There have been numerous reports that the WWE is looking to make WrestleMania 39 huge, and news coming out around the time that Steve Austin was offered a WWE match seem more than a coincidence.
While it was great seeing Austin in action again at WrestleMania 38, this year has the potential to be even bigger and better with rumors going around that CM Punk could return to face Austin.
Will CM Punk Return to WWE to Face “Stone Cold” Steve Austin at WrestleMania 39?
Of course, this is more speculation than anything given Punk’s return to MMA commentary following reports that he and Tony Kahn were negotiating on buying out his contract.
But there’s always more to it than we think, and this may just be scratching the surface.
Plenty of obstacles ahead
It’s easy to get ahead of ourselves for a match that would be money with the promos being epic between Punk and Austin being fire, but there’s a lot of things that have to happen first.
Dave Meltzer broached this topic on Wrestling Observer as he talked about the internal resistance to bringing Punk back to the WWE and more.
“I don’t know the legalities for Punk, but I think that’s the biggest money of all the matches he could do because Punk coming back to WWE would be big. There’s the injury that Punk might be able to make it to WrestleMania with a torn triceps. Everyone’s healing is different…and then there’s the legal issue.”
There have been rumors of potential lawsuits pending following the brawl after the ALL Out Media Scrum as well as there potentially being a non-compete clause for Punk if the rumors are true.
“If you’re looking for the match that’s going to shake up the business, the Punk match is the one, but I don’t know that Punk will have a release – there’s just a lot of issues there.”
With reports of Punk catching the wrestling bug again, there’s every chance this could happen, or at least that he’d want to make it happen for one more go.
In a perfect world, it’d be easy to pull off if Punk is healthy, but there are also reportedly plenty of people inside WWE that don’t want Punk back after the trouble he caused in AEW, though Meltzer did point out if Vince McMahon were in charge he’d probably be coming back with the money involved.
“Punk’s return to WWE would be big if they could do it. There’s a big question. Do they want to do it? I know people in WWE who absolutely do not want him there, but they are not the people on the creative team. Everyone knows what happened in AEW, it’s like, ‘Do we really want that? Do we need that? No, we don’t need that. We don’t really want that.’ But at the end of the day, it’s not their decision. It’s the decision of Nick Khan and Stephanie and Paul (Triple H). Paul may just go in there and go, ‘Look what happened. We don’t need it.’ They don’t need it, and he may just do that. If it was Vince, Vince would do it, I think, with that kind of money at stake.”
What do you think? Should the WWE try to bring Punk back for a match against Austin or leave him out of the equation? Let us know in the comments below.
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