you tell me

The investigation into what happened after the All Out press conference on 9/4
in Chicago was completed last week and ended with Chris Guy (Ace Steel) being
let go, the company working on a buy-out of C.M. Punk’s contract with AEW and
with the imminent return of the Young Bucks & Kenny Omega to in-ring activities.

The Bucks, Omega and Don Callis were all brought to the 10/26 Dynamite tapings
in Norfolk, VA. They were at the show but none appeared on television. Early in
the show, a video package aired showing a clip of the midnight Japanese time on
the night of December 31, 2018, when The Bucks & Adam Page released the BTE
episode announcing the birth of AEW, the first public disclosure the company was
being formed, the first press conference in Jacksonville from a week later, as
well as clips of the Bucks & Omega’s title wins. A quick clip would air followed
by graphics where they would then disappear, basically telling the story they
were the ones there from the start and had disappeared. The announcers never
spoke about it or acknowledged it. A logical return would be at Full Gear on
11/19 in Newark, NJ, in a match against trios champions Penta & Fenix & Pac
since the Bucks & Omega had just won the tournament to become the first
champions when they were suspended. There has been nothing said or hinted to me
that would be the time or place or match. But it does seem to make the most
sense as a first match back.

In Norfolk on 10/26, it was noted that several of the top people were saying
that Punk would not be back. A few names were mentioned with Chris Jericho being
the name mentioned most but that many if not most of the key top names were
saying that they wouldn’t work with him.

One top star noted, “Punk won’t be back. His value on screen isn’t one percent
worth the hassle and black cloud he causes backstage.”

Another top star noted the team has decided he’s out and regardless of some
being willing to work with him, the collective decided that he was voted off the
island.

Concurrent with it getting out that the Bucks & Omega were returning, Nick
Hausman of Wrestling Inc., reported a story from Punk’s side which included a
story, that was immediately heavily denied by multiple people who were there,
that the door of the dressing room Punk was in with MJF, Lucy Guy (the wife of
Chris Guy/Ace Steel) was kicked open, and that it hit Punk’s dog Larry in the
mouth, loosened some of his teeth and then the dog at a subsequent planned vet
appointment needed to have those teeth removed.

The obvious problem with that story is that if that came up in the
investigation, there is no way the Bucks & Omega would have been brought back.
In addition, there is no way that story wouldn’t have surfaced in nearly eight
weeks since the incident happened.

The reality is that based on usual wrestling, sports and entertainment
standards, the person deemed the bigger star, in this case Punk, would have the
advantage in an inconclusive investigation as to how it would be sorted out. Now
there is a difference in the sense that almost the entire locker room and in
particular the other biggest stars had sided with the Bucks & Omega over Punk.
But the outside investigation did clear the Bucks & Omega, Steel was fired and
Punk is also at this point not coming back.

Hausman was sitting right in front of me and was the reporter who Punk
immediately went after at the start of the scrum for feeling he was friends with
Scott Colton (Colt Cabana) and then going off on Colton. Hausman did at one
point have a relationship or friendship with Colton but that was no longer the
case for some time. Later, when Punk found out he was mistaken, he did
personally apologize to Hausman.

Hausman wrote that a source close to Punk said that AEW had not reached out to
Punk since the incident, where Punk went off at the scrum on Adam Page, and The
Young Bucks, although never mentioned The Young Bucks by name but talked about
the EVP’s who he said couldn’t even run a Target store. The Bucks &
AEW/Jacksonville Jaguars head of legal Megha Parekh went to Punk’s dressing room
while Tony Khan was still at the press conference. There were various versions
of the story claiming that the Bucks kicked the door down (which obviously
didn’t happen) and they entered aggressively. Punk punched Matt Jackson and a
fight broke out which included Steel hitting Nick Jackson hard in the face with
a chair and biting the left forearm of Omega deep enough that the bite marks
were still visible on his arms in photos of Omega from Japan well after the
incident had taken place.

From the start, lawyers were immediately involved and all parties were told not
to talk. We did, throughout, get multiple reports from Punk’s side of basically
his feelings, that he felt threatened and believed a fight was going to break
out, and that Steel’s reactions was because his wife, Lucy, was there with
Punk’s dog and had a broken foot and with the fight going on felt she was in
danger because she didn’t have the mobility to get away. Most recently came the
confirmation that Steel was fired on 10/17 and that AEW was negotiating a
buy-out of the remainder of Punk’s contract, which at that point had not been
completed because the two sides were not in agreement of the terms of a
non-compete clause, essentially a time frame where he would not be able to go to
WWE. Punk tore his triceps early in the match on 9/4 with Jon Moxley when he did
a tope. There was a claim made from his side that the injury, which resulted in
surgery a few days later, was worsened in the fight.

To this day, every person, either involved or there, but one, Lucy Guy, was not
allowed to talk publicly. Lucy Guy has not talked publicly, but of all the
people who saw what happened, she is the only one who can publicly at this point
giver her version of the story. Several others have said they hoped at some
point to be able to give their sides of the story, but now with the
investigation completed, none are allowed to publicly or privately talk about
anything related to the incident.

Hausman wrote that from the perspective of Punk's camp, the press conference
comments on Cabana, Page and The Young Bucks “didn't seem like a big deal, and
only escalated once Punk's locker room door was `kicked in’ and accidentally hit
Punk's dog, Larry, in the face. At a pre-scheduled veterinarian appointment a
few days later, Punk was informed that two of Larry's teeth had been knocked
loose and had to be removed.”

Hausman also reported that Punk felt threatened and reacted in a legal way under
Illinois' Castle Doctrine laws, which allow for the use of force in defense of a
person in their dwelling. He wrote that as of this time, there is no litigation
against Punk on behalf of anyone involved. It is true that neither the Young
Bucks nor Omega pressed charges, although lawyers from all sides were involved
in the proceedings over the period from between when the incident happened and
the investigation concluded.

Hausman noted that Lucy Guy was in the room during the incident, but has not
been interviewed as part of the internal investigation into the matter, which we
had already reported here.

He also reported that following Page’s “workers rights” line in the promo on
Dynamite prior to Double or Nothing, there was distrust on Punk's end going into
the match in Las Vegas and that Punk was concerned that the match would turn
into a real fight.

The obvious problem with that is months later, when Punk cut a promo on Page
which was not scripted, he was, if anything, either inviting a real fight on
live television, or set up calling a top babyface in the company a coward by
another top babyface for not coming out, which would be as unprofessional as
unprofessional could be. It was the reaction by people to that promo that really
led to Punk attempting at first at the press conference to turn it into a
conflict with reporters by asking for a show of hands of people who think they
are journalists prior to going off on Colton, and at first to Hausman in
particular.

Punk’s side of his impromptu interview after his return from foot surgery and
when he talked about Page with no storyline reason was along the lines of that
he believed his job was to sell tickets, PPVs and have fun and believed Page
impeded his ability to do those things. Punk said Page jeopardized the first
million dollar house in company history (the Double or Nothing show the two
headlined together), which apparently meant that Punk was not wanting to work
with Page after the comment But he did, saying Page said it based on a “baseless
rumor” that he got one of Page’s friends fired who ended up not being fired and
claimed at the time Page hid in his locker room when Punk was looking for him.
The story was that he hated doing that reprisal interview, was afraid Page would
play the victim (which didn’t end up happening at all) but believed it was the
only thing certain people would understand, that he didn’t start it and that he
liked Page prior to all this. Punk also at first didn’t want to address any of
this publicly because he felt it was bad for business and didn’t want to
contribute to rumors and drama, and didn’t address it at all when it happened,
until very publicly doing it on the television show and later at the press
conference.

The story of the dog being hit with the door had not been told to anyone that we
are aware of until the story broke on 10/26, which many suggested was timed due
to the Bucks & Omega returning to television, and perhaps with the result of the
investigation being what it was, an attempt to take them down when the
investigation did not do so.

As for other updates, as of the last word we have, there had been no
communication between WWE with either Punk or Steel as of several days ago.
Legally there still couldn’t be with Punk, since he is still under contract to
AEW. There is no indication one way or the other of Paul Levesque or Nick Khan’s
feelings on this matter, as it is very tricky for obvious reasons. Punk would
return to a giant reaction and help business, particularly at first. But very
bad feelings exist and the AEW stint likely didn’t help his track record as far
as him internally would go. The Cody Rhodes reaction by the fans also tells the
story about how it would probably be very good for WWE and not so good for AEW
to have Punk on their television, and the wrestling war is still very huge as
shown by WWE’s reactions almost weekly.

Steel was said to just want to move past this, was bummed that it happened and
the online harassment of him has been gigantic, although that goes for every
person involved in the story.

“A completely made up story,” said one person close to the other side. “He’s
(Punk) losing (in the investigation results) and is desperate. There was a
multiple weeks long investigation and this was oddly not discovered? Hmm. Also,
it’s so happened to be mentioned the moment there was news about (the Bucks &
Omega) possibly coming back? It’s insane that people would even humor this,” and
noted about the entire investigation on the situation being completed and how it
turned out.

Another person there at the time said it’s very clear that the story about the
dog never happened.

Another person who was in the room seconds after the incident started who is not
affiliated with either side, although ended up negative to Punk after it all
went down, said, “The dog story is a complete lie. When the altercation was
happening Punk was a total psycho and could’ve career PF less about the dog.
Kenny picked the dog up to save him from being hurt and gave him to Megha. Megha
was holding the dog screaming at Punk to stop. Punk didn’t even register that
his `baby’ was being held by a stranger in the middle of a fight. It didn’t stop
him one bit.”

The person said they saw everything exactly as it happened and said, “They never
spoke to Lucy Guy (the only person in the room who didn’t work regularly for AEW
other than the security), cause she was a non factor. Sat in the corner the
whole time as her husband was throwing chairs, punches and biting Kenny.”

But with buy out talks and the investigation concluded, it does feel to most
that Punk is done with the promotion. The fact that Punk was the company’s
biggest drawing card and with its television rights fee negotiations around the
corner, cutting ties had to be extremely difficult and considered necessary
either because it was deemed the right thing based on what happened, or because
the feeling in the locker room was so strongly negative among much of the
talent.

Most fans of the company, who are just looking for action and storylines, likely
hoped all this could be turned into an angle like UFC would do and a lot of
wrestling companies in the past if a similar situation became public knowledge
would try to do.

If we presume Omega’s contract gets extended due to his injury time off, that
would mean all three plus perhaps MJF (who has claimed he hasn’t signed an
extension but even if he did they are going to keep that a secret until the end
since it’s also part of storyline) would be due at the end of next year and
those are the biggest deals now coming due in terms of money and stature but in
all cases not until early 2024 except possibly Omega.

As far as what happens in early 2024, there could be so many things changing in
the landscape between now and then. By that time, the new television deal will
be in place. That deal will determine a ton regarding the ability to financially
compete for the highest priced talent. Losing Punk does hurt from a fan
perspective, and a business perspective, but the argument is that the value
isn’t worth the cost, and there’s also the simple right and wrong aspect of what
happened and who shouldn’t be there because of it.

The company was doing well before, and ratings are still good now. The live
event attendance numbers are an issue to watch because they have fallen very
quickly in a short period of time. Losing Punk, Young Bucks and Omega certainly
didn’t help, but the issues in drawing right now are deeper than that, and there
is a momentum and perception issue right now that has changed. It’s not
impossible to turn that around, but it’s also far from easy to do so. But it’s a
television rights business and a better TV deal financially means more than
anything else going forward. There are plenty of new deals that can be made
between streaming rights deals for the library, international deals, the ability
to run more PPVs, the ROH situation and so many other factors. Perhaps MJF could
get super hot. We’ve also seen reconciliations with talent that promotions were
100 percent sure they would never use again and talent that swore off ever
returning.

The Punk torn triceps injury was putting him on the shelf anyway. Some saw that
as a chance for time frame to heal all the wounds. That wasn’t happening and the
dog story then heated it up again and led to some not happy talent who thought
it was over when the investigation ended. It should be noted that the dog very
well could have had his teeth removed by the vet but that doesn’t make the idea
that the door was kicked open and hit the dog true, since it was so heavily
denied and had never come up previously.

People will always take sides and those who favor Punk and don’t like the other
side will take the tact that the Young Bucks and Kenny Omega should have waited
to confront him, or that they were acting aggressively. The way the
investigation turned out will not change those feelings. Others will say that
Punk threw the first punch. Others will say Punk had a right to be mad at Page,
or however the Cabana story spread through the dressing room looking to where it
started. Others will say that even though Cabana was a minor player in AEW, he
was popular with a lot of the talent. Pulling him out of the Dark Order with no
storyline, just him disappearing, and then no longer bringing him to TV was the
catalyst of everything. If we go with the idea Khan made the call on his own,
the reality is he made it to pacify Punk, whether Punk directly asked for it,
never even mentioned it and Khan just made the call, or something in between.
But those in the company were going to see it naturally in one way, whether they
were outright told and “knew” or not. It was the natural conclusion and that’s
what started it all. That start was unfair to Punk if one believes he had
nothing at all to do with it, which Khan did state, although it was months after
Cabana was taken out of the Dark Order before he did.

You can use hindsight and come up with a number of different things that led to
all this but in the end, it happened. Every dressing room will have its issues
and most top stars will use their star power to make demands, and that always
leads to some friction. Usually it doesn’t lead to what happened here and
usually a company doesn’t part with its biggest star over that. Plus, in this
situation even if stars inherently always get more leeway and make more demands,
this also involved a fight with three EVP’s involved, two of whom were directly
insulted at the media scrum, and it was done right in front of the head of
legal.

It also involved a popular babyface and a former world champion who was ripped
on in a personal non-business matter both on a live television broadcast, that
absolutely should not have happened on television, reprisal or not. It happening
on television was unprofessional. In the media scrum, that is supposed to be
more reality based and while it probably shouldn’t have been done, I wouldn’t
call that as unprofessional, but it shouldn’t have happened there either. Acting
as though a world champion who headlined PPV shows that were very successful had
never done anything in pro wrestling was not a good look for AEW as a company,
but its top star still said it.

There is a lot of hindsight here. Quite frankly, the situation should have been
dealt with before Page’s line in the interview about workers rights happened
back in May and long before there was talk because people backstage realized
Cabana was gone, and it was a topic of conversation in the dressing room and did
lead to negativity toward Punk. Khan likely believed removing Cabana wouldn’t
even be noticed by the fans and for the most part he was right. It was not an
issue at all with fans, but it was with talent.

While Page, and the rest of the talent, had no idea about the Punk promo on him
on live television, did Punk ask Khan beforehand? Did Punk tell Khan beforehand
about what he was going to do at the scrum? We have no answers. Khan himself,
literally the day before this blew up, talked about not being negative about
people’s real-life conflicts getting out, in the case of Sammy Guevara and Eddie
Kingston and more so Punk and Page as the catalyst for the question, and did say
he left reality could be turned into storylines. But as he and everyone found
out the next day, there is a flip side of that. Perhaps when Punk was going off
in the press conference and Khan wasn’t saying anything, he was thinking that
this comes off as reality, and a big reality is that Punk, as champion, needed
opponents, and Page could easily be one of them, Kenny Omega could be one of
them, and Young Bucks & Omega vs. Punk & FTR was a natural program because of
all the offshoot matches that could come from that.

But as one longtime star noted to us, the difference between Khamzat Chimaev
routinely starting fights and UFC never disciplining him and trying to turn
those into angles and AEW is that fighters sharing the dressing rooms with each
other every week. They really don’t have to get along because they are only
fighting a couple of times a year not sharing a dressing room weekly or more.

But it’s a lesson. While studying history, the 1997 Bret Hart vs. Shawn Michaels
program, which most involved knew about, did involve very real-life issues
making a natural big match between two of the top stars even bigger. Using the
real-life issues had its major problems at the end, but historically, in its own
weird way it was the catalyst for the evil Vince McMahon and great growth for
WWE while losing Hart.

This is not going to have that same outcome.

In the end, Khan isn’t going to talk about his decision, the results of the
investigation, any lawyer involvement (and there was plenty), his personal
feelings or the whys of his decision now. Perhaps he never will. That is notable
because in the 1997 Hart-McMahon issue, both sides were hot, Hart did punch his
boss like Punk did to Matt Jackson, and both sides talked extensively about it.
While people chose sides there, almost every key aspect of both sides of the
issue was known very quickly. It is the opposite here.

The irony is that AEW is starting filming of a reality show, and this real-life
could have even been used to build that as well, using that as a key storyline
for a first season. But with the legal aspects and the feelings of those
involved, that wasn’t going to happen either.

Punk was not going to be, by himself, the goose that laid the golden eggs for
AEW (a Bobby Heenan reference to The Crusher who drew for two decades in the
AWA, until, as Heenan would joke, a new goose, Hulk Hogan, came and laid bigger
golden eggs). AEW was the No. 2 promotion and had taken great strides from the
start, the greatest after Punk signed, along with Bryan Danielson and Adam Cole.
Then injuries took out all three. Ratings did weaken from the giant numbers in
that first month after those additions were made, but they were inevitably going
to. The big PPV number was unlikely to be replicated. Punk’s giant merch numbers
from his return weren’t going to sustain at that level. It was impossible that
they would.

Danielson and Punk were back, and then Omega came back, and things did not jump
back up immediately, but for Punk and Omega, they barely got their feet wet. The
hope was to revive Punk vs. MJF, and have the classic promo battles, plus all
the great undercard action. I don’t think things would have been back to
September 2021 no matter what, but they also didn’t have to be at that level to
thrive as a company going forward.

In the end, there are hopefully a lot of lessons learned although this was also
a very unique set of situations that blew up badly. In the book of AEW history,
this was a very important chapter. But in telling that story, the key stuff is
known, but there are a lot of blank pages as to what really happened. But there
are many important chapters yet to be written.