A few days late but June 27th marked the 10 year anniversary of CM Punk's infamous pipebomb promo.

While it doesn't hit as hard for me nowadays, back then this promo made WWE television must-see. I thought we were in for the start of a new era where guys were given less scripted promos and would have more heated rivalries where you had to bring your A game to make it onto the show. I thought Punk raised the bar and everyone else would have to meet it.

Then Punk returned in the build-up to SummerSlam 2011 and lost the title after Kevin Nash of all people interfered and allowed Alberto Del Rio to cash in his Money in the Bank briefcase.

I wouldn't say it was a total waste because we did get CM Punk vs. Daniel Bryan and CM Punk vs. Brock Lesnar on PPV. It also made a new star when the WWE were dying for some star power. At the time they had John Cena and to a lesser extent Randy Orton. Outside of that they were struggling big time.

The shame is that it didn't really change anything. You get the sense that the WWE still did their own thing, they just changed a few pieces around. Alberto Del Rio still got his title run, Kane still returned with the mask and Wrestlemania still happened exactly as it was mapped out from the start of 2011. It also resulted in weird changes like Kevin Nash/HHH in a Ladder match as well as John Lauranaitis main eventing a PPV.

However I think it turned some people onto independant wrestling and in turn got the brass in the WWE to pay more attention.

The lesson from that promo is that while it had 'shoot' elements, it still sold a match. Punk wasn't trying to take away from the magic, he was using real life grievances to explain this situation and why you had to order the PPV to watch this match. It's something Russo never understood when he took over WCW in 1999/2000.

What did you guys make of it all? Has this segment become overrated over time?

I don't think its become overrated at all , on it's own it's a great promo that resulted in at least one of the best and most captivating/hottest angles in recent WWE history. That's ultimately all you can really ask for from a singular promo like that.

The WWE undoubtedly dropped the ball with it but that's what they do. In the moment it accomplished what very few angles or promo's could come close to doing at the moment and that is a feat in itself.

Certainly can't blame the state of the WWE today not changing because of it , that would be like blaming The New Generation on The War to Settle the Score.

It still holds up, but in the grand scheme of things it feels like it really didn't matter much. It really felt at the time like something big was going down and we were witnessing history and then like all major things... they just couldn't let it simmer enough. Or outright unwilling to do it justice with whatever happened next. It's a promo I still listen to occasionally.

How many promo's or angles for that matter have ever really brought in full company change? I don't even know if you could point to the Ausin 3:16 promo - maybe the Vince "attitude" promo but he clearly had already decided the direction at that point.

Like all things WWF/E post 1999, a great moment that could have altered things for the better almost instantly undermined in favor of something the audience wanted less.

Also should be noted that it wasn’t even originally a WWE idea - they brought it to scale but the groundwork was there and made a ton of sense. It’s not like it was original idea that they had to flesh out.

Jun 30, 2021 22:04:56 GMT UT said:

How many promo's or angles for that matter have ever really brought in full company change? I don't even know if you could point to the Ausin 3:16 promo - maybe the Vince "attitude" promo but he clearly had already decided the direction at that point.

My initial thought to this was Bret screwed Bret was a turning point promo… but honestly I’m not even sure it was an angle idea for Vince.

I wasn’t around wrestling at all for CM Punk but I heard about the promo in general so eight or nine years later when I got WWE network on a whim and went back and watched it I was underwhelmed, but I can see pet of that being I had no expectations for what it would change because I’d seen the future of where wrestling was going…

Other than that the only promo I can think of is Scott Hall saying You Know Who I Am, but you don’t know why I’m here…

The cool thing about the CM Punk promo is we used to have some LIT RAW parties on PW and the atmosphere in the chat was insane with excitement. Everyone was cumming their pants.

The pipebomb should have ushered in a new era. Like Hulk Hogan lunched Hulkamania when he won the WWF title. Like when Vince introduced the attitude era. Instead, talent is neutered by bland 1 note presentation & writing.

It'll be talked about forever and deservedly so. We might never see anything like it on WWE television again.

CM Punk should have been given a 3-6 month vacation to heal up and they should have just ran with the whole Cena being a fake champion thing. He defends the title at first because he's loyal to the company and the fans and is a fighter unlike that coward who took the title and ran. But the crowd keeps reminding him he isn't the champ and even though he's right, CM Punk won't bite and face him. Cena eventually admits he can't call himself the champ until he beats CM Punk. When he acknowledges it, boom. Punk returns.

But hey, even though we got a pile of dogshit after the fact, the promo itself was incredible.

In hindsight, WWE had a fantastic run from 2011-2014 partly off the back of this promo. Ie; Summer of Punk, Yes Movement, AJ Lee, The Shield rise.

While you can't give it credit for completely changing the course of the business, it did shift focus from those final scraps of the Attitude and Ruthless Aggression eras to the independents ideals as mentioned above.

If anything, I've wondered if Triple H took some of these promos personally and it was the reason for NXT's shift to becoming an indie-centric product.

There hasn't been a talent like Punk since he left, WWE lacks rockstars, they lack danger, risk. They need this back.

There was certainly a lot of good that came from that era. I'd add Brock Lesnar and the return of Paul Heyman to that list as well, I'd argue it's been Paul's best run as a manager. The initial Authority stuff was great as well although extremely frustrating because they should have been doing that two years prior with Punk. Except HHH didn't want to be a heel for his feud with Taker and completely undermined Punk in the process although he was a natural villain. Instead they made Lauranaitis a character on the show, only for Cena to not only steal him, but work a main event match with him on PPV over Punk.

In real time, it really did just seem like more of the same. The forced Alberto Del Rio, Jack Swagger & Sheamus pushes, Kane coming back with a mask, Big Show constantly being repackaged as a heel or a babyface and getting PPV programs with stars and the worst decision of all - the birth of the 3 hour RAWs.

I think tons of wrestlers if they can break 4th wall can do what Punk did on the mic honestly, the problem is 95% of the guys aren't allowed to go off script this way and thus to the common fan sound rehearsed and non-organic when coming off the mic.

Don't get me wrong, I had a lot of fun during this angle but I feel it takes more skill on what Daniel Bryan did to get himself over vs what Punk did.

What was different from this stand alone promo vs these:







Vince Russo has done a shit ton of bad but he was the one who broke the next wall and allowed promos like all of these to exist. He went to untested waters at a time where breaking kayfabe was sacrilege and that you don't ever talk about the wrestling promotion to the fans and exposing it the way he did it in late WCW.  

The difference between those is that it was actually used to sell a match. A lot of shoot promos, like a lot of Russo's shoots fall on their ass because they're done for the sake of doing it and don't actually lead to anything. In fact they usually just take the fun out of it.

Punk was taking these personal frustrations and using it to sell a PPV main event which ended up becoming a full blown run.

Also just about every Talking Raw or Talking Smack features some version of the pipebomb, but the only one that has come close is honestly The Miz.