CM Punk And Kevin Owens Face Off In The Ring For The First Time Ever On WWE SmackDown
Kevin Owens and CM Punk shared the ring to kick off a commercial-free first hour of "WWE SmackDown," something that has rarely — if ever — happened before.
The show started with Joe Tessitore in the ring to invite Owens for an interview, on the basis that he felt he was getting unfair coverage compared to his Royal Rumble opponent, to which Tessitore apologized for the sentiment but affirmed that was not the case; Tessitore invited Owens to get what he needed off his chest, and Owens spoke of his anger watching Rhodes and Punk discuss a potential WrestleMania main event as if he couldn't be a factor. He said he was tired of being overlooked when he could be the WWE Champion after this weekend, before taking the "Winged Eagle" championship belt and going to storm off from the interview when he was interrupted by Punk himself.
Punk apologized for interrupting Owens, but since his name was spoken he deemed it fit to come out and address it. He recognized Owens' feeling of being overlooked, and said if he does somehow get passed "an angry" Rhodes and when he wins the Rumble it will be Punk vs. Owens at WrestleMania. Owens retorted that he liked the idea of beating Punk up in the 'Mania main event, but it would bring him more of a "warm fuzzy" feeling for Punk to never achieve his career goal, and thus hopes he doesn't win the Royal Rumble. Owens looked to leave before Punk stopped him for his own retort, saying that he had never lost five title matches at the Royal Rumble event nor had he lost to Logan Paul. He then challenged Owens to fight him in the ring, but Owens chose to walk away to close the segment.
As far as Wrestling Inc. can determine, Punk and Owens have never have never had a match or even a televised in-ring segment together, though they did interact backstage shortly after Punk returned to WWE in November 2023. Prior to that return, Punk and Owens hadn't wrestled for the same company since Punk left Ring of Honor in 2005, as he quit WWE months before Owens joined the company in 2014. The two men are famously not on friendly terms, though there doesn't seem to be any open animosity between them.