Rusev on John Cena

Well, the feud with John Cena was just, it was perfect. Like, I feel like Rusev is like this, just prototypical John Cena heel, like good versus evil. Right? Yes. And, and I love that man. He taught me so much. Cause you know, people seen this probably wrestle like 10, 15 times on TV, but we wrestled probably 1500 times on live events. We travel all over the world just to wrestle. And, uh, even the European tours, we used to do red, then blue, then the raw, then SmackDown, then maybe SmackDown again, raw. Like we would just jump everywhere to do this match and just learning from him, just listening, paying attention, what he does, why he does it, keeping my ears open, my mouth shut. And I've learned so much, man, if it wasn't for him, but even him, of course, but even leading up to that with Mark Henry, with the Big Show, with all these veterans that I get to work with, Big Show say, Hey, I'll see you in the ring. That's it. Like, you're just going to see me in the ring. Like you're a seven feet two, 500 pounds, but okay. I was so nervous, but all these veterans prepared me for that moment. And I'm very thankful for every single one. What do you think is the biggest thing you learned from John Cena? Just timing, timing, take my time. There's no such thing as a TV match on a live event match. Like there's no such thing as a bad crowd. If they're not reacting is because you are not giving them what they want to see him listening. Okay. He's a high pitch. He's a low pitch. Who's out there tonight. What's, what's the vibe? Like he's always there watching and, and learning the crowd as much as everything else. Um, just, yeah, not everything has to be like, gotta make sense and it's gotta take your time and listen to the crowd. I think that's the most important thing. Just listen to the crowd. They'll tell you. How hard is that to listen to the crowd when you've got a thousand other things to think about? It's hard. It's, it's not easy, but it's still, you've got to develop, right? Yes. Yes. It doesn't come off. It doesn't come that easy. Uh, it just takes by repetitions, just repetition. And that's why, that's why these live events are so great because it's, you don't have the, okay. Three minutes to commercial, one minute to commercial, 30 seconds, blah, blah, blah. You just get to relax and do the best you can and prepare. And, and that's why I did so much five days a week, man. We were just killing it everywhere we go. And you got the big win over John Cena. Was that, it was a fast lane, I think. I think it was fast. Yeah. Yeah. It was, uh, after the rumble where the rock came and screw me, it was 2015, my second rumble. You were this, that last person eliminated from that rumble person. 2015 was the last time Roman Reigns won. Yes. Yeah. Uh, he came in and screw me over, threw me over the top. And then backstage I went to complain to the interview and he came show up and there's the shoving and the pushing started. And here we are. What a cool moment in the Royal rumble. It's down to Roman and you as the final two in 2015. Yeah, it was cool. Uh, because I was gaining speed, right? Like I debuted in the rumble before that I was entrance number five and, uh, I didn't eliminate anybody, but you know, showcase my abilities, took five people to throw me over. Then a few months later I made my debut on raw. Um, but yeah, we just started building from there because they had a plan. They had a plan, a year plan in advance that they're going to have Bruce versus Cena WrestleMania next year. And we just followed their plan. And we went through this guy, this guy, this guy, and eventually got me to, you know, even the Jack Swagger stuff was so great with summer slam with, with the people versus, you know, the Vladimir Putin, mother Russia representatives, everything was just played role until we get to that moment with Cena. Yeah. They went, they went, it was great. And you know, he passed out in the accolade. Uh, I think I kicked him in the nuts as well on top of everything. You know, he had to be John Cena or you gotta, you gotta keep them down somehow.