Lane Johnson says he lost 15 pounds for his WrestleMania cameo: ‘We had to take our shirts off — it’d look better’

The Eagles lineman had to get in “Mania shape” before joining former teammate Jason Kelce in the ring at the Linc.

Eagles right tackle Lane Johnson and former center Jason Kelce (right) appear in the ring during WrestleMania at Lincoln Financial Field.Read moreElizabeth Robertson / Staff Photographer

Published Apr. 8, 2024, 5:38 p.m. ET

WrestleMania 40 weekend was full of surprises, with a number of special guests including WWE legends John Cena and The Undertaker. But for Philadelphia, the biggest cameo of all came on Saturday, when Jason Kelce and Lane Johnson stepped into the ring, jumping in to help Rey Mysterio beat his son, Dominik.

For Johnson, a longtime WWE fan, it was “awesome” to get his own WrestleMania moment.

The cameo had been in the works for two weeks, giving Johnson two weeks to get in “‘Mania shape,” as Pat McAfee called it during Johnson’s appearance on The Pat McAfee Show on YouTube, live from WWE World on Monday.

“I lost probably 15 pounds, trying to lose the fluff,” Johnson said on the show. “We had to take our shirts off — it would look better.”

Kelce ripped his “UnderDog” T-shirt on stage while Johnson more politely removed his “Big Dom” DiSandro shirt after the pair took off their Eagles-themed luchador masks.

Johnson has his luchador mask from the weekend stored in his home.

“You couldn’t see much out of it,” the 33-year-old right tackle said. “They stuck us down there right before the match when the lights went out, and we kept them on the whole time. As you can see, I couldn’t even tell when [Kelce] took his mask off.”

Kelce and Johnson learned a few moves from the Monster Factory in Paulsboro, N.J., which has been a pipeline to WrestleMania over the years, before stepping into the ring on Saturday. Their only chance at rehearsal came on the day of the event.

“The week leading into it they don’t tell you much,” Johnson said. “They just told us the day of to be there a few hours before, so we got to rehearse, found out what was going down. And then earlier in the week, Kelce was filming, and he was wanting us to go to Monster Factory, where people train, so we did that for a little bit earlier in the week, learned some moves, learned some stuff, and then got the chance to go out, and, man, it was awesome.”

The moment might have been the final run at the Linc for one of the Eagles’ greatest tag teams. Kelce announced his retirement after 13 NFL seasons, 11 of them with Johnson, on March 4.

“He was my tag team jump-the-snap-count partner for 11 years,” Johnson said. “So now, this is going to be an interesting year, got to get a new cadence, you know there’s going to be a lot of eyes. Last year I thought I was going to get 58 penalties, I got about eight, so that’s what I’m really worried about.

“But yeah, having him retire, [Fletcher Cox], it’s Jake [Elliott], Rick Lovato, and Brandon Graham left from the Super Bowl [champion] team. But [I’m] excited about some of the new additions, excited about the draft coming up. Hopefully this will be a big season for us.”