Did Punk leave AEW in better shape than when he arrived?

[rajaah]

The old adage is that you "go out on your back" and leave a company better off than when you got there.

As for the question, I would say no. Pros/cons:

Pros:

-Raised AEW's profile/notoriety a bit and certainly got people discussing the company a lot more over the last two years.

Cons:

-Didn't put over anyone in AEW that I can think of. He more or less went 50/50 with MJF and Ricky Starks, but won the overall feuds, which is the closest he came to actually putting anyone over. Oh, and also went 50/50 with Moxley (who didn't need it). All of his losses to those guys were via cheating or fluke injuries. So at the end of the day he didn't put a single person over in any feud or match. Wardlow dominating him (and then losing via quick roll up) is probably the most he actually did for any of his opponents.

-Embarrassed the company repeatedly and made it look bush league, when it was doing great without him and looked like a real WWE competitor on the rise. Does it still look like that?

-Considering he talked so much about the need to break up McMahon's wrestling monopoly, which Cody and the Elite then did... Punk himself probably did more to revive said monopoly than anyone else in the industry has or will.

[xCompackx]

Through the tribalism and bullshit Punk caused, we did get Collision out of it. I'd say that's his only real benefit to the company.

[Chiral]

His AEW run was like a bright rooftop fireworks display that ends up burning a chunk of the building below.

[Dub H]

Nope. he left a big besmirch on AEW's image. Ruined a year of booking and then ruined the launch of a new brand

[Dub H]

Sept 16, 2023 10:41:01 GMT -5 xCompackx said:

Through the tribalism and bullshit Punk caused, we did get Collision out of it. I'd say that's his only real benefit to the company.

Collision was gonna happen regardless,the only thing he did is make its first couple of months useless

[Kalmia]

I think he left it about the same. I think Punk brought in some viewers, but the extra viewers kinda drifted away, leaving AEW basically where it was before.

He helped some wrestlers and hindered others. His presence backstage wrecked some things but helped others and may have (unexpectedly) set up AEW better to handle problems in the future.

Some of the angles and matches in his first run were truly amazing but also coincided with AEW losing a bit of what made it AEW.

So for every negative, there's a positive and vice versa, IMO. It just depends on what you put more weight on. I'm sitting on the fence so hard on this one that I have splinters, lmao.

[HIM]

Nah. He didn't.

["Evil Brood" Jackson Vanik]

He exposed AEW to a lot more eyeballs and made them a ton of money with those PPVs early on. And I'm sure he build more confidence with AEW and WBD when they saw those results even if a lot of it was attributed to him. I'd say on they're largely better off and the highs outweigh the lows, especially now that we know he didn't cost AEW the Elite.

[IgnahtaSempria]

I'm gonna say 'no', because while Punk did bring in more fans, a lot of the fans he brought in are the loudly toxic ones who hate everything about AEW except Punk, and who call everyone "jobbers" and "indy losers" except for Punk's chosen boys.

AEW was never free of toxicity or Discourse^TM, but both of those ramped up significantly with the introduction of Punk's real-world Cult of Personality to the fanbase.

[rajaah]

Sept 16, 2023 11:38:44 GMT -5 Dub H said:

Sept 16, 2023 10:41:01 GMT -5 xCompackx said:

Through the tribalism and bullshit Punk caused, we did get Collision out of it. I'd say that's his only real benefit to the company.

Collision was gonna happen regardless,the only thing he did is make its first couple of months useless

I disagree, Collision is the one area where I think he actually worked to AEW's betterment in the past year and a half (since the MJF feud ended). That show is very well-done across the board and I think Punk helped get more eyeballs on it (though still not many, apparently).

Seems to me that everything went south the minute he got into a feud for the world title. Makes me wonder how different things would have been if he'd been kept away from the title and booked more like, say, Kenny (winning some feuds, losing some feuds, being treated as an attraction and co-main event but generally staying out of the title scene).

Added a poll to the first post, should have done that to begin with but it slipped my mind.

[Denny Zen is Cooking™]

The fact that “Problem With AEW Ticket Sales” is the most active thread on this board, and AEW live events were routinely outselling WWE around the time Punk first arrived tells me all I need to know.

Could just be correlation, could be actual causation, but one thing that’s certain is AEW decidedly not in better shape than it was before him.

[Nosnorb]

Sept 16, 2023 12:57:49 GMT -5 rajaah said:

Sept 16, 2023 11:38:44 GMT -5 Dub H said:

Collision was gonna happen regardless,the only thing he did is make its first couple of months useless

I disagree, Collision is the one area where I think he actually worked to AEW's betterment in the past year and a half (since the MJF feud ended). That show is very well-done across the board and I think Punk helped get more eyeballs on it (though still not many, apparently).

The show wasn't doing as well as WB had hoped, and one of the worst parts of that show was Punk himself, his "Real Worlds Champion" was the drizzling shits, and since he's been gone the show has improved a lot.

[kingoftheindies]

Overall no. While I'll maintain his program with MJF is some of the best work he ever did, I think the drama caused by Punk did a lot of damage that directly damaged AEW in a lot of ways. Is it irreparable damage? No, but basically the last year has been a case of no matter what AEW does there's always a dark cloud of negativity hanging over that.

[Cyno]

Sept 16, 2023 13:21:34 GMT -5 Denny Zen is Cooking™ said:

The fact that “Problem With AEW Ticket Sales” is the most active thread on this board, and AEW live events were routinely outselling WWE around the time Punk first arrived tells me all I need to know.

Could just be correlation, could be actual causation, but one thing that’s certain is AEW decidedly not in better shape than it was before him.

The product cooled down a lot after Punk joined but I'd put that more in the "correlation" category. Granted, Punk's injuries (not his fault and he was far from the only higher-profile worker who got seriously hurt) and temper tantrums (definitely his fault lol) contributed to that feeling. But then you also have other things like ticket price increases and market saturation contributing to that, too. Though ticket sales are also a lagging indicator.

[Xxcjb01xX [PIECE OF: SH-]]

I don't think Punk is leaving any lasting damage to AEW outside of maybe FTR being annoying boot munchers, but overall I would have to say he actively hurt the company more than helped it, and tried to cause a real divide between the talent and fans themselves, and I'm very glad he's gone so that can (somewhat) stop

Collision has been rather nice when it's not trying to focus on CM Punk's erratic as f*** storyline while 75 percent of the other matches are squashes because he keeps banning people.

[Mayonnaise]

Well he might have united all but a few outliers in the locker room which is a plus.

[Fade]

Maybe metrically in some degree (business business business), but as a viewer, absolutely not.

He came in at a time AEW was peaking, helped grow the product and make it better for a bit, and by the time of his first return, it’s like he came back with a perpetual flat tire or two, and started dragging the company with him. You take into consideration all the drama, brawl out, etc, he without a shadow of a doubt did a number on AEW.

[Treklubj]

Objectively, I would say Punk left it better than when he got there.

I can't be the only person who's first AEW PPV purchase was Punk's comeback match against Darby Allin. Tony Khan said that show had the company's highest buy rate at the time if I correctly recall. I remember being disappointed in the show, but I'm sure some of the new eyeballs liked what they saw and stuck around. At least a portion of those viewers probably started ordering the PPVs.

If they don't lose those people that came for Punk and stayed even now that he's gone, that's a win.

[Xxcjb01xX [PIECE OF: SH-]]

Sept 16, 2023 15:12:17 GMT -5 Treklubj said:

Objectively, I would say Punk left it better than when he got there.

I can't be the only person who's first AEW PPV purchase was Punk's comeback match against Darby Allin. Tony Khan said that show had the company's highest buy rate at the time if I correctly recall. I remember being disappointed in the show, but I'm sure some of the new eyeballs liked what they saw and stuck around. At least a portion of those viewers probably started ordering the PPVs.

If they don't lose those people that came for Punk and stayed even now that he's gone, that's a win.

They haven't, if we're going by Punk's return to now, Dynamite's viewership hasn't changed, and Collision's viewership also looks the same since the show when they announced he was let go. Obviously it'll be a thing to monitor but really by the end, it didn't really feel like people were there in droves just to see Punk.

[Mozenrath]

I think the answer is that he pumped some buy rates, but that it wasn't this hugely transformative event that'd make his bullshit worth it in the end. I won't act like he was/is a nobody, but while he'd bring up ratings in the short terms or boost certain buy rates, he didn't really show himself to be like some Michael Jordan-type that made everything gold with his touch. He's a star, but he wasn't heads and shoulders above the rest in the way he thinks he is.