Former WWE star Paul London spoke with Fightful about a number of topics, including his 2002 WWE Velocity match with 16-time World Champion John Cena and how Cena got in trouble for giving him too much offense.
London said, “So that that was that was frustrating and anytime we would have people down, I was fortunate enough to work John Cena when he was ascending as a heel rapper with Bull Buchanan at his side. I think he had caught wind that I had gone through UPW’s program post their developmental. But needless to say, we got along really well. So much in fact that he got in trouble after that match for giving me too much offense. It was on Velocity, yeah. I get that point because I wasn’t under contract at the time, but I was coming in fairly regularly. To the point where one time I remember Johnny Ace asked me who I wanted to team with and who I wanted to work with and I’m not even under contract. So needless to say I had these ties with Cena, but even when he came to OVW, he was like, ‘Why are you here? Like, you shouldn’t. You don’t need to be here.’ I’m like, ‘I’m just doing what I’m told.’”
On living in Kentucky when he was part of Ohio Valley Wrestling:
“I was, yeah. I experienced the cornfield maze, all that stuff. Louisville does Halloween well, I would think all of Kentucky does Halloween really well. So I I enjoyed this short time that I had there, but I didn’t get an apartment. I didn’t I was never thinking, ‘Be here long term.’ It was almost how can I skip over OVW and get right in there where I know I belong. But even then when I got up to the main roster it wasn’t so much about people not being open to the ideas, match-wise, it was more so a matter of how do we make these make sense?“
You can check out London’s comments in the video below.
(H/T to Fightful for transcribing the above quotes)
