Eric Bischoff Believes Firing CM Punk Is A “No Win Situation”

Eric Bischoff believes that there never was going to be an overall positive outcome when AEW fired CM Punk.

Many have their opinions on the matter and how it was handled, with some believing that the announcement of Punk’s release should have waited until the following Monday and some even going as far as to say that Punk should not have been fired at all.

Speaking on the 83 Weeks podcast, the Hall of Famer believes that it was a wiser choice to let Punk go at that point as opposed to giving the Chicago fans what they wanted and then giving the former World Champion his marching orders:

“Yes, the crowd is going to react negatively, yes there are going to be people that are disappointed, they will get over it. In the long run, I think people will respect Tony more for making a firm decision than they would have had he let Punk wrestle and then fire him. That would have looked really bad. Look, it’s a no-win situation.”

Bischoff then described a hypothetical scenario of what could happen if Punk was brought back following the events that took place at All In. The former Raw General Manager believes that if the backstage AEW environment is as bad as Khan described then the company could be at risk of more accidents happening and could even face legal action:

“Let’s assume Tony would not have made the decision he made and eventually, after suspension or whatever, brought Punk back. And whether it involved Punk or not, what if there were a more serious situation that took place where there was a bodily injury backstage? That becomes, in a lawsuit, a serious topic of unsafe work environment,”

Bischoff ended his thoughts by saying that he agrees with Tony Khan’s decision:

” I think it was the only smart decision to make, honestly. Anything else would’ve been pretty sketchy and pretty risky.”

When Would Have Eric Bischoff Fired CM Punk?

It has been well-documented that this has not been the first backstage incident involving Punk to hit the headlines. When Bischoff was asked when he would have made the call, the Hall of Famer responded that it would have happened in 2022.

H/t to Wrestling Inc.