CM Punk’s Potential Return to AEW and the Fallout from His Adam Page Promo

Speculation about the potential return of CM Punk has been rife, with Dax Harwood confirming on his podcast that Punk “misses wrestling” and “wants to come back.” Sean Ross Sapp of Fightful has also noted that Punk has expressed a willingness to work with AEW in a number of ways, including with the Elite.

However, the fallout from Punk’s infamous promo on Adam Page during his time with AEW has created some controversy. Dave Meltzer of F4WOnline.com commented on the matter during Wrestling Observer Radio, stating that the unprofessional promo, for which Punk was never punished, created a lot of heat that only worsened over time.

Meltzer suggests that had Punk been told that his actions were against the script and subsequently punished, the situation may have been alleviated. However, as it stands, Punk’s unprofessional behavior has caused tension that still lingers today.

“The big thing was the promo on Adam Page, which was totally unprofessional. There’s no defending it, but because he was never punished, which is one of the problems with this, is because he was never punished for it, it created a lot of heat that got worse and worse and worse. If he had been told, if, like, he had done that promo and Tony [Khan] would have said, ‘dude, you’re going against the script. Going to sit out for a couple of weeks.’ I think that at that point, either he would have pouted and quit and gone home, or he would have not pouted and quit and gone home, and maybe this thing would have been alleviated. I don’t know which would have happened, but it didn’t happen that way.”

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“So it got worse and worse and worse. And so now we’re at this situation where it’s like, obviously he’s probably going to be back, and if they want to work and he’s going to be back, there’s ways to do it. But going in there and trying to make the other people look unprofessional is probably the worst way to do it. Unless you’re trying to just kind of like pressure them out of the company. If that’s the idea, then again, we’ll have to wait and see how it all turns out.”

“This is clearly not good faith. Because it was good faith, we wouldn’t hear anything about it. They would settle it. They would settle it and we would see an angle out of nowhere that would shock everyone, or at least even or maybe we would talk about it or whatever and know the angle was coming. And if that happens, that’s fine.

“But as long as they’re talking about it, it tells me that, number one, they have no deal to do it. And number two, by doing it publicly, they’re not really looking at doing it. They’re looking at playing a public relations game over it.”

Despite this, it seems likely that Punk will eventually return to the ring, and if AEW is his chosen destination, there are ways to make it work. However, if Punk’s intention is to pressure others out of the company through unprofessional behavior, it is unlikely to be a successful strategy.

What do you think about the potential return of CM Punk to wrestling, and how do you think his controversial past actions will impact his future in the industry? Leave a comment.

H/T to NoDq.com for the above transcript.