John Cena appeared on Stephanie McMahon's ESPN+ show "Stephanie's Places" but chose not to talk much about his recent, buzzworthy heel turn at the Elimination Chamber. Instead, Cena focused on thanking McMahon for helping him learn during his WWE career.
Cena's career will always be defined by his decade-plus as the top babyface in WWE, despite the polarized reaction fans gave him for the majority of that period. Since his official turn to the dark side, many fans are fascinated by what went into the decision of the character change during his final run in the company.
However, when the topic came up during his interview with McMahon, Cena kept his comments brief. Rather than sharing inside baseball stories about his heel run, he used the opportunity to praise McMahon for being one of his teachers in the wrestling business.
Cena told McMahon that she was one of the pivotal figures who helped him learn how to be a better performer. He admitted that he copied many things from her over the years to improve.
"Can I just say I had some really good people to learn from, and you are in a very short list of names that falls into. I flat out steal a lot from you. So, thanks for helping me through this. You never know how you affect people," Cena said.
Fans may not remember that it was actually Stephanie herself who saw Cena freestyling on a tour bus back in 2003, which led to the genesis of his "Doctor of Thuganomics" gimmick. In many ways, that was the beginning of Cena's historical run atop the WWE landscape.
If you use any quotes from this article, please credit "Stephanie's Places" and provide a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for transcription.
