Punk did not want to know what Steel was going to say.
Heading into AEW All Out 2022, CM Punk was the challenger looking to become a two-time AEW World Champion as he went up against then-champion Jon Moxley.
Prior to the pay-per-view, an episode of Dynamite was shot in Hoffman Estates, Illinois and there was an in-ring segment with Punk and his longtime friend and trainer, Ace Steel. Steel hyped Punk up going into the bout and he shared details of that moment as he was doing a virtual signing with K & S WrestleFest.
Steel said he had bullet points of what he was going to touch on, but knew what he had to do to make that moment what it was. He did not run his verbiage by Punk because Punk wanted to hear it for the first time in the ring. Steel added that he did not mean to curse on television but he was caught up in the moment. He was also on the receiving end of praise from Arn Anderson because of his performance.
I had bullet points (for the segment with CM Punk on 8/31/22 AEW Dynamite). We knew where the story was. I knew what I needed to do to deliver. I didn’t run it by him ahead of time because he wanted to hear it live, and if you look at his face, he feels the emotion. So all of that was rooted in reality. All of it was rooted in reality. Just how I delivered the speech and you know, it gets dubbed the ‘Rocky 3’ speech because I’m the Mickey (Goldmill), blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But, it was rooted in reality. I was his coach, I was his trainer, I had to lay out, I had to identify myself. Chicago knows who I am, but there’s actually some ding dong like, ‘Who are you? Who are you?’ That’s fine. I’m not identifiable, I’m not an on-screen character. I wasn’t up until that point. But no, it was rooted in reality and I knew the inflection I had to have in my voice, I knew I had to deliver because this was basing that pay-per-view on this, right here. To where you have a guy like Jim Cornette talk about it. I heard a lot from a lot of people in the industry, unnamed, because those are the compliments for me, and it’s the unsolicited compliment. Like, people just saying, ‘Hell of a promo kid,’ ‘God damn, that was a great promo.’ Shaking my hand, ‘Best thing we’ve ever seen,’ stuff like that… Arn Anderson (still calls me ‘kid’).
I’m 51. Arn Anderson can call me a kid all he wants. But for him to say, ‘I felt that. That’s just great emotion.’ Like, there’s a guy who made you feel every Saturday morning or afternoon. I hear stuff like that. As far as I pull the curtain back but to hear it from those people, people that I watched growing up and they would become, dare I say, my peers at this point and it’s kind of a wild thing, you know, to hear that. But yeah, no, it was great and then I swore on national TV. Did not mean for that to happen but I was caught up in the moment… I was like, this has to hit a home run and holy sh*t.
AEW’s Kenny Omega opened up about the physical altercation involving himself, CM Punk, Ace Steel, Matthew Jackson and Nicholas Jackson at All Out 2022. To read his recount, check out POST Wrestling’s recap of his comments.
If the quote(s) in this article is used, please credit K & S WrestleFest with an H/T to POST Wrestling for the transcription.
