RVD On What Made Legendary ‘ECW One Night Stand’ John Cena Match Special

RVD remains one of the most technically-gifted pro wrestlers to have ever competed inside the squared circle. The pro wrestling legend has competed in several promotions such as ECW, WCW, WWE, and IMPACT Wrestling during his career that has lasted over thirty years. He had an instant classic match with John Cena in 2006 and it seems he explained why it was special.

During the earlier years of his career, John Cena was involved in a huge match with ECW veteran Rob Van Damn at ECW One Night Stand 2006, which saw RVD beat Cena for the WWE Title.

The match was particularly infamous for the hostility shown towards Cena, with many fans cussing him out and there was even a huge banner hanging from the balcony that stated: ‘If Cena wins we riot.’ Fans also threw back the t-shirt Cena tried to give them, multiple times.

While speaking with Chris Van Vliet, the ECW legend talked about his match with John Cena. RVD would then go on to explain why it was a special match.

The one match would probably be when I beat John Cena at ECW One Night Stand and won the championship belts. Which if they asked me, I’d bring it up. If they asked me what my favorite match was, [I’d mention it] because first off, the match itself was in my opinion, great. I loved the match. Obviously Cena is great. He was great with that crowd. The crowd was incredible. One of a kind crowd.

[It was an] irreplaceable moment, besides all of that, it’s like ‘What was my story, my build up, going into that particular match? Everything since 96.’ Maybe even before that, if you were to add the history. So for those reasons. Me and every fan in that building, we were all fighting for what I believed in, in my heart, and what got me all the way up to that point. That’s why they all wanted to see the match go the way it did and see Cena go down, or they would riot.

I don’t think anybody could have known exactly how that crowd was gonna be first off, to put that out there. I didn’t. I knew for sure that was my home. I knew that they were with me. That was my building. But I couldn’t have predicted that they were gonna feel so much that way. They’re gonna be like ‘No! F*** your T-shirt’ and throw it back. You see me laughing when you watch that.

I thought that was funny and great. What are the chances that a fan that could have a John Cena shirt, because they’re all real fans at heart, will do that? Then boom, second guy does it again, third guy wipes his ass with it. It’s like, ‘Holy crap. This is great,’ But I had no idea it was gonna be like that. John knew that he was in for a rough night, He was gonna get shit on a lot. He knew that. He’s just super cool. I really think he was looking forward to the match. I think that he had fun with it. I know I did.”

Rob Van Dam was also inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2021 and also gave Vince McMahon a bunch of rolling papers as a gift, which Vince McMahon found very funny. RVD is happy where he is in life right now and that is all that matters.

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