WWE Made Big Change To John Cena’s Planned Heel Turn

WWE made late changes to plans for John Cena.

John Cena shocked the world at Elimination Chamber when he turned heel just minutes after winning the match inside the famous structure of the same name.

With victory, Cena earned a shot at Cody Rhodes and the Undisputed WWE Championship at WrestleMania, but that was only part of the story. The star was soon joined in the ring by Rhodes, and subsequently The Rock and rapper Travis Scott.

After Rock made an offer to Rhodes to join him on an earlier episode of SmackDown, Rhodes had a decision to make. However, he rejected the Hollywood star by telling him to go f*ck himself. But that elation was short-lived, as moments later, Cena delivered a thunderous low blow to align with The Rock instead.

Although, that almost didn’t happen.

As noted by Dave Meltzer in the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, the original plan for Cena would have seen him turn heel at the end of his WrestleMania match with Rhodes. To a degree, this would have mirrored Steve Austin’s infamous heel turn in 2001 when he aligned with Vince McMahon to beat The Rock for the WWE Championship.

The plan was that the Cena turn with Rock would have been saved for WrestleMania’s finish. The idea is that once the decision was made, during the day, to do it on this show, then obviously it had to go on last.

John Cena Was Second Choice

Meltzer later revealed that The Rock originally wanted a different star to turn heel, leaving Cena as the beloved babyface he’s been for years. According to the report, The Great One’s first pitch was for Cody Rhodes to turn heel, but the Undisputed WWE Champion turned him down.

This saw the company move on to second-in-line Cena, who quickly agreed.

Following Elimination Chamber, it was reported that The Rock would be at WrestleMania, but there was no word on what he’d be doing.