RVD says there were talks for John Cena WWE retirement tour match

John Cena’s WWE retirement tour could have included a match against Rob Van Dam if things went differently.

On TMZ’s Inside the Ring podcast, RVD revealed that there were talks for him to face Cena at some point this year. RVD feels like the match was going to happen, but the possibility was derailed when he broke both of his heels in April.

“Let me tell you this, I wanted to be one of the return matches for John Cena on his retirement tour,” RVD said. “I was talking to them. There was a lot of interest. Without giving away too many details, you know, we were probably going to do it. And then I broke my heels.”

RVD is a famous opponent from Cena’s past, with their WWE Championship match from ECW One Night Stand 2006 being among the most memorable moments of Cena’s career.

The double heel fracture RVD suffered happened at MLW Battle Riot 2025. Before that, he had not wrestled since competing for AEW in April 2024. TMZ asked RVD if he still feels like he has a small WWE return run in him.

“Sure, it’s possible. I think anything’s possible,” the 54-year-old WWE Hall of Famer responded. “And I’m not ruling anything out. Personally, as far as whether I want to continue or not after my heels are completely 100 percent, I change my mind like every few days about it.

“I don’t really get [what] the product is becoming. And here’s one thing too, I feel like the fans that grew up watching my era felt like they knew how it worked in a certain way. And now they’re the ones running it, so they’ve changed it to actually how they think that it was run. And now we got the next fans that have been watching them that are coming up that are going to be running it

“It’s changing so much into something that seems so far away from the competitive — and maybe it’s for the best. Maybe they’re fixing things about the business, I don’t know. But for me personally, sometimes I feel like, ‘Yeah, you know, I could go. I feel great. I could go show the people that, you know, I can still do what I could do, hopefully it’ll motivate, inspire some people, maybe.’ And then at other times, I feel like maybe I’d rather just be attached to the old-school wrestling and remembered for that.”

RVD is under a Legends contract with WWE and made a couple of on-screen appearances for the company in 2024.

Cena has eight WWE appearances remaining on his retirement tour. It will conclude with him competing in his final match on Saturday Night’s Main Event on December 13.