Jelly Roll Says WWE Appearance Sparked Nearly 300-Pound Weight Loss

Country music star Jelly Roll says a moment inside a WWE ring forced him to confront a hard truth about his health — and ultimately changed his life.

In the new season of Netflix’s WWE: Unreal, which offers a behind-the-scenes look at WWE, Jelly Roll opens up about how a 2024 appearance made him realize he was, in his words, a “dead man walking.”

A lifelong WWE dream — and a wake-up call

Jelly Roll has been a WWE fan since childhood and always dreamed of appearing on the show. That dream came true in November 2023, when he took part in a segment with wrestler Dominik Mysterio. But because of his size at the time, he wasn’t able to do much physically.

Things changed a few months later at SummerSlam in Cleveland in August 2024. Jelly Roll got more involved, including a physical spot where he attacked Austin Theory. That moment became a turning point.

“When I’m getting up, I’m hanging on to the rope, R-Truth’s got one arm, and Miz has got another arm,” Jelly Roll recalled on the show. “It took two grown men to get me to stand up. I knew if I didn’t do something, it was going to kill me.”

A promise — and a massive transformation

After that night, Jelly Roll made a promise to himself and to WWE: he would come back the following year in the best shape of his life.

At his heaviest, Jelly Roll said he weighed 540 pounds. He committed to a strict, year-long fitness journey with a goal of getting under 300 pounds — a weight he hadn’t seen since he was 14 years old.

His dedication paid off. By the time SummerSlam 2025 arrived, Jelly Roll stepped into the ring at 299 pounds.

The Netflix series shows just how serious he was. WWE executive Bruce Pritchard revealed that Jelly Roll rented two houses near WWE’s Orlando-area training facility — one for himself and one for his music team. He trained for wrestling during the day and worked on his music at night.

Since then, Jelly Roll has continued to lose weight. He later told Men’s Health that he’s now down to 265 pounds.

Proving the doubters wrong

In the 2025 SummerSlam match, Jelly Roll teamed up with WWE legend Randy Orton to face Drew McIntyre, the reigning WWE Champion at the time, and influencer-turned-wrestler Logan Paul.

Both Orton and WWE Chief Content Officer Paul Levesque, better known as Triple H, initially had doubts about whether Jelly Roll could pull it off. By the end, those doubts were gone.

“If I were to describe Jelly Roll, he’s a natural performer,” Orton said. “You can tell he’s a lifelong fan. He knows what it takes in that ring, and he did it so well.”

“The best night of my life”

Jelly Roll ultimately lost the match, but the result didn’t matter to him. Afterward, he told Levesque that the experience was “the best night of my life.”

More than a celebrity crossover, Jelly Roll’s WWE journey became the motivation behind a nearly 300-pound weight loss — and a powerful reminder of how one moment can change everything.