John Cena Returning To WWE For Final Smackdown Of 2022
John Cena is back in WWE for the last episode of Smackdown in 2022.
It has been about six months since John Cena appeared on the June 27th episode of Raw, which was a celebration of Cena’s 20-year run in WWE. Since then, Cena has been away from WWE because he’s busy filming movies, television shows, being in commercials and other things like “The Independent” on Peacock along with the comedy feature “The Bubble” at Netflix.
Variety has reported that Cena will appear on the final Smackdown of the year on December 30th, which will take place at the Amalie Arena in Tampa, FL. Cena lives in the Tampa area although with his schedule, perhaps he’s not home that often.
The story from Variety went on to say that more announcements are planned for the episode in the coming weeks. That would mean that WWE could be choosing to load up that final episode of Smackdown of 2022 with some big names.
Over the course of his 20+ year WWE career, John Cena won the WWE/World Heavyweight Titles a combined 16 times in his career, which is a record for the company. Ric Flair is also recognized as a 16-time World Champion (Flair has said that the number should be 21). In Cena’s case, he has the most World Title wins that took place solely in WWE since some of Flair’s came in the NWA, WCW and two in WWE.
John Cena’s last match was the main event of Money in the Bank in July 2021 when he lost the WWE Universal Title match to Roman Reigns. If Cena doesn’t wrestle on December 30th then 2022 will be the first year without a match in WWE since he started on TV in June 2022.
Tonight’s episode of Smackdown will feature The Usos defending the Undisputed WWE Tag Team Titles against Sheamus & Butch.
On next week’s December 16th episode of Smackdown, GUNTHER will defend the Intercontinental Title against Ricochet. The December 23rd episode of Smackdown will be taped on December 16th in order to give talent a full week off during the holiday season.
In other Cena news, he will be filming a movie in Australia in February and March, so it could affect any plans involving Cena participating at Wrestlemania 39 on April 1 and April 2.