On Busted Open Radio, Mark Henry was asked if CM Punk should be brought back to AEW. Henry said the following:
“If I was in charge, I would bring him back and I would bring him back with him saying to the wrestling world, not an apology, but just state the facts. ‘Grown men will disagree and things will be said that probably shouldn’t have been said and I regret airing my dirty laundry in front of the world. It won’t happen again. Do we agree on everything? No. Can we work together and exist and have a business relationship? Yes. I will not let my personal feelings, my personal gripes, and concerns interfere with business again, because ultimately, the important thing is business and I am the business and business is good. AEW is better with me around.’”
Henry was asked if the locker room is better with CM Punk around:
“I think that AEW is pro AEW. CM Punk was an outsider just like I am. Like, I’m not an original AEW and when the shit hits the fan, you’re gonna go with the people that you’ve locked arms with in the beginning. That’s just the way it is. I’m talking about the core as well as everybody that was at AEW in its beginning. All of the people that worked their way, you look at The Dark Order and every facet of AEW in the office. They were a tight knit group. It’s great to be brought in, but ultimately, we still are the second cousins. I feel like CM Punk would have to come in and kind of acquiesce to that. So you know what? I know who I am. I know what I am and I’m gonna play my lane. But I’m here to make the business better. I’m here to make AEW better and I think that I can do that. My personal thoughts and complaints, I’ll keep to myself.”
Henry said the guys who were suspended because of the media scrum that were brought back already apologized to the locker room.
Henry talking about why Punk should be brought back:
“When they were going through the NXT-AEW wars, those were the people that were foundationally that company. I can see them siding with the top guys in there. They look at it as those are our guys. Everybody else that came in is great acquisitions to help the business go forward, but like you said, Jade Cargill, Will Hobbs, and FTR and certain people were like, ‘Man, I don’t give a sh*t what Punk did. I think he’s good for business. He helped me. He mentored me It’s good for business, but as you said, there are people that weren’t raised in a regime in the way that we were raised. So they’re going to have a clicky, our guy mentality, rather than listen, ‘What does Tony want? What’s good for business? What’s going to make dollars? What’s going to put asses in seats?’ That’s the ultimate thing.”
If you use any portion of the quotes from this article please credit Busted Open Radio with a h/t to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription. Busted Open Radio can be heard on SiriusXM’s Fight Nation (Channel 156), Monday through Saturday from 9 am to Noon eastern.
