Dave Bautista: I Respect John Cena’s Method Of Retirement. I Couldn’t Do It, I Would Feel Uncomfortable

Dave Bautista talks John Cena’s retirement.

In 2025, John Cena will embark on his retirement tour in WWE. Cena has previously stated that he will work he plans to work around 36 dates in 2025, essentially giving the entire calender year to WWE.

While speaking to Chris Van Vliet for a new interview, one of Cena’s biggest in-ring rivals, Dave Bautista, talked about he respects Cena’s way of going out, even if he couldn’t pull it off himself.

“I get along with John, I respect John a lot more than people think I do for some reason. I think the internet and fans have built this rivalry between us, which there really isn’t. This is how we’re different. I’d never do this. I couldn’t, it would feel disingenuous to me to go around and — But I see his point where he wants to go around and thank all the fans but there’s something in me where I just couldn’t do it, it would feel uncomfortable to me. Accolades feel uncomfortable to me. I can never be the type of baby face who was saying good stuff because I wanted to get the crowd to cheer for me. I couldn’t be that guy. I love and respect what he’s doing with his whole tour to say thank you to the fans but we’re just different that way. I couldn’t do it. I went out the way I wanted, I retired the way I wanted. I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it. I announced my retirement on Instagram. I knew I was going to do it, I just didn’t want to tell anybody I was going to do it because I didn’t want anybody to say, ‘No no, you got to come in, you’ve got to give a speech.’ Something about it would have felt false to me. I couldn’t do it.”

Throughout their careers in WWE, Cena and Batista faced off in six seperate singles bouts. Cena was victorious in his final match against Batista, as he made ‘The Animal’ say I Quit at Over The Limit in 2010.

Bautista recently said that he’s the lightest that he’s been since he was 19 years old. Learn more about those comments here.

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