John Cena

Today we have I think this is worth saying and I think we said it probably in the fact check

But of the six years we've been recording here

There's been work being done on the house

Sure

And none of the folks that do work on this house have been excited by a single guest ever or at least that we've known

About they've never cared once to my knowledge even when David Letterman went and talked to them personally

That's right. And there was a line for this gentleman in the driveway when we got out. That was just epic

It was really cool

I think he might be the most famous person we've ever had in here in real life

Like when you see him in the power in real life

Yeah

and a friend of mine that worked with him also said this about him that like you were walking down the street with him and

it's like

You're with King Kong or something. Well, he does say it in the interview, which you'll hear like he's very protective of his whereabouts

Yeah, he wants to protect his wife from that and then that made sense, right that like he's sort of ambushed

Yeah, so John Cena, he is an actor. He's a 16 time a world champion wrestler

He's currently on Peacemaker, which is great. He was in the Fast X. He's in another fast series

He's in Argyle the Suicide Squad vacation friends, and he has a new movie out

Now called Ricky Stanicki was Zac Efron and Andrew Santino

So funny, so please enjoy John Cena

You look so nice no one dresses up for us I made sure so we were texting before you got here

You said hey, can you do this one thing?

And I said, oh my god, I'd love to and I'll trade you for a photo of us lifting in black mold paradise

But he says give me a little challenging with the wardrobe and I was thinking no

He's probably got a sweater on or something. But no by God you're in a beautiful three-piece. Oh, thank you

We should have got the memo. Although you're wearing a nice button-down. That's my very special button-down

Really quick. Where are you staying while you're here? Where do you stay when you're in LA?

So if I tell you that then everybody's gonna fight. Oh, yeah. Yeah. No, that's okay

I lived in LA before all this back in 2000. Yeah, so whenever I stay here

I got a few places I can call home that nobody ever finds. Oh, okay, great. So you've like a two-pronged

Celebrity, it's maybe even four prong. I don't know. So it's a fork. It's a fork very kind of you

Thank you. Everybody tells me to fork myself. So

You've done it successfully

many many

Rivulets avenues, okay

So I was working with somebody who had worked with you on something and I can't even remember what it was

But they were saying oh you got to see him around children. You can't really imagine how fucking popular

He is with children. Like if you're walking down the street and some kids see you so you keeping your location private

Is that more for adults or for kids? I never blame anyone for wanting to say hello

But at the same time I travel my wife we go everywhere together

So I certainly value her safety and well-being and one of the promises I made to her on the altar was I will never

Put you or I'll do my best to not put you in an undue harm's way

So a lot of it is just about genuine safety and it's not to say that everyone out there has bad intentions or we'd ever

Run into someone bad, but you also never know when someone feels threatened if my wife who is my travel partner and partner in life

Now feels unsafe or uncomfortable to all these new places we go. I got another hurdle to climb in my personal life

It's just an exercise in the strength of boundaries and the value of boundaries

Okay, I dig it. But you are in town for how long until this is over?

Oh, really? You will jet out of the last stop on a press tour for Ricky's to Nikki

Okay. Well, I really like that because we like ending knowing that the end is near is helpful seeing that finish line, man

Yeah, you really sprint towards it. Yeah. Yeah, it is a good feeling. So thank you for ending my day

I have high hopes coming in and man, you already hit it out of the park with the coffee. So we're good

Okay, great

and as I told you

embarrassingly

I had just gone in to get lunch in my

454 SS and I was gonna pull it like where it goes kind of hidden by the AMG

I was like, I think I'll leave it in the driveway

John I'll see it and get excited beautiful out here. Thank you. The address is

Petrel head paradise out here. I'm so glad you noticed. Yeah, cuz I have gathered

I think we all know about each other right dudes in our business who are also in the cars

I think word travels fast and I don't know if that's because we're

Crazy, and there's only a few of us or I think it's the way the car culture figures itself out in my perspective

People appreciate cars and they're willing and open to share it. It's often a topic of common conversation like sports

It's one of the few things dudes can get in a parking lot and chat about I think that spreads fast when someone is a

Car person. This is how neurotic I am about it

Like I'm reading all about you today and I just happen to stumble upon that when you arrived here

You weren't a 91 Lincoln Continental. Yeah, and I was like great. There's a story about him living it. I'm not even interested

I love those 91 Continentals big enough to sleep in

And comfortable even for a big boy, did you do that? Yeah. Yeah, but it was my choice

I wanted to I had a roof over my head, Massachusetts. My dad was like, ah, it's not working out for you. Come on home

I'm like, no, I'm gonna rub two sticks together and see if I can make fire out here

So it wasn't like I got thrown out

I just had no money and I had to make a choice whether to go home or stay here and I chose to stay

Here and that was my bed for a while. Do you ever have fantasies about hunting that car down?

Not that one

So that one was a joint

Purchase where my dad gave me a little bit and I got a little bit

I got my first car at age 14. It was a 84 Cadillac Coupe Deville. Oh beautiful smoke the tranny by 15

So that was already gone

Uh-huh

I had a 69 Nova after that a 66 Chevelle after that rocked a mid-90s Cavalier for a little bit sure and pickup it was

Always trading and bartering and every car had been a joint venture of my dad would match my in we're talking 750 bucks

So it wasn't major. He did the same with a Continental really quick

Really interesting choice for a man with modest means who needs some dependability and gonna cross the country

You definitely put style above function. Well, it's a comfortable car

So I know I was gonna spend a lot of time in it

You see a lot of those cars their town cars their chauffeur cars

So, you know

They can go high miles and that was kind of what I had into it and I had all the options that I wanted everything

In there's power. Oh, maybe comfy leather. I want one so bad

The next car I bought was an 89 Jeep Wrangler and I bought it from Seaside Motors, too

Over in Santa Monica and I bought it with my own money and I still have that car today

I've changed the configuration of the garage many times that has never left my side and never will that's my Lincoln Continental my 67

I had it when I moved here. I'd sold a really dependable Honda Civic to get it

It was a dumb dumb choice a great choice

Well, there was a moment in my life where there was a billboard on Sunset promoting hit-and-run and it was my Lincoln

Who's been my eternal girlfriend since I moved to LA and I was like goddamn. This is good

That was probably my happiest little moment seeing the billboard that the Lincoln was on it. It's funny

You're like man. Have you ever thought to chase it down? I'm lucky enough to know. Hey, don't sell the first one you ever bought

There's cars. I've turned over to new owners that you get a little bit of sellers remorse. Yeah, like giving a dog away

Yes, I've wanted to chase down a few but fortunately I've not had to chase down the first one I ever bought

Okay, this area you lived in Massachusetts

It's only like a ton of 4,500 or something now it is when I was growing up there

It was whispering at a thousand people if you land in Boston, you look at Massachusetts on a map

Yeah, and you drive as far north and as far east you follow the water as you can until you are stepping in, New Hampshire

That's where we're at. Okay, so beautiful and bucolic and rolling hills

Oh my goodness green the port city next to it called Newbury Port is a famous

Shipping town from before the birth of America and they've done a great job of preserving the town obviously

So it's all brick and all pre-american revolution their homes back there from the 1600s

Your next neighbors acres away the high school houses three towns because one town not enough students

Yes, it was an interesting place to grow up. My parents had five of us. We're just left to our imagination five boys

Yes. Oh, you're the second oldest. Yes. Okay in my town not too dissimilar

We were at 5,000. I thought 10 but Monica found out it was really 5,000 much smaller

Yes, it's right when it transitions from kind of suburbs out of Detroit into straight-up farmland

And so in that town very blue-collar town when there was a family of five boys

They got progressively crazier and crazier where the baby the fifth boy was very dangerous

Was the pattern and you know, I think we were all equally insane. Okay. Yeah my parents

I don't know why they kept trying they were going for a girl. They were

They were and I think at five they were just like that's it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, when you gonna listen to the man upstairs

No, we were bad kids

Yeah, and it didn't unravel as it went down. I was pretty bad and led the charge

We just realized that they'd only catch one of us and how much older is your older brother?

My older brother is gonna be 50 this year. I'll be 47 and then it's 46 44 and 41. Oh your parents

Yeah, let's be honest your mom. Yeah

Absolutely

Now your dad, this is a fun factoid. He was actually an announcer for wrestling at some point. That's what he'll tell you

There's no record of that. Okay, great. I will say my dad is a showman

He started the drama club at Community College in Beverly, Massachusetts that he attended. He wrote for the school paper directed plays

That's where he met my mom. He was directing a production of streetcar named desire

He's always been a showman and he's always wanted to show off his skills

My dad hasn't lost that good for him. Yes

So, what was he doing to

Cloth and feed these five mongrel children

He was a real estate appraiser by trade and I got a tip my cap to the old man a damn good one

He taught seminars throughout the United States on his trade and he really found a home in value property

And then what did mom do stay at home mom? My family had their first child in the early 70s

So it was a typical family construct. My mom is college-educated. She was in the banking business

She did a little bit of international philanthropy her my dad settled down and that was kind of it for her

right and

Going through school you're following behind my brother's five years older

So I didn't deal with this terribly where you were like inheriting whatever first impression I dealt with it, man

my brother was like a true nerd and this is at the height of the 80s like revenge of the nerds heard the real kind of

Nerd not Silicon Valley billionaires. Our town wasn't yet at the revenge of the nerds sort of state

So I inherited life was tough for my brother in high school. Not only was he an introvert and interested in computers

He's also gay and being gay in the 80s in a small town in Massachusetts, man. That's an uphill climb

Oh, no, gosh. No, he just had a lot of character traits that weren't in the cool kid group

Right, and he's also holding this secret that he can't tell or talk to anybody about and I really feel for what it must have

Been like for him growing up, but I also inherited that chapter of his social constructs and man

It got me to learn how to lose a few fights

Yeah, okay. So

Conventionally, you had hope your older brother would step in to defend you. Was it a role reversal?

Did you feel inclined to want to protect your brother?

Were you protective of him that sort of behavior started like at 10 years old for me?

So I don't think I understood what was going on kids are harsh and they form cliques real fast

And we always just hung out with each other

So there's enough of us to have a basketball team, which means we could do whatever we wanted

We want to play football or baseball. There's enough of us

So we didn't feel we needed anybody else and our next-door neighbors

Like I said, we're acres away. So if we could make it through school and get back to the house, all is fine

Okay, so you guys were each other's best friends we were close

I think by default but then social circles started to form for me around 10 11 and 12

I took on the role of hey, if you say something to the younger brothers

I will do my best to throw myself in harm's way. Uh-huh. Well, it's gonna stop here. Yeah, listen

I don't know if it's a rural thing

I don't know if it's a blue-collar thing

But yet violence was a daily thing all through growing up kids just fought non-stop. They got picked on

Tremendously that's you and I's perspective. I don't think you can geocyte that I think in the inner cities

There's probably some brawls going on too for sure

I'm only curious why it's like my wife

She went to school more in the city or in the hinterland between the two and she's like no there would be a fight

Like once every six months at my school and I'm like, oh no

There was a few a week and then some were scheduled for Friday night at the Milford Cinema. Yep

It's like three o'clock high. Yes, always every day was

So it's a movie about a kid having to stand up to a bully and it's a day in the life of a school day

Counting down to three o'clock. He knows he's gonna have to fight the bully. Yeah, he's gonna get the shit kicked out. Yeah

Well, we had like my bodyguard cuz it was so ever-present

You're like it with the fantasy would be someone would come and stick up for you

Yep revenge of the nerds as we said

So I know you got your first bench at 12 and that's cuz it's getting my ass kicked starting at 10

That's what it was motivated at. Yeah, and you thought if I could get big

People will stop leaving alone. Yes that actually happened kids would beat me up at 12 and 13 and then junior high and high school

Were on the same property the building of junior high would be my left hand as I'm making this explanation for your viewers and the high

School would be my right hand

They're both on hills and you have to go to the valley

My bus was on the high school side and some of the seniors bus was on the junior high side

So you have to walk by the elder statesman and every day man

I got my ass kicked or at the very least it was a strong nudge. So I go tumbling down the hill again

Yes, I never fought back, but I never acquiesced

I know exactly who you were so many kids had to occupy that exact zone

I got made fun of for the way I dressed the music. I listened to the people I associated with my older brother

I turned it up. I never backed off

you never silence who you were and then when I was 15 when the yield of

Three to four years of constant strength training and eating right in the middle of adolescence takes place

I walk into a physical education class with now seniors who were pushing me down the hill and they were kind of looking at me

Like are we gonna fight in the locker room?

And I remember specifically one kid who literally spearhead the anti John movement in junior high and I closed my locker door

And he's next to me. We're looking at each other

Like is it gonna go down and for some reason at 15, I summoned up the situational awareness to be like, hey, man

We're good. Don't worry about it. And that was it. Not only did he never pick on me again

I really never got effed with again in high school. So it worked for you

It took a whole lot of perseverance and a whole lot of failure and losing fights

But yeah, eventually they stopped eventually they got another target

I guess how are you educating yourself on what to eat and what to do the weeder weight bench that I got came with a

display of how to use all the attachments and before I could get any

Sort of information like a muscle and fitness or flex or an Ironman magazine

It started with that and then once you get the muscle and fitness their adverts for hey

This is mega mass mm or heavyweight gainer 900 all the broad 90s

This is metrics and this is my oplex and meso tech creatins just coming out

Yeah, I started when nothing was available

But then shortly after that everything became available and strength and science especially applicable to sport

I remember quitting baseball at 15 because my varsity coach said don't work out because it's gonna ruin your swing and I handed him

My uniform that day. It was like I'm gonna go back to work now. Yeah, it was very obvious to you

What you wanted to do? Yeah, were you also playing football in high school?

There was no youth football in West Newbury. The first time I put on a pair of pads was 15 years old

So we tried to discover how to play the game

I mean we played pickup football but tackle football full contact is a different sport

But yeah, I started at age 15 and that's when I really knew I've been working out for self-defense

But this is applicable in sport. Yeah, all the coaches are like man. We can do something with you because you're strong

I was head and shoulders above the rest of my classmates because I was the only one that took care of myself and the girls

Respond to this transformation hard to say which is the chicken or the element of what did it the intoxicating cocktail that became?

Yeah, it's hard to say well, let me ask you this the girls in junior high not notice you and and then did they notice

You in high school. I think that's an accurate statement. That's an accurate. Yes. Okay

Where does Schwarzenegger fit into this because for me again, I'm two years older than you

I saw Conan the Barbarian at a drive-in when it came out and I was like what on earth is this?

I hadn't seen a mr. Universe competition or anything. I just couldn't believe a real human was him

I became so fascinated with muscles in that moment. Who was your kind of gateway?

I remember seeing commando on VHS. There we go. And that's true Arnold being Arnold. Yes seminal film

Yes, and all that stuff is whimsical, but then you learn. Oh, man. He was a bodybuilder before

I think it's when I jumped into like the periodicals to be like, oh, this is how you get that, right?

Who was the King Coleman or has already gone to Jake?

No, honestly when I started man, it must have been like Sean Ray you're talking 1986

Maybe Flex Wheeler pre Dorian Yates. It was still the 80s wave of bodybuilding

But you weren't specifically aiming yet to be a bodybuilder, right? It was just a very functional choice

Don't get your ass kicked and is there a way to do it without violence sports happened out of that?

And that was an opportunity that was like, yeah, let's pursue this. This will be alright

And then you go to Springfield College and there you play football

Yeah, and you're a center and you're the captain of the team

Eventually after four years of trying there

Yeah, my peers voted me as somebody to go out and call the coin toss and now was this

Very important role as we just saw in the Super Bowl recently did this built-in?

community of dudes

I feel like that would have been very cathartic if you were feeling a bit alienated in junior high and

Imagine the captains are one of the popular players on the team social acceptance is a really interesting thing

I would like to think that we all want love in our life

And I think acceptance is a gateway drug to that of like a man. You're cool. All right, there's a connection there

so of course

I was searching for something like that and found it in sport and

Wasn't ostracized for who I was or how I behaved before going to Springfield. I lived at high school for two years

I went to Cushing Academy as a boarding student. That was just 400 of us as

15 16 and 17 year olds living there with each other. Yeah, were you chewing tobacco?

Everybody else was everyone else. You weren't doing that. Yeah, I picked up leaf tobacco for a brief period of time in WWE

You were a good boy. Yeah, I think I had great respect for

The opportunities I've been given was I a good kid at home?

No, because I rebelled against authority and wanted to do things my own way. Was I a good student?

No, I was a good student when I was told there was opportunity and reward for being a good student

I was a DF student when I applied to Cushing Academy and like a non varsity athlete

They promptly rejected me and the Dean of Admissions Wayne Sanborn. I remember it like it was yesterday

He said if you get your grades up to A's and B's and you can varsity in two sports

We will reconsider you to go through the application process in one year

I turned the ship around varsity lettered in two sports a B student

I came back had to do the whole process and then they said we'll accept you and we also realize your family is broke

We're gonna give you an opportunity. So this is a school coming out of pocket for me

So now somebody has bet on me just like my first football coach bet on me

I'd jump in front of a train for that guy because he's like, hey, man

I know everybody else is kicking your ass, but I see potential in you. I'm gonna bet on you

So I think I've always had great respect for those who are willing to bet on me

Well also the way I've heard you speak about your father in interviews

You seem to have a very sweet respect for him and appreciation for him work in progress

Okay, great cuz I locked horns with my dad all the time. Oh me too, man. Yeah, I can't stand authority

It's really rough for me

I guess I'm okay with the construct of

Authority as long as it has a decent why and a lot of the parental why is because I said so

Yeah, and that shit don't mess with me. I believe everything in life should have a good explanation

You and I are in lockstep on that

I need to believe in the plan a little bit even if I don't believe in it as long as I understand it

All right, I'm backing down

Right cuz obviously you had coaches and you must have been a good athlete to the coaches

You could deal with it when there was a reward at the end of it. Sure

And again, these are people who vouch for me

Although I had a conflicting relationship with my dad because he was never an athlete

Do you think it was insane that you were getting so built? Yes. Was he embarrassed by it?

I don't know

I'm just starting to lay the foundation with my dad where we can breach into this stuff and I do love him and I want

To walk the talk. So if I love him, I want to get to know him and I want to do my part to bridge

Our relationship. These are little nuggets that I can't wait, but I still got a little work

For him on that. Yeah, I don't know. Yeah

I've read Arnold's books the tube that he wrote early in his bodybuilding career

Everyone thought he was a freak his parents were like what the fuck you this is insane

Yeah, this is not an honest day's work. It reeks of vanity

Maybe there's a lot of things that a parent might in the earlier days before people make careers of it

Well, even if you can make a career of it, that's still a person's perspective. This reeks of vanity. Yeah for you

I think it reeked of safety

Yes, but then of course when you start getting big as a young man and you're physically bigger and stronger than all your peers around

You you're still figuring out life. You don't have the wisdom to understand what's going on. So it can put you in funny situations

That's empowering can be thank God. I was always put in a bigger swimming pool every time

I think I got it figured out I get dropped in a pool where kids are getting drafted into the NHL and go into division

one programs after that

I get dropped into Springfield College as a 19 year old where the

22 23 24 year olds are far stronger just because of the amount of time under tension and then I get dropped into

Venice, California, which is like man. I think I've done good with this natural, but I quit

Yeah, I can be a blessing to always be sort of at the bottom and climbing or just to never be the biggest fish in

The pond I was always grateful to have the timing in my life to have strong male mentors and not to be the biggest fish

Yeah, cuz when you're the biggest fish in the pond, you kind of inclined to stay in the pond. It's good living

Yes, it can be a little bit of a trap to stay in that comfort zone

What I'm trying to lay cable for is you've navigated a lot of super alpha worlds

And so I'm really curious how you've navigated it and it would start in high school

And it would then be very present on a football team. It's a very alpha world

You're really big when you were greeted with intense alphaness

What was your response to it generally oddly enough in

Reflecting on past experiences and trying to live in the present when you recreate history. It's never really true. It's just your version

Yeah, I think I've always had a good idea of knowing the room and I've always been able to ask myself

Where's the win? So it's okay that you're not the leader of the Lord of the Flies. Where's the win in that?

I don't need that. I just want to be able to do the thing

I want to do my goal was never to be the number one thing. I was an offensive lineman

So that position by and large you never get talked about every day

You do all the boring practice you call the coin flip in your case the very last year

For four years once you go out and talk to the referee before the game

Never talked about in the paper. No one ever discusses you. I mean it played at a division three school

So it's not like I was searching for glory

I just want to go out and play right but you also had a chip on your shoulder about never being subjugated again

Right not living in fear of any other men

The one thing I did is I never fought back, but I also never stepped back

So I don't think I was ever in fear. I still went to the bus every day

I never went to the principal. I never asked for security or any of that stuff

I was never afraid of it because I had been getting the shit kicked out of me for 10 years little do they know I

Had four brothers. I've been losing fights for a decade. It's alright. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, you'd already experienced the worst of it

It was survivable. Yeah, but yeah, you don't have a chip on your shoulder about bullies

No, because of golden moments like as a 15 year old in that locker room where the bully is looking at me afraid going

Are we good and I'm like, yeah, man, we're good and then seeing him melt away just realizing how difficult it is to figure out

I'm not perfect. I've been on both ends of that

Those are really choices outside of my value system that I feel bad about I can understand both sides and I can understand the motivation

Of both sides. I want to put my arm around a bully and be like, hey, man, what are you doing?

What's really going on in your life? You want to talk to somebody about it?

It sucks that that happens and social behavior, especially on young people is tough, but I never like fuck him

We're gonna get those guys. Well as you navigate life as a boy, you do start putting two and two together

Generally, the bullies have the shittiest fucking house life like in elementary. I was a bully. I hate it

I was but I was big I felt powerless at home and when I got to school and we were on the playground

It's time to wrestle. I'm like, oh fuck. I am NOT powerless

This feels very good. And as my life got better, I was less like that

Yeah, you get out of Springfield and you how soon moved to LA the day I need to get out of West Newbury, man

Okay, and you have no fantasies of playing football professionally. Nope being famous playing football. None of that

I have a degree in kinesiology a lot of students at our time would spend their spring breaks in Cancun or Daytona Beach

I went to Los Angeles to try to see if I could land an internship and

I did I landed an internship with a company they were installing fitness equipment

So if you bought a bunch of stuff from at the time Cybex shoutout Cybex

They would drop the equipment off at this warehouse and the warehouse would install it

So they were installing large footprint gyms private gyms kind of like what Soren X a rogue will do today

They'll come and set up

I was like man

I could use this to maybe get a job in the corporate world with Cybex so I get a job where I have to wear

A golf shirt every day, but I'm talking about working out and selling fitness equipment

This is gonna be the sweet spot and I was bodybuilding and doing okay naturally

I was in a small pond and got dropped into a bigger pond as soon as I went to Gold's Venice

Not only is this not for me, but also I need to be here. I need to be around this, right?

So I realized I was way out of my league just like an offensive lineman in a division three school

If you watch the Super Bowl, those guys are six seven three hundred thirty pounds. I'm six feet

You were humble the time not without aspiration just realistic and seeing everybody in Venice. I'm like, okay, that's not why you were doing it

Anyway, I didn't start lifting weights to be mr. Olympia

I just loved health and wellness and I was fascinated by strength and boy what a place to do that

I also thought that man I could apply this expensive piece of paper here and someone's gonna hire me if I'm just around the dots

Lined up and I went out to California to try to apply my degree, right?

And so pretty quickly that doesn't bear any fruit. No, and so how do we get into wrestling by accident?

So the job sucked

I was literally just a warehouse servant who folded moving blankets and disassembled old equipment all day and never left the warehouse

I never made it to the install team

I never talked to any corporate reps and boy did I have a lot of hours at not a lot of pay

I was like man

I got a hold on this job to pay some bills, but I'm gonna quit on this date

And then I got a security job in Hermosa Beach

I would be the big guy at the door making sure no fights broke out

Sparrows sharkies right next to Zeppi's pizza the pizza place fed me for free, which was great

And then I got a job at Gold's I was working at the nutrition store. I'd kind of do jobs around there

That's why I slept in my car because I could shower at Gold's you got the whole locker room

You can get a locker or two. Nobody says anything. Yeah, I'm like, man

I got to find direction in my life took the CHP exam failed

So I'm like, well, that's out and I was about to join the Marines

Oh my gosh

But every day I'd be in Gold's and every day talking to the guys in Gold's and one of my friends

Mark Bell and his brother Chris, they're like, hey, we're training to be wrestlers over in Orange County

Would you do that? And it was the weekend. I was gonna join the Marine Corps. Oh my lord

a happy accident once again opportunity being like you guys there's a school to do this and as soon as I saw a ring

I was like, okay. This is gonna be the thing that keeps me here. I now

Don't care what job I have because I'll deal with the Monday through Friday suck because I can be a character on the weekend

I never went out there being like I'm gonna make it big in the WWE

It was like I'm gonna wrestle at the flea market on Friday night on Saturday

We're going up to Northern California and this is gonna be fun and I can pick out my outfits and I was working at the

Gym, so the suck really wasn't that bad. So I'm working in an environment where I got friends

I have enough to eat. I got a roof over my head. I got a car and I got fun for the weekends great

I'm just gonna ride this out as long as it can go of the different categories that make a good wrestler

Obviously, there's a physicality to it. There is a coordination element

I'd imagine there is some level of game plan like a quarterback and then there's the improv and the character in the on the mic

Stuff which of all those categories came easiest to you and which were you?

Having to really apply yourself to be good at so I still don't have a good grasp on

Knowing my own capabilities like always knowing my line and just towing it and trying to push it not saying like oh

I'm going to the top rope to do a backflip right where I have lordosis. So it's uncomfortable to go ass over tea kettle

What's lord? Oh, it's a opposite of scoliosis over the years. It's gotten better about 20s

I was like big booty out all the time. Yeah

Okay, so John is so exciting I just got the full body scan and I discovered I have pretty severe scoliosis

I didn't know hopefully you can correct that. No, I think the ship sailed. I'm 49. I don't know man. It's never too late. Oh

So severe you're not like hunched over. It's not forward or backward. It makes a sharp, right?

It explains some things never too late

Oh every time I would do traps at the beginning before I really committed to them

I'm like, why is this the only thing that kills when I do because everything's like this? Yeah, the whole body is crooked

Yeah, what a finding at my late age. Have you done a full body scan? I have not does it interest you?

It does all of the ability to take your car into the shop. I use that analogy

You're not gonna invest in an automobile that you enjoy from car guy to car guy and just let it sit

It's constant carry you bring it in for service

Even though it doesn't need anything just to get a professional's opinion on you're doing everything, right?

All that stuff about the human body fascinates me and it's like we're truly at a golden age of people using new methods to discover

How to live healthier and discover stuff early. Yeah, man, that's really something of interest

Yeah, so how quickly because you came out in 99. Yeah, and then you get your first

WWE which was then WWF contract I guess in 2001 or yeah, so it's a pretty quick ride

Maybe not at the time when you're no I need to contract might have even came in 2000

Okay, so how do we get from the Orange County parking lot flea market?

Bonanza into that world the WWE was actively

Recruiting for the first time and that was that wave again right place right time

Can I pause you you don't seem to have the same affinity for Schwarzenegger that I do I can accept that worry

That's not true. Okay. Well, you're playing. I just think in different lights. Okay Hulk

So I had a period where I fucking loved the WWE

I think it was WrestleMania five came to the Silverdome and Pontiac

I mean a three three and everyone watched that you are not alone. Is that the one where Hulk had body slam Andre?

Yep. Oh my god

What a time to get into that thing wrestling was in the zeitgeist us being that age very impressionable

And what a superhero story that was I think the pinnacle of it for me is like I already know Rocky

I love Rocky Rocky's toughest guy in the world and then also in Hulk Hogan's in Rocky. Yep, and I'm like, oh my god

Look how big the Hulk

So exciting so was the Hulk a guy for you as a young man grown up, of course

But then when you get into the profession and you want to make a name for yourself

You tend to look at different professionals different ways

I started liking other people's work just for what they had to offer and what were the things they tended to impress you again the

Physicality or the showmanship. I really always had a good grasp on working out

I didn't gravitate toward guys who were big

I watched guys who moved well who spoke well how they carry themselves how they define their character. Do I like this guy?

Do I hate this guy why it wasn't like man?

I want legs like that dude, or I want to be able to do that move you want the whole persona

Yeah, just trying to make discoveries on what works

Stay tuned or armchair expert if you dare

Well, I've was fascinated to find out we had like three versions before we get to John Cena, yes we have the

Prototype half-man half-machine 100% the shits because I'm now realizing while I'm sitting in front of you

You do bear a bit of a resemblance to Jean-Claude Van Damme and his prime appreciate it, man

He had played a cyborg was it before or after that? It was after that

So it was an idea from the kid who asked me to go down there

You'll be the prototype half-man half-machine

Because I'd never had a drink before in my life at that point

All I did was like eat for what workout alcoholism. No, not at all. No family history. None of that

I didn't feel I needed it again

I went from being in no social circle to swimming in a lot of pools and I didn't think I needed another vehicle

I was already a dumbass enough. I found out in my early research alcohol denatures protein. So I was like, okay

Well, if I'm taking in 30 grams a day

I got to make use of the best of it because I just spent my allowance on this bag of weight gainer

Okay, you had like another addiction which was optimizing your body hundred percent. So that had to take precedent over

You couldn't bring on any other yeah

From that it influenced all the choices I made

I don't think it was an addiction because I still had a successful life around it. Sure. No consequences

Yeah, but it occupied a lot of my time and curated a lot of my choices. Okay, so you had never drank

No, I work security at a bar dead sober

Have you since drink? Oh, yeah. Yeah

As an alcoholic, I'd really am having a hard time not drinking

Okay, yes, okay. Okay. So at this point you have it

So you're the prototype and they just thought because they saw me operate this kids a machine and the kid was like

Oh, you're half man half machine. How did that manifest itself in your showmanship?

Would you be on a mic at that stage? So it was just monotonous horrible move like a robot. The cool thing was I tried

Yeah, the uncool thing was it didn't work, right? So it's great though

It's great John because it's just like acting you do these first acting classes. It's so fucking embarrassing

You're so bad, but then you're over it. You did the worst you could do and you lived. So the next one is mr

P I went from the flea markets of San Diego and the Mexican border to Middle America in

Ohio Valley, so the Ohio Valley, okay

There's some history to this forgive my ignorance on wrestling

But I hear that a lot Ohio Valley, Tennessee built that Ohio Valley and down into Tennessee was a very very strong territory

It used to be like a cartel every place was run by a guy

They all would meet and fix prices and make sure if this is the champion and all that this is the old days

Yeah, I watch a few docs on this in these wrestlers would travel they go in and out of these different organizations

They'd be different characters. Yes, so if I run Northern, California, and I hear you are wanted in, Texas

I'll run you into the ground for four weeks and then ship you off to Vaughn Erickson, Texas

And they'll ship you back to Jerry Lawler in Nashville

And then you come out to work for Vince McMahon senior in New York

And then you go down to work for Billy Graham in Florida and all these guys control the u.s

And then is it McMahon who unifies us? Yes, so he's the first to make like a National League and NFL of it all

Okay, so you're in the Ohio Valley. That's kind of big-time, right? That's a huge step up

The next step is getting on television. The day I got my contract was the day

I quit my job and I was still out in California at the time

But when I matriculated to like triple-a baseball, I guess was the best way to say it this could happen. How exciting it was great

How frequently were you wrestling performing? Maybe that was a better way to say it three times a week and you're so young

It's not even are you sore all the time or no?

No

Because there are different audiences that expect different things from you middle America wanted to root for the good guys and hate the bad guys

So some performances don't call for you to do a full-on stunt show

Some performances call you for look like an idiot and I was a bad guy

So I was a perfect foil and I was not afraid to look stupid and Jim Cornette and Danny Davis two very wise men

Shook the 50% man 50% machine and said we're gonna still call you the prototype aka

Mr. P and we're gonna put you with this character

We have called the role model and it was the typical trope of an in-shape guys

Name was Rico Constantino being the role model for how you should live in society and holding himself in a certain way

But then doing nefarious things in the ring. So the classic bad guy

And I was his protege

so he would mentor me and tell me like how to look and how to lift and then how to be in the ring and

Then cheat to win when it all costs are these underlying things of like we live a good life, don't we and then be bad

They were fragile. Yes. Yeah, it's an easy thing and I could be more of myself and I could be goofy. They embrace that

Oh, wow, you're gonna be a good foil for my good guys do all the crazy stuff you'd want to do