CM Punk Reveals How He Felt About His WrestleMania 29 Match With The Undertaker

Barring some sort of miraculous comeback to the company, CM Punk’s match against The Undertaker at WrestleMania 29 back in April 2013 was the last time the “Straight Edge Superstar” competed on WWE’s biggest annual show. Though Punk didn’t win, the match is regarded as one of the best on the show and the last standout Undertaker match at WrestleMania before he dropped the undefeated streak to Brock Lesnar one year later.

There’s been a lot of speculation over the years that one of Punk’s greatest frustrations with WWE Creative was that he never got to be in the main event of WrestleMania. By this point in his career he was fresh off his 434-day reign as WWE Champion but despite support from the crowd (and a stellar match with John Cena on an episode of Raw) he was kept out of the WWE Championship match between Cena and then-champ Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.

Punk cleared the air about his feelings towards his match with “The Phenom” and his spot on the card during his Starrcast III panel on Saturday.

“The WrestleMania main event, I look back at it now, it was like a mechanism in my head,” Punk said. “Like, it doesn’t f—ing exist. To me, that last WrestleMania I worked, it was evident that I was never going to get that last match. And at that point I didn’t care, I just wanted to be paid the most. And that to some people was even ridiculous. But given the top of the card and where I was, I was like, ‘No, pay me. Give me what I want or pay me’ And that’s kind of where I was. So now I look at it like, ‘I should’ve just been asking for more money the whole time.’

Punk says there was no truth to the rumor that Punk was mad he was wrestling Undertaker. Rather, he was upset that he was never portrayed as a legitimate threat to his undefeated streak on television.

“I don’t remember being mad that I was wrestling The Undertaker at WrestleMania, because I think if you look at it, the whole streak thing was like a big thing,” he said. “I think I was probably mad about the way it was presented. I was just like, if I’m involved [I want it] to be the best it possibly can be. And if you’re just another guy wrestling The Undertaker at WrestleMania, it feels like that’s exactly what you are. Like, ‘Oh, The Undertaker needs to beat somebody at WrestleMania. Here you are!’

“I had ideas to actually build it up and make it look like a threat,” Punk continued. “And I never felt I was. I was disappointed in that but I was never mad I was wrestling The Undertaker. I thought it was a good match.”

Punk gave a little fun fact about the feud between the two elsewhere in the interview. During the build to the match Punk continuously mocked Undertaker for the real-life death of Paul Bearer, going so far at one point to pour ashes from Undertaker’s urn onto “The Deadman” and himself. According to Punk, those “ashes” were actually cat litter.