On Saturday night, the WWE hosted their annual Survivor Series pay-per-view from the Allstate Arena in Chicago, Illinois. This show featured the return of Randy Orton after a year and a half away with injuries and the biggest return to modern history with that of CM Punk.
CM Punk closed out the show with a thunderous return to his hometown. He received a similar standing ovation on the debut episode of AEW Rampage from the United Center in Chicago, Illinois, in 2021 and AEW Collison in 2023. This was Punk’s first appearance in WWE in nine years.
CM Punk’s first run in WWE went from 2005 to 2014. His history is well documented during his time in the WWE. Punk’s wrestling journey began as a backyard wrestler for the Lunatic Wrestling Federation. Punk would leave LWF to attend the Steel Dominion wrestling school in Chicago where he was trained by pro wrestler Ace Steele.
Punk would later wrestle for the Independent Wrestling Association Mid-South winning the IWA Mid-South Light Heavyweight Championship twice and the IWA Mid-South Heavyweight Championship on five separate occasions with high-profile feuds like Colt Cabana, AJ Styles, Eddie Guerrero, and Chris Hero.
The majority of those wrestlers along with Punk would later work for Ring of Honor and TNA Wrestling. Punk would have some great feuds with both companies including Raven, Jimmy Rave, America’s Most Wanted (Chris Harris and James Storm), Christopher Daniels, Samoa Joe, and the Briscoe Brothers (Mark and Jay Briscoe). In Ring of Honor, Punk went on to win the ROH Championship three times before signing with the WWE in 2005.
Punk played a huge role in the relaunch of WWE’s version of ECW. He won the title on three separate occasions. Punk would later switch to the Raw Brand in 2008 before he was moved to Smackdown in 2009. His peak came in 2011 when he cut the famous pipe bomb as his contract was nearing an end but he would re-sign with the WWE.
During his time in the WWE, Punk won a total of six championships including the World Heavyweight Championship three times, the WWE Championship twice in addition to the ECW Championship.
In Punk’s later years, he and the WWE had a sour relationship which led to Punk walking out on the company in 2014. In a December 2014 interview, Punk said “I was sick and hurt and burnt out, and I walked. And I can do that because I am an independent contractor.”
Punk would later join the UFC and became a commentator for Cage Fury Fighting Championships. While he was away from wrestling for seven years, his name was still talked about throughout the wrestling world. Everyone wondered if you ever stepped foot in a wrestling ring again.
In 2021, Punk would make his wrestling return to All Elite Wrestling on the second episode of Rampage from the United Center. It was a heart-warming moment for wrestling fans seeing him back in a wrestling ring with new wrestlers to dance with inside the ring.
At first, all was going well for Punk and AEW. However, the situation went downhill quickly shortly after Punk won the AEW World Championship from Adam “Hangman” Page at Double or Nothing in Las Vegas, he told the crowd on an episode of Rampage that he injured his foot and was going to be sidelined for a while.
Instead of vacating the championship, AEW let him keep the title while having a tournament to determine the interim championship which was won by Jon Moxley. However, Punk would return to Dynamite on August 17th to confront Adam Page, who Punk claimed “went to business for himself.” This started the downfall between Punk and AEW.
All Elite Wrestling President Tony Khan is known by many as a nice guy, he had a chance to resolve the issue but it was proven over time that he has no leadership skills. The lack of leadership has hurt AEW in the last couple of years.
The breaking point between AEW and Punk escalated after the AEW All Out pay-per-view’s media scrum in which Punk went on a rant calling out his former friend Colt Cabana and The Elite after winning the AEW title for the second time over Jon Moxley. The rant led to a supposed locker room brawl between The Elite and Punk. However, no one has talked about the brawl and no one knows what happened.
After the scrum, Punk and The Elite were both suspended. This time, Punk’s title and The Elite’s Trios titles were vacated. Punk’s suspension lasted nine months before making his return to AEW on the debut of Collison on June 17, 2023. Punk made Collison a must-watch show on Saturday night and it was a better show than Dynamite.
Toward the end of his AEW career, Punk was involved in a backstage altercation with Jack Perry involving Perry using a car’s windshield or glass as a spot during his match with Hook after it was reported that Punk told Perry not to use real glass. This was the final straw that broke camels back and Punk was fired by AEW on September 2nd.
AEW President Tony Khan started Collison with a statement saying, “The incident was regrettable, and it endangered people backstage.” He later stated “Never in all [this] time have I ever felt until last Sunday that my security, my safety, my life was in danger at a wrestling show. I don’t think anybody should feel that way at work, I don’t think the people I work with should feel that way, and I had to make a very difficult choice today.”
What started out as a mission for Punk to work with the young talent in AEW proved to be that a majority of them did not want to listen to veterans like himself. He did work with some young guys like Darby Allen and MJF the highlight of Punk’s career in AEW.
Many fans have felt that Punk’s firing from AEW robbed them of potential feuds with Jay White, The Elite, Bryan Danielson, and many other wrestlers working for AEW.
The AEW situation led to many hoping and praying that Punk would return to WWE. During his time away, Punk trolled the fans on his social media accounts as to where he might go next. He showed up backstage during Impact Wrestling’s TV tapings giving them advice while visiting his friend and trainer Ace Steel.
After a few weeks of speculation, Punk shocked the world by returning to WWE. By him returning to the WWE changes plans immediately as far as the next few months including the Royal Rumble and WrestleMania 40 in Philadelphia next year.
There are so many storylines that WWE can put Punk in and it looks like his first feud will be Seth Rollins (Tyler Black in ROH) to kickstart his second run in WWE. Whether you love him or hate him, he does entertain the fans and leaves a lasting impression. He is the most talked about wrestler in modern history and let’s hope his second WWE run goes better than his first.
