00:00CM Punk WWE Heat Revealed! Ricky Starks Buries AEW & Gets Punished For It! Eric Bischoff
00:07Returns To WWE! And more. I'm Luke Owen and this is the WrestleTalk News.
00:19Earlier this year, WWE fans were super excited to see Cody Rhodes finish his story and go
00:24on to WrestleMania 40 to avenge his WrestleMania 39 loss to Roman Reigns. What he didn't
00:31plan for though was Black Adam crashing at the box office, and The Rock's plans to
00:34take over all DC movies with him at the helm falling apart so he returned to wrestling
00:38instead to face Roman Reigns. We all know the story by now, Rock announced on TV that
00:43the WrestleMania 40 main event would be him vs. Roman for the title, but social media
00:47backlash and the We Want Cody movement forced WWE to pivot, turn The Rock heel and go back
00:54to their original Cody-Roman plans, and was all the better for it. And now Roman Reigns
00:59himself has opened up about these changes in an interview with Sports Illustrated, giving
01:04an analogy that only he could. He said, "'It didn't matter to me. I was the main event
01:10no matter what. I'm the guy that everyone wanted to dance with. I'm the hot chick.
01:16Everyone wanted to take me out." Roman will likely be main eventing again this coming
01:20Saturday at Survivor Series where he takes on Bloodline Wolfpack with his OG Bloodline
01:25and a returning CM Punk, who was added to the team by an also returning Paul Heyman
01:30on last Friday's Smackdown. According to Sean Ross Sapp on Fightful Select, Punk being
01:34in the WarGames match was always the plan and not a last minute decision.
01:38And we are now officially one year and one day since the huge return of CM Punk to wrestling
01:43if you ignore the other two returns to wrestling he did in his three year tenure at AEW. Punk
01:49returning to WWE was a proper Hell Has Frozen Over moment, as Punk had spent the previous
01:5510 years burying WWE at every chance he could get, especially when he was working with All
02:00Elite Wrestling. And the reaction from those in the WarGames match who reportedly did not
02:05know Punk was coming back until he walked out onto the stage has been well documented.
02:10Drew McIntyre reportedly walked out of the building, and Seth Rollins was caught on camera
02:14by a fan giving Punk the middle finger. Both of these have since been turned into storylines
02:19which was supposed to lead to Seth Rollins vs. CM Punk for the World Heavyweight Championship
02:23at WrestleMania until Punk's injury, but did lead to one of WWE's best feuds of the
02:28year between Punk and McIntyre. But there were other people in that ring, and some of
02:34them have now shared their thoughts on Punk's return.
02:37On their YouTube channel, WWE released an edition of WWE Playback which looked at the
02:42behind the scenes events of Punk's return with some roster members watching it back.
02:47During those watch-alongs, Sami Zayn sat next to Damian Priest and talked about his
02:51unresolved issues he had with Punk which dates back to their time on the independent scene.
02:56He said, "...I think there was still some weird underlying stuff with Punk and I, which
03:00you know, Punk, Punk is a, I think it's pretty well documented that he's an interesting
03:05character who's had his ups and downs with most people, both in the ring and backstage
03:10at various points if you've known him a long enough time. So I think there was just
03:14some unresolved stuff between he and I. And we haven't spoken in how many years at this
03:19time so seeing him back at first was like, huh, okay, well documented ups and downs,
03:25I'm not sure what you could be talking about there Sami."
03:27But it all appears to be water under the bridge now as Sami adds that he and Punk have cleared
03:32the air and talked about any issues they might have had. Sean Ross Sapp of Fightful Select
03:36added in a report, "...I've not heard a single issue or negative interaction that
03:41CM Punk has had since he's been backed. He's not just been a model citizen, he's
03:46been quite helpful from my understanding." Which is a stark contrast to his time in AEW
03:52where the negative interactions and not clearing the air is what led to him getting fired from
03:57the company.
03:58And speaking of stark contrast, there's an AEW star, Ricky Starks, who is saying some
04:04negative things about All Elite Wrestling, which we will have more on after a word from
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05:34Ricky Starks has not wrestled for AEW since March 2024 when he was still tagging with
05:39Big Bill and the pair lost in a tag tournament match against Top Flight. It has since been
05:43reported that Starks turned down a creative pitch that would have seen his team with Big
05:47Bill break up, leading to a feud in the summer between the two that Starks would eventually
05:51win. Starks himself has said that he has never turned down any creative pitches from
05:56All Elite Wrestling. But the fact of the matter is, he has not been on TV and is reportedly
06:01fit and healthy. And he recently made his return to the independent scene at Glory Pro
06:06in a losing effort to Cody Lane, and was also at GCW this past weekend where he cut a promo
06:12saying that he was currently frozen out from All Elite Wrestling.
06:16The whole thing had a whiff of the Jack Perry about it, who earlier this year returned to
06:20wrestling at a New Japan show and tore up his AEW contract, starting his scapegoat character
06:26that was born out of the brawl in incident with CM Punk. Perry was, of course, still
06:31working for AEW, and this was an angle to set up his return to the company and joining
06:36the Elite. However, according to Fightful Select, Starks' frozen out comments at GCW
06:42were not a work. Fightful Select are also now reporting that Starks has been pulled
06:48from all future GCW shows. However, it might not all be about Starks' comments. Fightful
06:56Select are reporting that AEW instead took issue with GCW's Effie's comments about
07:00the company and Tony Khan on a recent podcast. Effie took exception to AEW running the Hammerstein
07:06Ballroom in December, which GCW will be running in January. AEW announced that ROH's final
07:12battle will take place from the venue, ROH has a long history with the Hammerstein Ballroom,
07:16and they'll also be doing tapings of the Christmas editions of Dynamite and Collision.
07:21GCW had announced their shows two weeks earlier, which is what Effie has taken exception with.
07:27He argues in the podcast that there's no exclusivity in wrestling and the bigger company
07:31in AEW coming in could hurt the sales of the smaller independent company GCW. But what
07:38AEW reportedly took exception to wasn't Effie's comments about the Hammerstein Ballroom,
07:43but about Shad Khan, Tony's father. Effie made a joke about GCW owner Bret Lauderdale
07:49not owning a football team, then added, Bret doesn't have a dad who pays him to stay
07:54away, also claiming that AEW runs at a $40 million deficit. Fightful Select report, after
08:00that, AEW was not interested in having Ricky Starks work GCW. According to Fightful Select,
08:06Starks is free to wrestle for other independent promotions, but he can no longer take bookings
08:11from GCW. Bret Lauderdale himself said on the Game Changer Weekly,
08:15I found out about this the same time as everybody else did for the most part. I've stated
08:20this many times before and it's no secret. I don't really have a line of communication
08:24with AEW. I've never talked to Tony Khan on the phone or via text in my entire life.
08:31They don't talk to me. I'm not trying to say that in a negative context, but I guess
08:35we've never really had to talk. This report came out the same day that Fightful Select
08:40reported that Starks' contract with AEW has been extended and will now expire in the
08:46Spring or Summer of 2025. AEW had the option to extend his contract in the Spring of 2024,
08:53which they enacted, and Sean Ross Sapp writes, those that we spoke to said that prior to
08:58the option being picked up, Starks was hoping to test the open market. He adds thus far,
09:03we've not learned of any plans involving AEW and Ricky Starks.
09:08Which means this is a lot like the Rey Fenix situation, where AEW extended his contract
09:13due to his time off from injuries to prevent him and Pentagon Jr. signing with WWE. SRS
09:19added on Blue Sky that Effie's comments about AEW is what led to Starks being pulled
09:24from GCW, but what didn't help was that he also did an interview with Chris Van Vliet
09:29where he opened up about his current frustrations with All Elite Wrestling, calling his current
09:34situation a head f***. He said, I'm in my prime and it sucks when you're on such
09:39a momentum riding the wave doing work and doing stuff and then to just be at home for
09:45so long. You're kind of like, whoa, it kind of throws you off. I'm not meant to be at
09:50home. I'm not meant to be a homebody in this current phase in my life. I'm not meant
09:55to be just chilling at home and doing not the thing that I've been busting my ass
09:59to do for the past 13 years. He also addressed being caught on security camera footage coming
10:04out of Cody Rhodes' bus at this year's Royal Rumble, an image that was shared online
10:08by fans. Stark said, the next day, Sunday, I woke up and this whole thing was blowing
10:14up and I was like, what is this? I had people from my job, I had one guy who was like, were
10:20you at the Rumble last night? And I said, yeah, and what the f*** about it? He goes,
10:26saying, that's a bad look. How is it a bad look? I can't control somebody taking
10:31security footage while I'm walking to a bus. I don't control that. Tell me how that
10:35is a bad look. Stark argues that he also attended WrestleMania alongside QT, Marshall and Aaron
10:41Solo to watch Jade Cargill's match and Cody win the WWE Championship and that was not
10:45an issue. He said there was no issue at all, only because, before I went, Tony already
10:50said, hey, it's okay. So like, there was no issues. Now, if he actually didn't mean
10:56that, okay. I don't know, that's different, but there was no issue about that and I still,
11:01to this day, don't see a problem with it. You should check out the rest of the CVB interview
11:06because it's absolutely brilliant. And he also talks about that moment with Adam Copeland
11:12which goes viral every few months and said of it, I don't think Ricky Starks came out
11:16of it looking bad, it wasn't me that looked bad in that whole situation. AEW will be heading
11:21to Australia in early 2024, but, reportedly due to poor ticket sales, it has now been
11:26moved from the Suncorp Stadium, which held around 52,000 people, to the smaller Brisbane
11:33Entertainment Centre, which holds around 13,000. Someone who will probably be laughing about
11:38this a lot on his podcast very soon is Eric Bischoff, who made his return to WWE on last
11:44night's NXT via a video message to announce that he'll facilitate a face-to-face between
11:49Trick Williams and Rich Holland. Later on in the show, ex-puck Sean Waltman also announced
11:53on Twitter that he'll be on NXT next week. Bischoff hasn't been seen with WWE since
11:58he came in as a new Executive Director of Smackdown in June 2019, but was let go from
12:03the position around four months later. It was reported that Bischoff had not kept up
12:07with the WWE product, and there wasn't a lot of positive things to be said about his
12:12pitches. Bischoff himself has said that his short tenure in WWE did not work out due to
12:17him.
12:18Elsewhere on the show, Gigi Dolan returned to television after returning to an NXT house
12:21show last Friday. She helped Tatum Paxley against Fatal Attraction, which contains her
12:25former tag partner Jacey Jayne. Check out yesterday's WrestleTalk News where Oli Davis
12:29looks at WWE's Big Problem.
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