Seth Rollins has explained the animosity towards CM Punk.
As Punk made his return to WWE at Survivor Series, fan footage caught an irate Rollins being held back at the ringside area. While the reaction is part of an angle and will lead to a future match between the two, it is believed that much like the Rollins feud with Matt Riddle, other real-life issues persist that have bled onscreen.
Back in January, while CM Punk was still under contract with AEW, Seth Rollins labelled Punk a cancer, making it clear that he did not want to see a WWE return anytime soon. In an interview on the Sports Illustrated podcast, Rollins explained where the animosity stems from.
The World Heavyweight Champion began by stating that Punk did start off by being helpful but has turned more selfish as time has gone on:
“A lot of it is personal. A lot of it is stuff I don’t really want to get into. For the most part, I just think he’s been really selfish when it comes to his perspective on the industry. I think he’s been extremely self-serving, has played the martyr role to a tee and has, for someone who, when I met the guy, and look, I have a lot of good things to say about parts of my relationship with him. He helped me in places when he didn’t have to, whether that was for his own good or not, I’m not entirely sure.
Regardless, it helped me get where I needed to go and do the things I needed to do. For a guy who, when I met him, made it seem like he was all about giving back to the business, he really turned into a pretty selfish guy and wanting to take more from the industry.
Continuing, The Visionary stated that Punk has said negative things about himself, his friends and people within WWE, noting that the former AEW World Champion is “a fraud”:
Look, he said some really bad things about me. Talked down about me for years, and the company, for years. I’m talking some really bad stuff. Called me a bootlicker and crap like that. You don’t know me. You don’t know what I stand for. I’m a loyal person, and I felt pretty insulted by a lot of the ways he treated me, treated the place I work for, treated friends that I worked with. I don’t need to get into any of the stuff with Colt Cabana if you want to look at that kind of stuff, that’s out there. Just the way he treated people.
The way I felt like he’s only looking out for himself, and then the way he talked about me and my friends and the people who are here putting the hard work in at WWE, trying to make this thing as good as we possibly can because we love the industry, truly love it, not just what it can do for us, we actually love it and want to give back to it and make it the best it could possibly be.
I also felt like he’s a fraud in that sense, or at least turned into one at some point in the last decade. That’s the long of it. It’s a deep-rooted, I wouldn’t call it hatred, but there’s animosity there.”
Will Seth Rollins Work With CM Punk?
Later in the podcast, Rollins was asked if he would be willing to turn down a match with Punk given the aforementioned issues. Rollins stated that while he is not forced to do anything he doesn’t want to, he knows what is best for business:
“It’s a negotiation. It’s a conversation. No one is forcing something on you, but I’m a businessman, for sure, I’m hoping to do business, if it’s there to be done. I’m open to mending fences, if that’s even possible. I know that might sound crazy, but I’m open to it. I’m almost 38, and I ain’t got time to hold all these grudges. I think it’s a lot of energy to hold that negativity in, and I’d like to put that energy somewhere else and make it positive.
I’m open to all different facets of what this could be. There are certain conversations that go on, it’s not a cut and dry, ‘you have to do this.’ Sometimes, it is. I’ve been in positions where it’s like, ‘this is your job, I pay you the check. This is what I want you to do,’ and that’s just how it is. That’s okay too. If you don’t like it, you can skip it and we don’t have to do business.
I’m pretty open-minded when it comes to stuff like that. I think there will be a way to make it work for everybody. He says he’s the Best in the World, that ain’t the case, I’m the Best in the World. I’ll make anything work, no matter who it is,”
H/t to Fightful.