More Details on CM Punk’s AEW Rampage Debut

CM Punk’s All Elite Wrestling arrival on last week’s AEW Rampage brought in big ratings, sold a boatload of t-shirts and sent fans home happy with free ice cream bars. Since then a few details have emerged about the evening from various people in the company. The latest episode of Road to Dynamite gave a backstage look at Punk’s arrival as well as how the production team handled the show-opening segment.

AEW commentator Tony Schiavone also provided some details on the latest episode of his What Happened When podcast, including just how little direction Punk had for his first promo as a member of the roster. A Reddit user on the r/SquaredCircle subreddit broke down all of the biggest highlights from the episode.

“I talked to him about his promo and he said, ‘I really don’t know, I’ve been thinking about so many things to say, and I really don’t know what I’m going to say,’” Schiavone said (h/t WrestleTalk). “We just did know that the one thing he was gonna touch on was Darby to set up the pay-per-view match. From then on we had no idea what he was going to say or how he was going to say it. And, to be honest with you, he didn’t let us on. It really looked like to me he was really, really, really thinking about this hard and it had weighed on him for some time.”

Punk has since had time to reflect on the moment and declared the episode the best night of his wrestling career while on ESPN Chicago’s Kap & J. Hood earlier this week.

That might have been the greatest moment, the greatest night of my career. Just the entire night couldn’t have gone more perfect. The way we set it up as the worst kept secret, selling out the United Center on the rumor that I was going to be there, never announced, never advertised. It shows the connection to the fanbase that AEW has, that they get it, right? They want to be involved, they want to be entertained, they want to go up to shows and have a good time.

“So we didn’t feel the need to beat them over the head to get a TV rating. And don’t get me wrong, I know executives at TNT love their ratings,” he added. “But to me pro wrestling has always been about moments and getting people to feel something. It was the perfect storm, the perfect night.”

Punk continued — “The way I debuted, everybody being super positive backstage. I met so many new people, having my family with me, I could go on and on. It was the perfect night and the perfect moment for so many reasons. And I’m just talking personally. Publicly I think it’s a smashing success.”