The much-talked-about CM Punk interview with ESPN’s Marc Raimondi has dropped. The interview, done to promote Punk’s return to AEW for the Collision premiere on Saturday, made headlines this week as it was reported that Punk’s comments would upset a lot of people. Below are highlights.
“I know pro wrestling is absolutely the most bizarre form of entertainment on Earth, but to me, I treat it like a business, and I treat it like the television show that it is. So, y’all haven’t seen me since I won the belt. I’m coming back. Tune in to find out exactly what I have to say. I’m picking up right where I left off,” Punk said.
Punk said he tore his left triceps tendon completely off the bone in the All Out match against Jon Moxley, and that the injury required surgery and a lengthy rehabilitation process. He said it was tough mentally because the injury was sustained in just his second match back after recovering from breaking his foot in June 2022. Punk said he’s back to 100% now.
“I think, in wrestling, we always kind of joke how we always get hurt doing the dumb stuff,” he said. “Fall off a 15-foot ladder through a table and you’re fine and you’re running 6 miles the next day and you’re in the gym. And then it’s just always the dumb little things, like some routine thing that I’ve done a thousand times in my career, and it injures you. And then just the mental aspect of this recovery, it has not been easy. Luckily, I’ve got a really good support system, my wife [April Mendez, a three-time WWE divas champion under the moniker AJ Lee] and [dog] Larry, and I’ve got great friends and a super great rehab team that was able to get me back this quickly even though it doesn’t feel — it feels like it was 12 years ago.”
Punk said the division within AEW started sometime in the spring of 2022. Regarding the May 25, 2022 Dynamite segment with Adam Page, Punk said he and Page discussed backstage before the segment what they would say, as Punk said he did for similar segments in the past with wrestlers such as current AEW World Champion MJF and Eddie Kingston. But when they got into the ring that night, Punk says Page strayed from what they had agreed on.
“You talk a big game about workers’ rights,” Page said on TV that night. “Well, you’ve shown the exact opposite since you got here. I love this place, I care about this place. This is my home. And this Sunday at Double or Nothing, I will not be defending this championship against you. No, for the first time in my life, I’ll be defending All Elite Wrestling from you.”
The promo was a bit confusing to most fans, especially the first part, since these were two babyface wrestlers, but to the naked ear, it just sounded like pro wrestling trash talk. Punk said it was not that and confronted Page about it when they returned to the backstage area.
According to Punk, Page told him he said what he did because Punk had Colt Cabana fired from the company, or at least tried to. Punk said he told Page that that was not true and that Cabana still worked for the company. While Cabana had a lengthy absence, AEW President Tony Khan has said in multiple media appearances that Cabana’s absence was because he was reassigned to work for ROH.
Punk told ESPN that he has no relationship with Cabana but that he “never” asked Khan to take Cabana’s or anyone else’s job. However, others in the company, including The Elite, believe Punk did indeed do that, according to sources. Page was evidently confident enough to bring it up unexpectedly on TV.
Khan and Page were unavailable to provide comments in the ESPN article, according to AEW. When reached for comment via email, Cabana said ESPN should go through AEW “for everything.” AEW Executive Vice Presidents Kenny Omega and The Young Bucks declined to comment via their agent Barry Bloom.
Page’s comments during the Dynamite segment, which were a “shoot” in wrestling terms, infuriated Punk, so much so that he considered not going through with the Double Or Nothing match out of concern that Page might intentionally try to hurt him. However, Punk worked that night and captured the AEW World Title.
“And I proceed to have what I think is a garbage match because I’m trying to protect myself on stuff instead of actually just working and trying to put on the best performance I can,” Punk said. “I’m keeping an eye out. He chopped me in the mouth one time, and I’m just like, ‘OK, did you do that on purpose?’ You chip my tooth, and I’m like, ‘All right, should I give him a receipt?’ It changes the dynamic. It poisoned everything for me, and it made it all really, really ugly, and that was what set all of this off, and here we are over a year later and ain’t s— been done about it.”
Punk broke his foot doing a crowd dive during his entrance three days after Double Or Nothing. In his return to TV on August 18, Punk called out Page during an in-ring segment, and no one knew he was planning to do so. Things then escalated and we got what happened in the All Out media scrum, with Punk calling out other wrestlers, which led to the backstage fight.
Punk said he had regrets about what transpired in that media scrum and has since apologized to Khan for it. He said his and Khan’s relationship is now “great.”
“The first thing I said to Tony when I sat down with him and spoke to him after it was, ‘Man, I’m really sorry I put you in that position,'” Punk said. “I apologize for the scrum. But when you’ve watched that scrum, you’re looking at a very, very frustrated guy who had told people. That’s not the first time he heard all that. It’s not the first time lawyers were told all that. And I was just looking for something to be done and nothing got done. So, if you want something done right, you got to do it yourself. And I just didn’t approach it in the right manner, but tension was high. I was very, very pissed. I pretty much knew that I had just injured myself again. I was hurt, and I was disappointed. Yeah, it’s very easy for me to say I regret that and I handled it the wrong way, 100%.”
Punk said that he doesn’t like saying “no comment” but that “we are trying to move past what happened that night specifically.”
“I don’t think what happened was a big deal…” Punk said. “This has happened in the last 10 months in hockey, in basketball, in baseball, in just about every sport. And it’s covered and it’s gone the next day. I think because I have injured my tricep and I’ve been out for so long, I think it has been exacerbated. I think it’s been exacerbated by people spreading lies about the whole thing. And when, in reality, my attitude is, well, shit happens.”
Punk said he has not had any talks with Omega or The Bucks since the All Out incident, but he has tried. He said when he has reached out, he received “messages from lawyers saying, ‘Do not contact this person.'” Punk said he is unclear whether those responses came at the request of legal representatives of Omega and The Bucks, or a third party.
Pro wrestling is known to take real-life events and use them for future storylines, but Punk said he had been told that using the AEW debacle on TV and spinning it into some matches that would undoubtedly draw money will not be happening.
Punk said he resents that he’s been painted as “the bad guy” in online reports as he feels he’s just been defending himself. Punk said people in the AEW locker room leaking things to the wrestling media have contributed to the internal drama.
“Now we all got to roll in the fucking mud, and that never should have happened and has never been course-corrected,” Punk said. “So, I understand people want to say that, ‘Oh, man, Punk is a dick.’ Well yeah, because I’m defending myself and I will always defend myself. I’m open to have a full-blown fucking sit-down powwow discussion with everybody about it. But it hasn’t happened yet, and it’s not because of my lack of trying.”
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