UPW founder Rick Bassman recently spoke with Wrestling Inc. and discussed several professional wrestling topics. Here are the highlights:
Discovering John Cena:
I started John Cena at UPW. People always wanna give me credit for ‘discovering’ John Cena. But the truth is that John Cena discovered John Cena. He put the body together that he has and he was either born with or developed the work ethic he has. Whether it had been UPW or XYZ Wrestling School, I think ultimately, he would have found his way [to WWE].
But he found his way there through my system and it’s one that I personally and financially supported so guys like John could have a place to get training and exposure and be put in front of people that could really bring his career to the next level. I did that for John and for free because at the time he came to me and told me he didn’t have the money to go to the school.
But I knew the guy would be a star. You didn’t have to be a genius to see that he had all of the gifts and was positively going somewhere. The polar opposite of being appreciative about it, he’s gone out of his way to hurt me and bury me ever since. It boggled my mind; that’s all.
He and Cena’s history:
John and I were never buddies. We got along but there’s some guys from my company like Nova and [Paul] London that I’ll be friends with until the day I die. We are buddies but John and I were never buddies. What happened was, immediately after leaving UPW he went to OVW and Cornette – who absolutely hates me even though I love him, not as a person as I don’t really know him.
I’d love to simultaneously beat the sh*t out of him and sit down and go to dinner with him. But John got to OVW, and I’ve heard this from so many people, that Cornette went to work on him and immediately said, ‘Don’t let that piece of sh*t [Bassman] put his hand in his pocket. Don’t pay him a penny. He’s taken advantage of the boys and that’s not how it works.’
Booking Cena on a show called “Manhunters”:
I was genuinely excited for John and this is where people who are haters can choose to believe me or not. My favorite thing to do was to call people and give them good news. Yeah, I wanna make my commission but, believe it or not, I love to deliver good news. So, I called John, ‘John, deal’s closed and we got you $40,000.’
He goes to me, ‘Huh, don’t spend that $4,000 in one place, Rick.’ It was so obnoxiously magnanimous. Here’s a guy who just netted $36,000 and couldn’t afford tuition a few months before. Right then I thought this is weird. Anyway, John got to OVW and back in the day their average development deal then was $300 a week. That was a godsend back then as the idea of paying wrestlers to train was a whole new thing.
Cena being part of a four-man class from UPW that signed with WWE:
[The other three] had deals worth $300 a week. John’s was $500 and that was unusual for those times. But I went to work hard on Bruce Prichard and Jim Ross who ran Talent Relations. I told them he’s gonna be a star and has a work ethic that’s second to none. So we got him $500 and John paid me my $50 commission for 3-4 weeks… The second he got to OVW, he sent me a one-line letter dismissing me as his manager. Ever since then he’s talked about me as shady and as a guy who takes advantage of the boys and puts his hands in their pockets. So, there you go.
Where he and Cena stand today:
I don’t really care and I don’t ever expect any resolution on this. If I saw John today I would probably try to have a conversation with him. I don’t want anything out of it as I hate shattered relationships and broken bridges. I’ve been really fortunate in my life to be able to put together any relationship a rift has developed in. With John, I’ll say this about him – I’m in no way begrudging his success. This guy worked his ass off. I see that.
But the disconnect, in my mind, comes in the way I described to you. I’d love to hear his take on it. Again, I don’t really need to and he’d probably wouldn’t waist the time or the breath on it. But I made a big investment – not in him per se – but an investment in having a place that I put together that people could come to and get opportunities from.
I worked hard and smart to do that. At the end of the day, a good agent or manager who takes commission… sometimes you’ll collect commission for years and years on a job you did very little work on. But typically, it’s a lot of work and you’re using your investment and beyond that, hopefully you’ve done a deal for the talent where their net is more than it would have been if they did the deal themselves. And I always did that for my clients.
