WWE Rumors: John Cena And Daniel Bryan Refusing To Work ‘Crown Jewel’ In Saudi Arabia, Per ‘Barstool Sports’

After last night’s Monday Night Raw, the card for Crown Jewel took a big hit when Roman Reigns relinquished the WWE Universal Championship to battle leukemia again. With that tragic news coming out, WWE continued on to build up the controversial event still scheduled to take place on November 2, 2018.

Well, things may have just become even worse for the company as rumor has it that both John Cena and Daniel Bryan are refusing to travel to work Crown Jewel.

For weeks, there has been a lot of drama surrounding the event in Saudi Arabia due to the disappearance and murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi. As reported by Inquisitr, there have even been concerns from WWE superstars who have said that they are afraid to go over for Crown Jewel — as they fear that their safety is at risk.

Said superstars were initially speaking anonymously to avoid any potential backlash from WWE, but two notables are now speaking out. Robbie Fox of Barstool Sports recently claimed in a Twitter post that both John Cena and Daniel Bryan are actually “refusing” to fly to Saudi Arabia in order to work Crown Jewel.

Fox says that while many other superstars have expressed similar sentiments, they don’t “have the power” like Cena and Bryan might. With that, Fox also provided an update to say that WWE is now looking for new locations to potentially host the embattled pay-per-view.

UPDATE: WWE is currently in the process of frantically scouting locations to move Crown Jewel to. This is NOT definite confirmation that it's out of Saudi Arabia, but the location and date are unquestionably in major jeopardy right now.

— Robbie Fox (@RobbieBarstool) October 23, 2018

While this has not been confirmed in any way, Wrestling Observer Radio, by way of Wrestling Inc., said that they have not heard anything about Daniel Bryan refusing to work the event. As of Monday afternoon, the WWE creative team was advised that John Cena would not be in Saudi Arabia — and would not be working Crown Jewel.

It’s not known if Cena will change his mind if the location of Crown Jewel is changed, but the belief is that he will. That being said, there is the possibility that the event could be called off completely. WWE, for now at least, is keeping it on the schedule.

If both John Cena and Daniel Bryan were to pull out of the pay-per-view, it would cause big problems for booking. Bryan is scheduled to face A.J. Styles for the WWE Championship, while John Cena is set to be part of the eight-man WWE World Cup Tournament.

With just a little over a week to go until WWE is set to present Crown Jewel to the world from Saudi Arabia, things have become extremely complicated. The pay-per-view could end up being moved entirely — or just take place where it is already scheduled to happen, albeit without a few top stars on the card that had been previously advertised.

If things carry on as planned, John Cena and Daniel Bryan refusing to go will force WWE to have to rewrite the card in a substantial fashion.