John Cena Is Officially Out of the Royal Rumble

WWE announced today that John Cena is officially out of the Royal Rumble.

WWE claimed that John Cena suffered an ankle injury from a Drew McIntyre ankle lock two weeks ago, but that’s reportedly a work and John Cena was apparently never going to be in the Royal Rumble in the first place. But WWE had a lot of tickets to sell (Chase Field seats over 40,000 and it’s not sold out), so they advertised him.

The idea, according to Dave Meltzer, was that Cena was supposed to be attacked and “injured” by Lars Sullivan two weeks ago (to set up a possible WrestleMania match), but Sullivan’s debut was delayed.

Cena is scheduled to start shooting his next movie, Playing With Fire, on February 4 in Vancouver.