wrestling / News

Johnny Gargano Gives Update On Tommaso Ciampa, Recalls First Meeting John Cena

March 22, 2023 | Posted by Jeremy Thomas
WWE Raw Johnny Gargano Image Credit: WWE

Johnny Gargano recently gave an update on his longtime tag partner/rival Johnny Ciampa, and recalled his first time meeting John Cena. Gargano, who battles Grayson Waller at NXT Stand & Deliver, recently spoke with Catch Club for a new interview. The show sent along some highlights, and you can check them out below:

On Tomasso Ciampa’s status: “He’s currently rehabbing, he’s trying to get back. He’s one of the toughest, most resilient guys I’ve ever met. And what he’s had to put his body through to do this is so inspirational. I was back there and obviously I’ve known him for a long time. I’ve been side by side with him, basically for our whole journey to get here. And to experience all that together, to be told no together. And then kind of rise up and be where we are at today, it is a really awesome story that will hopefully be told in full one day. But he’s doing well, he’s in good spirits and he hopes he’ll be back soon.”

On a potential DIY reunion: “You never know. I think as long as me and Ciampa are in the same company, or even in wrestling in general, we’ll always be linked together. And there was always that idea of what would happen if DIY was on RAW and SmackDown. The amount of dream matches that could come of that. And I think we haven’t scratched the surface of that yet.”

On his interactions with John Cena: “John Cena, for my money, is the prototype of our industry. The way he treats people, his work ethic, it’s so inspirational. It’s what we all strive to be. We all want to be like John Cena because he is basically the prototype of the perfect WWE Superstar, in and out of the ring.

“And I remember the first time I met John, I was an extra. I was not working for WWE, I was still doing the indies at the time. I had a match before a WWE RAW that was in Ohio I believe. So I was backstage and I did this match against a guy named M-Dogg 20/Matt Cross who I wrestled a bunch of times as well. And after the match was over, I walked out and I was standing in the hallway, and someone came up to me and put their hand around me. I looked, and it was John Cena. And he said « I just want to say that was amazing. Keep doing your thing, man. You belong here. You deserve to be here one day, and you will be one day. Just keep working. This was one of the best matches I’ve seen in a long time. »And put that in perspective, he’s John Cena, and he came up to an extra. He had no reason to do that.”

On his advice for younger wrestlers: “Once you start training in this business in any way, never lose that fan side of you. Because I feel like that is when things go bad, It’s when you forget how cool this actually is. We’re here today and we’re playing WWE2K23, and this is my job. I used to play WWE video games my whole life, and now I’m here and I’m in the game and that’s still incredibly cool on me, because I’m a wrestling fan. And I think the minute you lose that wrestling side of you and it just becomes a job, it means you shouldn’t do this anymore. So if you’re getting into wrestling, never stop being a fan, it will help you so much.”