CM Punk Looks Back On Initial WWE Main Roster Call-Up From OVW

Being a Paul Heyman guy sounds great on paper, but for many wrestlers being associated with him was a hindrance. Much depended on Heyman's standing with the WWE at the time, and for CM Punk, their association began when he was in the doghouse. On "The Rich Eisen Show," Punk detailed his early days in Ohio Valley Wrestling (OVW) and how Heyman eventually became his main cheerleader.

"I always kinda operated under the idea that this is fleeting [and] I'm gonna get released," Punk said. "'Cause I don't got any allies. I don't have any friends. And then I got down to OVW, and boom, they put Paul Heyman there. So I'm just like, okay ... And I dedicated myself to learning as much as I can in that window that I thought I had until I got fired."

Punk said that under the guidance of Heyman and OVW head Danny Davis, he learned the ins and outs of running a weekly TV show, from planning to timing to editing.

"I just tried to learn as much as I could," Punk said. "But I learned very fast, [Heyman's] down here because other people don't like him either. And so me becoming a Paul Heyman guy was more of a scarlet letter on me than anything else. It was just like, 'We don't like Punk. Oh, Heyman likes him? Now we hate him.'"

Punk added that his 2006 call-up gave him doubts over how he'd break through, given the landscape of WWE at the time was a "murderer's row" of would-be Hall of Famers. Currently on a hiatus after his win at Bad Blood, Punk is expected to miss WWE's next Saudi Arabia show, Crown Jewel, and it's unclear if he will miss Survivor Series as well.