CM Punk Explains How He Turned His Injury Into A Positive
CM Punk is returning to the ring at WWE SummerSlam while looking back at how missing time due to injury helped his current storyline.
When CM Punk made his shocking WWE return at Survivor Series last November it was obviously a big deal because it was the first time he was a part of WWE since walking out of the company in nearly ten years.
Following his WWE return, Punk wrestled in two live event matches where he beat Dominik Mysterio. Meanwhile, Punk’s lone televised match after coming back was in January’s Royal Rumble. Unfortunately, Punk suffered a torn right triceps while taking a Future Shock DDT from Drew McIntyre. Punk was the runner-up in the Rumble to Cody Rhodes.
After having surgery to repair his torn right triceps, Punk worked hard to get back into the ring. He was recently cleared to return, so WWE made the match official with Punk facing McIntyre at SummerSlam on August 3rd in Cleveland. The match is taking place just over six months since Punk was injured.
While looking back on his injury, CM Punk told Sports Illustrated’s Jimmy Traina that while injuries suck, Punk said he looks at his injury as a positive.
“They all suck, yeah. You know, I’m such a curious case though because people will say, ‘Oh, he’s injured,’ and look what I have done while injured. I’m still the most interesting, talked about guy in professional wrestling. I still sell the most t-shirts. I still have the highest-rated segments, and I’m tired of pretending that I have to be humble about that.”
“People will use my being injured as some sort of a negative. I’ve just turned it into this blossoming positive. So, yeah, it bums me out when you get hurt. But when you’ve been an athlete for decades, you kind of get used to it.”
CM Punk Says Injury Allowed Him To Focus
As he continued, CM Punk said that rehabbing his injury allowed him to focus on what really matters.
“You realize, ‘Okay, you cry about it for eight minutes, have a cry with your wife about it, and go, “Ah, this really sucked because we had these plans and plans are disrupted.”‘
“But a lot of the time, the best things come from when stuff goes haywire. If you have the experience and the knowledge to actually use what you’ve been given… I can’t really complain. I just try to look at the positives of it. People will be like, ‘Well, positives of being injured?’ Yeah, it gave me something to focus on. It gave me something to really just bust my ass and not prove anybody wrong but prove myself right.”
The CM Punk-Drew McIntyre match at SummerSlam will also feature a guest referee guest referee who doesn’t like either man: Seth “Freakin” Rollins.