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John Cena retained the Undisputed WWE Championship at the 2025 Backlash against Randy Orton. The 17-time world champion stuck to underhanded means to defeat The Viper on his home soil. At WrestleMania 41, he was helped by Travis Scott, but the rapper was not present in St. Louis.
The FE!N artist appeared at The Show of Shows in Las Vegas to help John Cena win the Undisputed WWE Championship against Cody Rhodes. He didn’t just distract The American Nightmare, but also pulled the referee out of the ring before he could complete the three-count when Rhodes tried to pin Cena.
Travis Scott was unavailable for the Backlash Premium Live Event. Notably, the Latin Grammy Award-winning artist is currently in Barcelona for a show scheduled for Sunday, May 11. Thus, John Cena had to fend for himself in St. Louis.
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The Cenation Leader secured the victory by low-blowing Randy Orton and hitting him on the head with the Undisputed WWE Championship belt after a distraction from R-Truth. Before this, The Viper had the upper hand for almost the entirety of the match.
Orton even landed multiple RKOs on Cena and punished him with two Attitude Adjustments, one on the announce table and the other on a regular table. After his win, John Cena called himself the Last Real Champion again and delivered a short promo where he reiterated that he didn’t need the WWE Universe.
Why did John Cena defeat Randy Orton at WWE Backlash?
Randy Orton came close to beating John Cena at WWE Backlash on several occasions. He pinned the champion multiple times for more than three seconds. However, each time, there was either no referee to count the pinfall, or they counted slowly owing to the damage they sustained at the hands of Cena.
Eventually, St. Louis saw its hometown wrestler bite the dust against one of his biggest rivals in history. The creative team seemingly made John Cena retain his gold at Backlash to preserve his momentum on his retirement tour. The heel superstar created history at WrestleMania 41 by winning his 17th world championship, ending his longstanding tie with Ric Flair for most world title wins.
The historic win couldn’t have been followed by a title loss in his very first defense, especially when John Cena is currently running the Last Real Champion gimmick. He has also threatened to "ruin" pro wrestling by taking the title away when he retires. Thus, dropping the gold just three weeks after ‘Mania would have killed his character’s momentum.
John Cena still has many more appearances to make before the year comes to an end. Thus, it is likely that he won’t be losing the Undisputed WWE Championship anytime soon. Additionally, there is also a chance that the Stamford-based promotion may field Cody Rhodes as the wrestler who eventually dethrones Cena in a passing-the-torch moment.
It will be interesting to see how long the Last Real Champion holds the top gold in the company.
