Nearly ten months after his final appearance for WWE, CM Punk finally addressed the circumstances behind his departure from the sports-entertainment organization in an explosive two-hour interview with Colt Cabana on the Art of Wrestling podcast. On Figure Four Daily on F4WOnline.com on Friday, Bryan Alvarez offered insight on the reaction around WWE to the former Superstar's controversial remarks.
Even with Punk having a number of detractors in WWE, Alvarez was told that virtually everybody in WWE who listened to the podcast "thought it was awesome."
Alvarez said, "Now if you know CM Punk, CM Punk is a guy who has his lovers—maybe that's the wrong word—he has his fans, and he has his detractors. There's a group of people in WWE who are big fans of CM Punk, and there are people in WWE who just can't stand the guy. When he left, I heard from people that were like, 'Thank God this guy has left! He drove us crazy. He was so angry.' When he did his podcast with Colt Cabana, he admitted that at the end, he was actually sorry for how many times he told people to f--k off. When it happened, I had been told from people that he was so miserable, he was such as a crabby individual, they were glad he was finally gone out of the locker room because they couldn't handle him anymore. Now with that said, the impression that I got was, even people who did not like CM Punk, even people who really thought he was a miserable guy and were not CM Punk's fans in the slightest, they were fans of a lot of the stuff that he talked about in the podcast."
He continued, "It is true, there are a lot of guys in the company who are afraid to speak out, they're afraid to say anything, they're afraid to approach management, they're afraid to ask questions, and CM Punk got a lot of that out in the podcast. And he opened a lot of people's eyes that didn't know anything about what goes on internally in WWE. So there were even people that don't like CM Punk and don't want him back in the company, who are happy that he did this podcast and said everything that he said."
Alvarez said Vince McMahon is upset with Punk, but he's not "fuming." With the WWE Network airing a live "Stone Cold" Steve Austin podcast with the WWE Chairman and CEO immediately following Raw next Monday, Alvarez was told that it is very unlikely that he will talk about the matter in-depth. If he does, the feeling is that he will offer a "corporate answer."
Paul "Triple H" Levesque was among those hit the hardest in Punk's two-hour long speech as The Straight Edge Superstar addressed his issues with the WWE executive throughout the show. During his meeting with Levesque and McMahon that led to his exit from WWE, Punk went off on Levesque for not putting him over in 2011 when he was riding high on the momentum from his infamous "pipe bomb" promo in Las Vegas, Nevada. Upon being told by McMahon that he would be wrestling Levesque in a 'main event' at WrestleMania 30, Punk recalled turning to Hunter to say, 'All due respect, I do not need to wrestle you, you need to wrestle me. I do not want to wrestle you. I seriously resent you for not putting me over three years ago when you should have. That would have been best for business but you had to f--king come in and squash it. And then I had to lose to f--king Truth and Miz. It didn't make any business sense then, it doesn't make any business sense now, and I am in a position now where I can tell you that I don't have to nor do I want to wrestle you at WrestleMania. I don't care if I was supposed to win.'"
Punk then noted, "Which I was. I didn't care. I didn't want to give him the f--king privilege. I said a lot of s--t in there. I told them again and Hunter, he was gritting his teeth and I knew... he never liked me. It's one of those situations where you always hear those stories in the dirt sheets about 'Hunter says this about Punk' and all this negative stuff but me and him in a room together? Never any good vibes. Always negative, the way he would always look sideways at me, the way he always treated me."
According to Alvarez, Levesque is furious with Punk over his remarks. He said he received a text message from a person in WWE reading 'Triple H wants to kill Punk.'"
Alvarez added that Levesque, as well his wife, Stephanie McMahon, have 'an abject hatred' for Punk. He is also considered to be on their no-call list.
WWE officials are also extremely unhappy with Cabana. Cabana, who was being courted by the organization for an announcing role as recently as last year. He is said to now be on their "s--tlist."
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WWE Issues Statement In Response To CM Punk's CommentsSource: wrestlingnewsworld.com
CM Punk stated in his tell all interview with Colt Cabana that WWE doesn’t do anything to protect the wrestlers, alleging they are only worried about protecting the company.
He detailed with numerous examples and Yahoo Sports highlighted them at this link. In response to the article, WWE issued the following statement:
“WWE takes the health and wellness of its talent very seriously and has a comprehensive Talent Wellness Program that is led by one of the most well-respected physicians in the country, Dr. Joseph Maroon.”
