John Cena Looks Back At Early Days In Wrestling & Creation Of Prototype Gimmick

John Cena recently looked back on his early days training to wrestle and his infamous first gimmick of “The Prototype.” The retired WWE star had his professional wrestling debut in UPW as The Prototype, a half-man and half-machine gimmick. Cena has always been self-deprecating about the character, a notion he expressed during his interview on the No-Contest Wrestling Podcast.

Cena spoke with the hosts about his early days and starting to train in California, which gave him an opportunity at UPW. He credited Christopher Daniels as the person who came up with the character. You can see highlights below:

On Starting To Train:

“That was from Chris and Smelly and Mad Dog Mike Bell. They were the family that convinced me to wrestle. When Attitude Era was on fire and I was just working at Golds and I literally was just going nowhere. I was about to join the Marine Corps. I tried to be a cop, I failed the CHP exam. I was like, ‘Man, I’m just going to go to San Diego because like I’m okay in a uniform. I can wake up early. I like working out, you know? I know I’m going to get food and I’m going to get benefits. This seems like a pretty good gig.’ And they were like, ‘Yo, you’re always talking about wrestling.’ They used to come into the protein bar shop and we used to just shoot the s**t, and so would everyone. But I knew my stuff.

“And finally Chris was like, ‘Man, my my brothers are training down there. Do you want to train down there?’ I’m like, ‘That’s a thing?’ It was my first inkling of like, ‘There’s a wrestling school. What the f**k?’ I mean, ‘You guys, could I go?’ They’re like, ‘Could you go? Look, you’re in shape. Yeah, of course. You’d be great.’

On Where the Character Came From:

“Chris was locked in with creative for Ultimate Pro Wrestling and he came up with The Prototype, because those guys used to train with me. And I would never take a day off, would always overtrain. Brought my meals and like, I was like I was a robot. People were like, ‘What the — this guy’s not real.’ Like even the bodybuilder guys are like, ‘Man, discipline is levels up on this guy.’ So they were like, ‘You should be half man, half machine.’

“Real easy to make that connection. Just, it sucked. Because it was a first effort. But man, I just — like everything in my life, success or failure, I went all in. Like, ‘This is my opportunity. I’m going to give it a try.'”

On People Remembering The Gimmick Today:

“So like, we always we always look back on history with nostalgia. Those were some really bad matches.”

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit the No-Contest Wrestling Podcast with an h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.