CM Punk Says Nobody Has Ever Made Him A Real Offer To Wrestle Post-WWE Departure
In Ariel Helwani’s most recent sit-down interview with CM Punk in Chicago, Illinois, the former WWE Champion revealed something quite shocking for most wrestling fans to hear: since his split with World Wrestling Entertainment, he’s never been made a real offer to wrestle for anyone else. By “real”, he means that nobody has laid out a specific date, opponent, and monetary offer, and asked if he’d accept. Every wrestling company on the planet has obviously had people reach out to him and let him know that if he ever wanted to return to pro wrestling, they’d welcome him, but no real offers have ever been sent his way.
For me, that fact wasn’t super surprising. I grew up thinking that every major wrestling promotion (and hell, I even thought the indies) had their shit together and were super professional organizations that had their every move planned months in advance, only to start becoming involved in the business a bit to realize they’re just as clueless as everyone else…if not more clueless. Of course nobody ever made him a real offer! As if that would work…pshhh!
What was a bit surprising for me, though, was hearing Punk’s tone change about a potential return to wrestling.
For years now, it’s been a hard “no”. Constantly saying wrestling was in his past, but he hates it now and could never even imagine returning to the squared circle. Now, since winning his defamation trial with the WWE’s Senior Ringside Physician Chris Amann, it’s an “I don’t think so, but I don’t know”. It’s actually the exact same thing we saw happen with Shawn Michaels earlier this week. He’s been the most dead-set on staying retired wrestler we’ve seen in this generation, always pushing that WrestleMania XXVI was the last time we’d ever see “The Showstopper” in the ring, but out of nowhere now he’s “open to one more match”, and even threw out AJ Styles’, Daniel Bryan’s, and Johnny Gargano’s names as potential opponents. This has absolutely nothing to do with Punk’s slight change of heart, but I thought it was worth mentioning regardless.
CM Punk meets Mike “The Truth” Jackson in the octagon on Saturday at UFC 225. Jackson is 0-1 in his professional MMA career, his one loss coming at the hands of Mickey Gall by way of rear-naked choke in just 45 seconds. Punk, on the other hand, is also 0-1 to Gall by way of an RNC, lasting 89 seconds longer than his opponent however. Should be an interesting matchup this weekend.