The road to WWE WrestleMania 40 has been filled with twists and turns. CM Punk, who was reportedly planned to take on World Heavyweight Champion Seth Rollins at the event, suffered a torn tricep injury during the men’s Royal Rumble and announced last week that he will miss what would have been his first WrestleMania in 11 years. The unfortunate news follows the reported absence of Brock Lesnar from the show due to his implied involvement in the Janel Grant lawsuit, on top of uncertainty over Rollins’ status after he also suffered an injury earlier in the month.
However, it now appears Punk could return to WWE programming much sooner than expected, although it won’t involve stepping inside the ring. Speaking on Fightful’s Wrestling Perspective podcast, Punk’s close friend Ace Steel claimed that WWE wants Punk to take on a commentary role but admitted he’s unsure if they’ll go that route.
“They want him on commentary, but I don’t know that they go that route since they did an injury angle to pull him out,” Steel claimed. “They did the storyline of [Drew stomping] on his arm, there’s a physicality that puts them out. I personally don’t want to see him in an on-screen roll unless it’s, in the meantime, he’s doing NXT TV or something.”
Steel continued, sharing his thoughts on why Punk should be kept away from the Raw brand, and Drew McIntyre specifically, if he were to take on such a role while recovering from his injury.
“I really don’t want to see him on the same show as Drew McIntyre because his sole focus would be going after Drew McIntyre,” Steel said. “‘I can’t fight you, well I’m going to try!’ We’ve seen people hit by cars and forktrucks and all these things. But I feel the fact that they did the injury, [now] that they put the storyline to it, a lot of people think he’s faking it, which is hilarious.”
If you use any quotes from this article, please give a h/t to Haus of Wrestling and credit Wrestling Perspective.