Uncle Dave, Dave Meltzer, Wrestling Observer Newsletter editor and Young Bucks mouthpiece, is saying that there are many in AEW who want to see CM Punk return.
Which can only mean one thing: the Bucks have been told by Tony Khan that Punk is coming back, and Meltzer is being used to do damage control.
You can tell this by how Meltzer, on a recent edition of Wrestling Observer Radio, is now reframing the backstage brawl at “All Out” that led to the suspensions of Punk, The Young Bucks and Kenny Omega.
“There was a lot of damage there to the brand. It wasn’t just like he yelled at The Young Bucks. It was the brand. I mean, he basically said that AEW is second-rate,” Meltzer said on the podcast, crafting a whole new story of the shoot answer that Punk gave to a question from a reporter after “All Out,” which he used as a jumping-off point to expose backstage tensions that had been simmering for months.
For the record, Punk didn’t say, or basically say, or come close to saying or hinting, that AEW is second-rate. The focus of his venom was directly on Matt and Nick Jackson, Kenny Omega and their acolyte, Adam Page, for months of shoot comments from those guys in interviews and on AEW TV aimed at kneecapping Punk.
Credit to Cody Rhodes here: he saw this backstage nonsense with the Jackson up close and personal backstage and was able to secure for himself not only a good money gig with WWE, but somehow finagled a WrestleMania main event out of the deal.
Punk, who himself could still have a WrestleMania main event in him before he’s done, was injured in his AEW world title win at “All Out,” tearing a triceps muscle in his victory over Jon Moxley that required surgery and several months of rehab.
In the intervening time, the ratings for AEW’s flagship show, “Dynamite,” have plateaued, on either side of 1 million viewers a week, with the quarter-hours featuring The Elite – the clubby nickname the Bucks and Omega have for themselves – coming in well below that.
The Elite’s defense of their six-man belts on last week’s “Dynamite” averaged 779,000 viewers, according to Wrestlenomics, down 25.7 percent from the show’s top quarter-hour last week.
This would be one good reason for many in AEW to want Punk back: to get eyeballs back on the product, not fleeing in the hundreds of thousands when the wrestling gives way to a trampoline show.
The timeline for Punk to be ready to make an in-ring return could have him coming back as early as next month, which is why, we have to presume, Meltzer, speaking for the Bucks, is talking about Punk now.
Having laid the foundation for Punk to need to apologize for saying AEW as a brand is “second-rate,” then, Meltzer tried to make clear that the ball is in Punk’s court from here.
“There’s a lot of mending of fences that need to be done, and there’s been no mending of fences at all,” Meltzer said. “Punk could be back in two months, and then there’s a decision of how that goes. That’s going to be a big story, of how that goes down or how it doesn’t go down.”
Uh, huh.
This is what the Jacksons want to be the case, that they can pressure Khan into forcing Punk into a public apology, or at the least, using the lack of an apology ahead of a Punk return as a grievance were they to decide to leave the company, or Khan were to decide to part ways with them, when their contracts are up early next year.
Based on their lack of ratings draw, don’t expect whoever the new owner of WWE is next year to blow up the Bucks’ phones once they hit the free-agent market, which is almost a guarantee at this point.
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