John Cena congratulates Miz on 20th anniversary of WWE debut

September 1 was a big anniversary for The Miz — and one of his greatest rivals helped him celebrate the occasion.

Tuesday marked 20 years since Miz, after competing on Tough Enough and making it through developmental, officially arrived on WWE SmackDown. His debut match was a victory over Tatanka that was taped on August 29, 2006 and aired on SmackDown a few days later.

John Cena sent out a tweet this morning congratulating Miz on his 20th anniversary. In the post, Cena noted that, when speaking with young wrestlers, he always brings up Miz’s work ethic as an example to follow.

“Respect is earned. You earned mine a long time ago,” Cena wrote. “Each sunset makes it far more difficult for most anyone else to deny theirs. Congratulations on an incredible 20 years! You ARE the example I consistently bring up to young talent of effort & turning anything into entertaining!”

Miz and Cena headlined WrestleMania 27 against each other (with The Rock getting involved as well) in 2011. Though Miz was hoping to get one more match against Cena on Cena’s retirement tour, it didn’t end up happening. Miz did make an appearance on Cena’s retirement show and then interacted with him on-screen at WrestleMania 42 when Cena hosted the event.

In his own post celebrating his 20th anniversary, the 45-year-old Miz reiterated that he’s not done yet. He’s teaming with Kit Wilson against Bakusai (Shinsuke Nakamura & Kyoki) on this Friday’s SmackDown, which has already been taped. Miz has been a regular at WWE’s house shows this summer with Danhausen and Kevin Owens as his most frequent opponents.

WWE’s John Cena Classic —

Cena is now an ambassador for WWE after retiring from the ring in December 2025. At a Fan Expo event in Canada last weekend, he gave an update on WWE’s plans for the John Cena Classic. The event will be WWE’s version of an All-Star Game with talent from the main roster and NXT both featured. Cena said that, though he can’t reveal the details yet, things have progressed to the point where they are known internally.

“Normally, I want to say, ‘We’re figuring out the details.’ I’ll say this: we have all the details,” Cena said. “You just gotta hang in there with me, because they want me to keep it a secret until it’s time to say it. But we got a lot of information we’re going to dump on you. It just ain’t going to be today. I’m very excited about it. I really am, I really am excited.”