John Cena is a name synonymous with WWE. He was the franchise player for the wrestling company. There are only a few names in the industry who can evoke such strong emotions and reactions from the crowd as Cena did. He has tied Ric Flair‘s record for most world championships reigns at 16. He served as the company’s top stars for more than a decade. However, before taking on the superman gimmick in the company, Cena still had to gain the trust of the company to fully believe in him.

Before using his popular The Doctor of Thuganomics gimmick, John Cena was about to be let go by the company. WWE Hall of Famer JBL said in a recent interview that Vince McMahon personally asked about his first impressions of Cena and whether he thinks Cena has potential to be in the main event scene.

“There weren’t a ton of believers in Cena,” Layfield said while appearing on the Two Man Power Trip of Wrestling podcast (via Sportskeeda). “I don’t think there were un-believers. But Vince asked me one day, he said, ‘How is he?’ I said, ‘He’s your guy, man.’ Vince said, ‘He’s that good?’ I said, ‘Yeah.'”

“It’s a different dynamic going from, say, eight minutes to going to 30 minutes,” JBL added. “Now, I think he had done it with Kurt Angle too, obviously one of the greatest of all time. But when I first got out there with him, some guys never make that transition. It’s hard.”

John Cena has transitioned to Hollywood as a successful actor and wrestles sporadically. Most recently, he made a brief return to the WWE, where he challenged Roman Reigns for his WWE Universal Championship at SummerSlam. He was unsuccessful in capturing the title. Cena was asked at the Florida Supercon back in September if we would ever see him wrestle in another company. Cena reiterated pro wrestling’s famous “never say never” philosophy. Though he added that he is certain it would never happen.

“There’s a whole like ‘never say never’ philosophy and I’m also that way in life because you never know what life will bring you. But, I can with certainty say no.”