WrestleMania 34: John Cena Arrives as a Fan in the Crowd

John Cena said for weeks that if he didn’t have a match for WrestleMania 34, he would show up at the Mercedes-Benz Superdome as a ticket-paying fan. It turns out he wasn’t kidding.

Cena took photos with a number of fans as they waited for the pre-show to begin.

“So John Cena really is a fan this year,” @kimberlasskick wrote.

“John Cena is LITERALLY in the crowd as a fan!” @BTuckerTorch wrote.

By the March 12 episode of Monday Night Raw, Cena had realized he had no set path to WrestleMania. He lost the Royal Rumble match in January, failed to win the No. 1 contender Elimination Chamber match for Brock Lesnar’s Universal Championship and lost a Six-Pack Challenge for AJ Styles’ WWE Championship weeks after that.

With no options left, Cena did the one thing he was allegedly told not to do in challenge the Undertaker. “The Deadman” had not competed in a match since losing to Roman Reigns in the main event of WrestleMania 33, and by all accounts was retired. Over the span of three weeks Cena did everything he could to get his attention from calling him a coward to beating up his brother Kane to imitating his moveset and taunts to outright trolling him on social media. But no matter what, the Undertaker never responded.

By Monday’s episode of Raw, reality had finally set in for Cena. He called out the former world champion one last time, then admitted he’d be at WrestleMania as a fan.

“Do you hear that, Undertaker? That is four weeks straight of an entire audience, people around the world, pouring their hearts out for you. And you don’t have the common decency to stand up and do a damn thing. Am I upset about WrestleMania? Nah. Am I upset with The Undertaker? Hell yeah. You can ignore me all you want, but Undertaker the second you ignore these people, you are a dead man walking.”

Undertaker was reportedly spotted in New Orleans on Saturday, but whether he actually appears at WrestleMania remains to be seen.