 14 occasions, plus the World Heavyweight Championship three times, and has won multiple other championships with the company.
Cena has also developed an acting career, starring in movies such as Bumblebee, F9, Fast X and The Suicide Squad, while he has also released a studio album and works for charitable causes including the Make-A-Wish Foundation.
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Four matches are scheduled to take place on Saturday Night's Main Event, with Cena's retirement match versus Gunther being the climax of the evening.
Before that, the event is due to open with Undisputed WWE Champion Cody Rhodes taking on NXT Champion Oba Femi.
A female singles match will then follow as Bayley takes on Sol Ruca, which will be followed by a tag team match as AJ Styles and Dragon Lee face Je'Von Evans and Leon Slater, with Cena's clash against Gunther the final planned match of the evening's running order.
Gunther won the right to be Cena's final opponent after emerging victorious in The Last Time Is Now Tournament, beating LA Knight on SmackDown earlier this month with a submission.
Cena's actions once led to a WWE show having to be changed around after he went off script to reward a wrestler who had snitched on The Rock.
Cena once called out The Rock for reading his promotions from a teleprompter, rather than saying them off by heart.
Cena said: "The Rock chose to stay home and read off a teleprompter.
"You can see the words in his glasses - rewind it back."
It emerged that Cena was told about The Rock using a teleprompter by fellow wrestler Brodus Clay who noticed words appearing in the latter's sunglasses - and Cena took it upon himself to reward him for making him aware of this after a section was originally cut due to time constraints.
At WrestleMania 28 in 2012, Cena purposely wasted time ahead of taking on The Rock at that event by pretending to go to the toilet, as Brodus recalled on the Stories with Brisco and Bradshaw podcast.
It led to WWE co-founder Vince McMahon having to reschedule the event as Brodus had his moment to shine in a filler segment where he emerged fellow wrestlers Cameron and Naomi and a host of background dancers to perform a dance routine.
Speaking on the podcast, Brodus said: "Vince was shaking his head and saying 'dammit, I think we're going to have to cut it'.
"I turn and I look at Cena, he looks dead at me and he goes 'Hey Brodus, I gotta go to the bathroom and I think it's going to take me four to six minutes?'
"I said 'about four minutes' and he said 'alright, I'm out' and just walked out.
"Vince looked at me and was like 's**t, go!' so I go and I get my Mania moment because he had to go to the bathroom for four to six minutes, which ironically was the time of my dance.
"We never spoke on it, I wanted to thank him but he just wouldn't hear it."
