Joe Hendry Reveals Specific Advice John Cena Gave Him Behind-The-Scenes In WWE & How He Used It At WrestleMania 41
As noted, Joe Hendry appeared as a guest on the INSIGHT podcast with Chris Van Vliet for an in-depth interview covering all things pro wrestling.
In addition to the highlights from the interview we already published here on the site earlier today, the TNA World Champion also spoke about how he became Randy Orton’s opponent at WrestleMania 41, advice John Cena gave him, as well as how WWE snuck him into the building at Allegiant Stadium for his surprise match on “The Grandest Stage of Them All” earlier this year.
Featured below are some of the highlights from the discussion where he touches on these topics with his thoughts.
On becoming Randy Orton’s WrestleMania opponent: “So I heard Triple H say recently, and I don’t want to misquote, but this is what I heard him say. I heard him say that revealing things before they happen is ruining the surprise, saying how it was done afterwards is almost like just the intrigue of how that happened. So with respect for that, he’s talked about conversations we’ve had. So I will say I found out about a week before and Triple H called me personally. And I thought, because I was at WWE World. That’s one of the reasons it was so well hidden, because I was already booked for WWE World. So there was no shock or surprise with me being around the company. I thought I was going to be getting a promo there, maybe presenting a Slammy, something like that. And so he said, ‘Can you talk?’ Phone goes, and very quickly we got to, ‘So I’m sure you’re aware that Randy needs an opponent…’ And I’m in the airport, I did not think that’s what the call was going to be, and I said yes immediately.”
On working with Randy Orton: “So I don’t how far I want to pull back the curtain on that one, for a couple of reasons, but this is what I’ll say. Randy was unbelievable to work with, unbelievable. WWE has been unbelievable. TNA has been unbelievable. The way I’ve been treated, I could not have asked for better. Randy was just the coolest guy when it came to this and we clicked immediately. Because I don’t want to speak for him, but I felt like I understood the assignment, and I just really strongly felt that that visual of putting our two characters together, the spin and the RKO combining, to me, was the viral moment. So I think I was in the mindset of having a bit more experience, going back to John Cena’s advice, I wasn’t thinking so much about my moment. I was thinking about the moment for the show and for the business, and I think John giving me that advice at the Rumble helped me to have a bit of a shift there.”
On what was the specific advice John Cena gave him: “So I remember going up to John and again, this is how cool John is. So I said, ‘Hey, it’s great to ask your advice sometime.’ This is Rumble, he’s got a huge spot here. He’s like, ‘Well, why don’t we go talk right now, and you can ask me anything you ever wanted to ask me.’ I was like, all right. So I was like, ‘I’m in there with Roman. How do I take what I’ve got and make the most of it? How do I make it more?’ John said this on Pat McAfee, so you know I’m not kind of peeling back the curtain here, beyond what’s out there. He said, ‘You don’t.’ He paused, and he explained to me, and he was 100% correct. The viral moment at the Rumble for me was the entrance, looking around, coming in and hitting my moves on Miz and then being eliminated by a Roman. After Roman comes in, that’s his moment. So it’s like, what John was trying to say is it’s like your moment is coming out there, and now you’re a cog in a bigger machine. It’s not about you getting what you can out of this moment with Roman; it’s like, how do you prop up Roman’s moment? That kind of taught me to think, instead of [being] selfish about these moments. If I hadn’t had that conversation with John, I don’t know that I’d have been thinking about the best way to do the RKO. It’s like that got me thinking about it from that perspective. I really feel like me and Randy were just on this same page. He was awesome. I can’t tell you how thankful I am to have all the moments that I’ve had.”
On how WWE snuck him into the building: “So we got me in a car at WWE World, I had to change in the car, not into my wrestling gear, we did that at the building. But I had to change in the car. I got the most generic hoodie possible. So it was like, Las Vegas hoodie or whatever. I had a COVID mask, I had sunglasses, I looked ridiculous. It was covered head to toe. Honestly, I wasn’t even in the betting odds. There was an “other” category where you would have to manually put in Joe Hendry; that’s how secretive this was. It was not one of the standard options. There were about 10 options, and I was in ‘other.’”
