The following is an excerpt from a new article from the Chicago Tribune website:
CM Punk wins WWE Championship, Cutler and broken thumb visit Public House, Jenny McCarthy bartends at Cuvee
Luis Gomez
About Last Night
10:26 a.m. CST, November 21, 2011
The day after Lockport native CM Punk won the WWE Championship at the Allstate Arena in mid-July, there were photos on TMZ of Punk celebrating with the title on the streets of Chicago. Not long after that, Punk was appearing on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” and getting interviewed by ESPN’s Bill Simmons.
Unfortunately, there won’t be anywhere close to the same reaction after Punk’s WWE Championship win on Sunday at Madison Square Garden. The buzz surrounding Punk is still strong these days, but nowhere close to where it was — or where it could’ve been.
Punk had the wrestling world eating out of his tape-covered hands when he appeared to go off script June 27 during an episode of “Monday Night Raw.” He revealed that his contract in real life was expiring and vowed to leave the company and take the WWE Championship with him. And like many of us have wanted to do when quitting a job, he told off his boss (Vince McMahon) and a few co-workers (John Cena, Triple H) in the process.
It was exactly the sort of honesty fans wanted to hear during a time when WWE ratings were down and storylines were, at times, stale. It was the kind of story that, as Punk himself pointed out, put WWE back in the mainstream for something other than a wrestler’s death. As a result, the interview requests for Punk started pouring in, from GQ to Kimmel to ESPN’s Jim Rome.
Check out the complete article online at ChicagoTribune.com.
