WWE superstar and former world champion Drew McIntyre recently joined West Sport for an in-depth interview about a wide range of topics, including the Scottish Warrior’s thoughts on his epic promo with CM Punk, where he told Punk he prayed for the real-life injury that he sustained that will keep him sidelined past WrestleMania 40. Highlights from the interview can be found below.
On the promo where he told Punk he prayed for his injury:
To me, that’s kind of the thing right now, there is this freedom in WWE, especially for people that the company can trust to go out there and be you and be what you feel is right, within reason. The certain ones of us they can trust on the microphone. There is that feeling of ‘I’m going to try some stuff.’ A lot of it, to me, is, ‘I think this is hilarious. I think this works for the character. I think this is going to be a heck of a moment.’ I want to build Punk up and say I can relate to him and say truthful things. Everything for me has to be based in truth, for me and that character, because if it’s real to me, it’s real to everybody else, and you’ll feel it. Punk and I did have issues when I was younger, all that stuff is true. I went in there and told him, ‘I’ve been through injuries, I’ve had moments taken away from me, and I can understand that.’ He spoke about one of his friends and him going through chemotherapy and how that’s a real hero. I could relate to that. I didn’t know that until I was watching backstage. My mother went through the same. Unfortunately, that’s how she passed. I told him I could relate to all this stuff. When it comes to the injury and how I felt him coming into the company and leap-frogging superstars, trying to take spots at WrestleMania, particularly my spot at WrestleMania, I wasn’t going to let it happen. I took him out and I wanted to let him know, ‘I prayed for this to happen.’ The way people reacted was like a delayed reaction. ‘Did he just say that?’ I could feel it in the arena. The next line was, ‘After the Rumble, when I got eliminated by you, I couldn’t sleep. I let myself down, I let the world down not winning the Rumble, but more specifcally getting eliminated by Punk. The next day I found out he torn his tricep off the bone, and that night I slept like a baby and headed into Raw with a big smile on my face.’ Then attacked him, stomped his tricep, and chucked him out the door. Where were we? Me main eventing WrestleMania, that’s it.
How he never truly wishes for anyone to get hurt but does believe that feuds are more interesting when there are legitimate issues:
You have to be professionals. I don’t wish anyone to be hurt, no matter what the personal feelings are, no matter if they are rooted in reality, because they are. You just have to hope everybody is a professional and they understand we’re trying to entertain the fans. To me, what works is reality and what’s real. You watch boxing or UFC; if you know, the two fighters absolutely despise each other, you’re way more invested than just hugging and buddy-buddy. If they’re screaming and getting pulled apart in press conferences, trash-talking, and social media attacks, you’re more invested if you feel this is a legitimate issue here. If there is a legitimate issue, turn it up to ten.
(H/T and transcribed by Fightful)
