Do you believe Punk was happy in AEW? If so, what happened?

[Abdullah]

I think a lot of attention has gone, rightly, to the muffins and the bitings and whatnot.

But the really interesting thing to me is what happened to the guy that spent eight weeks talking about how stoked he was to be back? He talked about his depression, and his need to spend away from the ring after WWE? I cannot accept that it was fake or disingenuous or part of some master plan. I believe he meant what he said, as far as his goals of working in AEW. Some have said that he even hyped The Bucks and Hangman Page. Cabana, who hadn’t been used regularly in the weeks and months prior to Punk’s arrival, showed up here and there. Things seemed fine.

So, yeah. If you accept, as I do, that happy Punk came from a real place… then where’s the breaking point? I like the guy. I have the shirt. I enjoy his work. But this question isn’t because I want to defend him. I just want to have some discussion about how Punk’s return has crashed and burned in more or less the way the most cynical (but accurate) viewers predicted.

As for what I think? I don’t know. I think I’ve experienced and seen firsthand how the rush for intriguing headlines and clicks has led to some really poor decisions. I think, as cartoonishly villainy as Punk was at the scrum—if the tidbit that “some people think Punk was involved with Cabana’s exit” never circulated, we might not be here. And, if I’m trying to understand Punk, then I think I would be upset that people were whispering about me behind my back. He just went about it in such a way that you wonder whether he knew he was injured and decided to go through with his planned screed and exit with a bang.

Yeah, the fight is funny (and bad.)
Yeah, the scrum is funny (and also bad.)

But it’ll pass. What sticks with me is how Punk again seems to have killed his love for wrestling, and why that happened.

[Denny Zen is Cooking™]

I don't know CM Punk. All I have to base my opinion of him on is the way that he has portrayed himself publicly throughout his career. Based solely upon the public situations that he's been involved in over the last decade or so, I absolutely believe that he has pretty significant narcissistic personality traits. I'm not going to sit here and act like I'm a psychiatrist or a psychologist and try and diagnose the guy with mental health issues, but I feel like it's pretty safe to say he has an extremely high opinion of himself and is very skeptical of people who he feels are encroaching on his spotlight.

With all of that in mind, I absolutely think Punk was happy in AEW over the course of the last year. In many ways, it was all that he has ever publicly represented that he wanted in wrestling. He was the top star. The program was entirely built around him. He was receiving hero's welcomes in every arena he wrestled in. He was main eventing major PPVs. He didn't have to cut promos or play a "character" that he wasn't personally comfortable with.

But, it feels like last Sunday was the perfect storm for a meltdown for a guy who has publicly portrayed himself like CM Punk. When he firmly established himself as the top guy and the champion, he got injured. That kind of thing has to weigh heavily on a guy who appears to be wired like Punk is. All the while, he felt as if he was being slighted - both behind the scenes and on the program itself - by guys like Hangman Page, Omega, and the Bucks. Guys who he certainly would reasonably feel threatened by given that they, at least ostensibly, hold positions of actual power within the company. Couple that with him gradually losing his hero's welcomes from the audience, culminating in him receiving a decidedly mixed reaction in his hometown (and despite the entire story being that he was representing the entire City of Chicago, and the vignette before the match being designed to get him the hometown pop to end all hometown pops) and it was just a powder keg ready to blow on Sunday night. The fact that he got injured again was the match that set it all off.

Ultimately, he probably shouldn't have been put in front of a live microphone. Obviously, dude was in a really bad place on Sunday, but it feels like it likely could have been handled behind the scenes over the course of the next 6-8 months. I'm not even sure Punk was "unhappy" in AEW in the grand scheme as much as he's just a mercurial and volatile guy who was EXTREMELY unhappy in that particular moment and let it bubble over in a way that likely cannot be "fixed" now.

[SneakMan]

Obligatory disclaimer that I have no idea what Phil Brooks is like as a person:

Punk's first experience with the wrestling business was being embezzled by his brother when they ran a backyard fed together. That type of experience is bound to make somebody bitter and paranoid, and speaking from experience, bitterness and paranoia never truly go away. You can temper those feelings with positive experiences and therapy and whatnot but there's always gonna be that voice in your mind telling you that your so-called friends are really just biding their time and sharpening their knives. Then combine that with his WWE experience, where he nearly died from a staph infection, got fired on his wedding day, and had a friendship of nearly two decades broken up by a lawsuit. And so Punk's bitterness and paranoia only grew. 

So I think what happened is that Punk did truly fall back in love with wrestling when he came to AEW. But he heard rumors. And those rumors, in his mind, snowballed. "Some people think I almost drove Colt out of the company" became "The company is out to defame me" which then prompted him to try to burn the whole thing down. 

[pinja]

If Punk was coming from a bout with depression chances for him rebounding when something bad would happen were high. So he came from an injury, likely spent too much time on the internet reading and listening to people having an opinion on his personal affairs, maybe someone told him a few things in exaggerated (or not) fashion - and when he returned, his direction was a bit iffy. Real life stuf bled into the show. His big return match, he regained the title - and instantly got hurt again. That'd be some kind of breaking point for most people and Punk's manifestated in the form of that media scrum and the skirmish afterwards. I do feel for him, I think it's to complicated of a situation to write Punk off and I also think he's rightfully put through the wringer.

[Bo Rida]

Yes, until he got injured.
Being stuck inside, in pain, maybe not sleeping all screw with anyone's mind, any issues he then had would have become magnified. Then he gets injured again.

[Deleted]

I freely admit that there's a good possibility that I'm projecting my own experiences onto CM Punk, so take my opinion with a very minute grain of salt.

That being said... You have to find out that happiness comes from within, and I don't know if Phil Brooks is capable of happiness if he has to be CM Punk.

I think Punk was happy when he came back and got a hero's welcome. I think Punk was happy when he had that dog collar match with MJF. I think Punk was happy when he beat Hangman.

What Punk doesn't like is feeling like his control of a situation has been undermined or otherwise diminished. I suspect a lot of that stems from the turmoil and insanity of his upbringing, because that's a pretty common thing.

Hangman Page pushed a button that made CM Punk feel like he wasn't being presented as the conquering hero babyface that he wanted to be. That was strike 1.

Strike 2 was when Punk felt that The Elite were leaking stories about him, whether it was true or not.

The real kicker to all of this was that press conference, where I really do think that Punk vastly overplayed his hand, and then when confronted about it for real, threw a tantrum and some punches, leading us to where we are now.

The reality is that no one who is happy cuts that that many people out of their lives. No one who is happy is going to get that worked up over a stupid-ass wrestling program (and let's face it, I love wrestling, but it's stupid-ass play fighting male soap-opera bullshit). No one who is happy is that acerbic, that paranoid, that generally hateful.

So, in short, Punk is only happy if other people make him happy, because he can't do it himself.

[Dub H]

He was happy until he realized two things

1-There were people with more influence/more respected than him

2- People didnt want to kiss his ass

[comahan]

This is all reckless speculation on my behalf, but:

I do think he was happy, I think for a while everything seemed peachy, just going by his social media stuff everything up until that Hangman faceoff promo seemed like it was good. Then when Sasha/Naomi walked out and Punk tweeted about supporting co-workers, and Hangman came back with the veiled reference to Cabana, I think things fell apart.

That seemed to be the one thing that was off limits - Kingston, MJF, Mox, etc regularly tore him down in promos and made reference to pretty much everything else, but he seems really, really sensitive about anything relating to Cabana. And thats around the time that reports began to surface online that Punk was suspected to have something to do with Cabana not being on TV anymore

My speculation is that having the Cabana thing brought up and then being pointed to as the reason for him being off of TV really soured him on Hangman, who he had talked about wanting to work with a lot in previous months leading up to that. And it seems he let his imagination run wild and assumed that it was Hangman and his friends who were telling the dirtsheets that Punk had something to do with Colt being off of TV. Because he had also been full of praise for the Bucks for years, even as recently as interviews during his MJF feud. One of his most often cited dream matches in AEW was he and Danielson against the Bucks.

And, I guess, instead of handling it like an adult, he decided to go full scorched earth about it. Cause it seems he didn't actually have anything to do with Cabana being off TV, at least not directly. Maybe Tony did it himself as a means to placate Punk, but it doesnt seem he ever pushed for it. So when he was blamed for it, he lost his mind, and for some reason decided to respond in the most unprofessional way imaginable.

I think he was pretty happy with everything up until all of that happened. Then that, on top of the injury that derailed all of their summer plans, him sitting at home and stewing about it... it all blew up when he came back.

[kingoftheindies]

I thinknhe was happy up through the MJF feud because up through then THR aEW run was really just Punk doing a return tour then MJF was reliving his best hits so to speak.

But I also remember when he returned how he talked a lot about how he was a guy who inspired a bunch of the AEW wrestlers. So I think the fact that many of the wrestlers (who had gotten over in AEW before Punk) were less receptive to his suggestions he let it get to him.

I also think the fact that it became pretty accepted that Punk was messing with Colt ate at him too and Punk just isn't one to let things go or handle things privately

[Kalmia]

Going only off what he showed on TV and on his social media (because that's the only access we have to CM Punk), yes, I do believe he was at the beginning. I've mentioned in other threads about how his Instagram and Twitter were constantly full of photos with, and shout-outs to, the most random of AEW wrestlers. I loved seeing it all because it was so unexpected from Punk. He put Hangman over loads of times. I find it hard to believe that was all fake.

[Deleted]

I lean yea. There were backstage rumors of him working with younger talent, let alone he talked about the younger talent he wanted to work with, and he was able to do the Bret Hart inspired matches. He seemed like he was happy all things considered. I don’t know the guy as others had emphasized, but I think for a while he was. It really is a shame, a motivated Punk seemed like something that could really help AEW.

But the moment he complained about TK always putting him with younger talent made me also second guess how happy he was to work with the Hobbs/MJF/Hangmans of AEW. Guess it could come down too how we are defining “happy” lol

[Deleted]

He was... until he wasn't...

Not sure when the switch happened. I think it was slowly built up over time.

His body not being able to keep up. He was never a wizard in the ring in the first place.

Being incredibly thin skin being in worked shoot promo battles with MJF, Eddie, and Page.

The anti-establishment underdog gimmick doesn't really work when you're the highest-paid guy on the roster, booked incredibly strong, and are old enough to be most of the roster's dad.

He's been looking more and more miserable out there since the MJF feud. When he came back it just looked like he would rather be anywhere else.

In the main thread, there were a lot of jokes about "You don't want Punk.. You want Sheamus..." but being the same age, starting around the same time, but having two completely different career paths. Everything I said about Punk the opposite can be said about Fella. One of my favorite thing about the big red guy is that since he put on the hat and jacket. The dude looks like he's having blast out there. Even if he's losing half the time.

[Facetious]

He was until Hangman made a single comment and it ruined his life. Man sat at home for 3 months waiting for that apology.

[Mid-Carder]

Seems like the Hangman promo was a catalyst for a lot of his unhappiness. To be honest, I kind of get his frustration at a line about a situation Hangman isnt involved in. He's just gone about it in the worst possible way.

[Dan Royal]

Like others, I'm not a health professional. This is my opinion and it could be 100% wrong.

I think there's a disconnect between who CM Punk thinks he is, as opposed to who he really is.

He thinks he's an underdog anti-establishment punk. When he's really a millionaire working for a billion-dollar corporation.

He thinks he's a huge draw that's helping a struggling promotion get off the ground. When he's really a moderate draw that's sort of helping a promotion that's already doing pretty good.

So when he's not being respected and treated like he's the savior of wrestling, his brain can't process it and it causes the recent meltdown.

[jimmycon]

I was actually thinking about this earlier today. I went back and watched Punk’s promo from 3rd June when he announced his broken foot. It was really hard to square that (clearly sad but overall pretty positive) cm punk with the bitter, angry dude that came back three months later.

So I don’t think it was just Hangman’s promo, it feels like something really snapped in his mindset during the injury, to the point I started wondering if he deep down didn’t really want to come back, but felt obligated and was subconsciously looking for a way out. Who knows, I’m just guessing like all of us are really.

[Jindrak Mark]

There didn't seem to be any hints of him being unhappy until the promos with Page around April/May. I just don't get it though. Punk is a guy who spent years taking little (and major) digs at people in promos, exploiting their real-life flaws, then he seemingly gets pissy at someone else for a very mild line in a promo.

[Denny Zen is Cooking™]

Sept 9, 2022 10:46:12 GMT -5 jimmycon said:

I was actually thinking about this earlier today. I went back and watched Punk’s promo from 3rd June when he announced his broken foot. It was really hard to square that (clearly sad but overall pretty positive) cm punk with the bitter, angry dude that came back three months later.

So I don’t think it was just Hangman’s promo, it feels like something really snapped in his mindset during the injury, to the point I started wondering if he deep down didn’t really want to come back, but felt obligated and was subconsciously looking for a way out. Who knows, I’m just guessing like all of us are really.

I sincerely think Punk saw himself as a Chicago institution on the level of, like, Harry Caray and Michael Jordan and getting mixed reactions there while doing his "you're not fighting me, you're fighting CHICAGO" schtick really set him off more than anything. 

[Burst]

It really kind of feels like the injury is what flipped the switch, and definitely I could see Punk being the type to be a bit too negatively self-introspective while at home injured, particularly if he was spending way too much time browsing what people were saying about him. Still convinced that knowing he was injured again after the title match was the strike three for a meltdown.

I do agree with everyone that's said that it felt like he was genuinely having a good time prior to the injury.

[Kevin Hamilton]

I'm not sure Punk is ever happy for long stretches.