The last seven days have been a pretty busy for the sporting world. We got a Manchester derby, a huge fight for Kell Brook and a pretty memorable UFC event in Cleveland, Ohio. The highlights for this card included two huge heavyweight fights with title implications, with Stipe Miocic retaining the UFC Heavyweight title and the former champion Fabrico Werdum also picking up a win. The biggest fight of the night however, at least from a wrestling fan’s perspective, was the long awaited debut of former WWE Champion CM Punk.
Due to the circumstances of his departure from WWE more than two years ago and his popularity among wrestling fans, Punk was the talk of the town going into UFC 203 on Saturday. Making $500,000 for this fight with Mickey Gall, Punk’s training in the two years since he retired from professional wrestling led him to the Octagon. All of the hype and anticipation for this fight led to the “battle” ending in just two minutes, when CM Punk tapped out to Mickey Gall and being severely outclassed.
There’s a lot to take away from this experience for everyone involved. The UFC now know for certain at what level CM Punk can actually fight at. CM Punk, from what he said in interviews since the fight, apparently thoroughly enjoyed the experience. Finally, Mickey Gall has seen his stock in UFC rise a fair amount after beating a huge celebrity. Following statements made from CM Punk and Dana White, it seems that Punk’s big fight in Cleveland could be the only UFC fight Punk will end up having in his life. Despite this, CM Punk insisted that his MMA career is not over.
So what does this mean for CM Punk? Will he fight for Bellator? Will he change his mind on his post-fight declaration and give up on MMA? At this point, the only thing that seems certain is that Punk’s got a LONG ROAD ahead of him before succeeding at a high level in MMA. He’s nowhere near at the level of Mickey Gall, who was fighting in his third professional fight. No disrespect to Mickey Gall (or Punk for that matter) but based on MMA skill and accomplishments alone, there is NO WAY that him or Punk should be higher up the UFC card than a top bantamweight fighter like Urijah Faber.
Only the two heavyweight fighters in the main-event made more money than CM Punk for UFC 203. Even Fabrico Werdum, the former UFC Heavyweight Champion who beat Travis Browne on the card, was paid less than CM Punk. Unless the pay-per-view buy rate for the show is in another league due to the interest from wrestling fans, it’s already coming off like Punk was nowhere near as valuable as UFC had paid for him as well as the production for such projects as the Evolution of Punk documentary. UFC went the extra mile to try and promote Punk, and what they got from him in response was a two minute fight with Punk not being able to throw a single punch.
I remember playing UFC Undisputed 2009 on my XBOX 360 many years ago and right before the career mode for the game began, the game featured a speech from UFC President Dana White. In this speech, he says: “You don’t get a shot in the UFC by coming in off the streets with a karate trophy. If you go in there with just wrestling, you come out with just a concussion.”
That line tells all the MMA fighters that they will only be getting in the ULTIMATE fighting championship by fighting at an elite level. CM Punk, with all due respect, is not a fighter at an elite level. His fight with Mickey Gall proved that. Punk never even competed in a Jiu-Jitsu competition or anything like that before he signed to fight for the organisation. He’s just… there.
Say what you will about Brock Lesnar but even HE had been a top level amateur wrestler and competed in MMA in Japan prior to be signed with the UFC. That was enough justification for UFC to sign him up and the pay-per-view buys as well as Brock’s reign as UFC Heavyweight Champion proved that Brock was worth the investment by the company. Now look at Punk. He’s already been paid $500,000 for one fight and crumbled when fight time arrived. It hurts UFC in the sense that they brought in Punk to compete at the HIGHEST level of MMA in the world.
This revealed that if you’re a big enough name in sports and/or entertainment, you can find yourself fighting in pay-per-views faster than fighters that have worked their whole lives to get there. As mentioned, if it’s someone like Brock, whose performances justified his position, then that’s fine. Not to mention that Brock’s drawing power actually aided the other fighters financially, giving them little reason to complain if he brings in more money to the organisation as a whole. Punk doesn’t have that power and was clearly outclassed at UFC 203 by Mickey Gall.
I don’t want to say that it exposed UFC as a sporting organisation but it exposed what it takes to get there. There are many fighters who have incredible MMA records outside of the UFC, that don’t get to be in the third-to-last fight of a UFC pay-per-view and paid $500,000 for two minutes work. That I think is a key problem that Punk’s performance has created. When WWE puts the title on somebody like Mick Foley and Daniel Bryan, going with the angle that anyone can be a WWE superstar, that’s one thing. In that environment, anyone CAN be a WWE superstar as it is a scripted environment. We’ve seen Stephen Amell wrestle, we’ve seen Snooki wrestle and we’ve even seen Dennis Rodman wrestle at a high level for WCW. We’ve even seen David Arquette as WCW World Champion. In a scripted environment, that’s fine.
When you try to promote the idea that anyone can be a UFC fighter, by having CM Punk come in with no previous mixed martial arts training and get beat, it hurts the legitimacy of combat sport as a whole. The truth is that not everyone CAN be a UFC fighter and can fight at a top level. There’s a reason why Bobby Lashley, despite potentially being a draw that could bring in some wrestling fans, has not been snapped up by the UFC yet. Ultimate Fighting Championship is about bringing in the “ultimate” fighters from around the world. When the fans tune in, they tune in to see the stars. They tune in to see the very best fighters on the planet perform at the highest level and that’s usually what they get.
If it turns out that the pay-per-view buys puts CM Punk at the drawing power that is close to a Conor McGregor or a Ronda Rousey, that could be UFC’s saving grace. However, if it’s at the same level of your average pay-per-view, then all of this hype will have gained little reward for UFC’s promotion of the “Best In The World” in CM Punk. If anything, I can see Dana White distancing himself from celebrity fighters like Punk in the future if they fail miserably in the ring. All I can say is that if CM Punk truly believe that he can get more over than what he was in WWE, then he’ll need somewhat of a miracle if he’s no longer fighting in UFC’s Octagon.
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