The former WWE performers had a so-called feud outside of the ring.
John Cena is taking ownership for his part in the real-life feud between himself and Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. The two WWE performers-turned-actors had a much-chronicled beef back in the day when Johnson was transitioning into his acting career.
During a chat with the Happy Sad Confused webcast, Cena opened up about his fraught relationship with Johnson.
"I got selfish and me living WWE at that point and not having any concept of growth or someone else's perspective, I took Dwayne's comments as not genuine. My view was, if you love something, be there every day," Cena explained. "What a hypocrite I am because I still love WWE and I can't go all the time. And I just didn't see that. I was so selfish. And I had his number, we could have talked about it."
Cena said that instead of talking things out with Johnson behind the scenes, he opted to publicly call his opponent out.
"I understand why he got upset. Because he's changing the perception of an industry," Cena shared. "I just got selfish and wanted a main event marquee match because it would better what I thought was the business. And that's short-sighted and selfish."
He said that though the feud fueled the WWE face-off between the two stars, it came at the detriment of their personal relationship.
"It made some great TV, but it was almost at the cost of our friendship, which I would now say is in a great place," Cena said. "You're supposed to have trust with each other, and I violated his trust."
In 2008, Cena called out Johnson for saying he "loved" the WWE but then not returning to the franchise for milestone events because he was focused on his acting career.
"Just don't f**k me around and tell me that you love this when you are just doing this to do something else," Cena said at the time. "That's the only thing that gets me really pissed off."
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