CM Punk Reveals Why He Teased Five Knuckle Shuffle At AEW Full Gear
During the AEW Full Gear Post Show Media Scrum, CM Punk spoke about his match with Eddie Kingston and teasing a five knuckle shuffle during the match. Punk performed Cena's signature running shoulder blocks followed by a side slam, and then teased doing the five knuckle shuffle but didn't end up going through with it.
The Best in the World spoke about teasing the move, doing a tribute to Eddie Guerrero on the day he passed away 16-years ago, and why he truly enjoys to "f*** with people".
"I have one boss when I'm in the ring, and I often like to say I have no boss when I'm in the ring but the truth is it's the people," Punk said. "I listen to them and sometimes I go with the flow and let them take me places, and sometimes, regardless of the seven-year gap, I've been doing this for a minute and I know what I'm doing. To me, it's fun just to f*** with people. This is the whole juice for me, right? Getting reactions, getting different reactions, and getting to play with that, and 16 years ago today we lost Eddie Guerrero, and I just thought, I'm wrestling a dude tonight [with the same name]. How great is this going to be when I get them chanting for Eddie?
"In my head, I'm going to be thinking about Eddie so I get to play with emotions and stuff like that because I feel it too. When they're chanting for Eddie, I'll go ahead and give them the three amigos, you know what I mean? This is not what you want, are you not entertained? I never really expect to get booed or cheered. I have a pretty good idea and I think what I'm really, really excellent at is reading the room.
"Again, pulling back the curtain it's one of the reasons why a Friday ago when me and Eddie did the promo in the ring, I didn't want people to see me or him until tonight. I figured the hay was in the barn, we set the stage and I didn't want to influence them either way anymore than we already did. Let's just let the chips lay the way they are Saturday and we'll go out there and see what's what. That's what we did, hopefully everybody enjoyed it."
During their match, Punk and Kingston received mixed reactions from fans, with the crowd seemingly siding with Kingston for part of the bout. AEW President Tony Khan spoke about the fans reacting this way and compared the reaction to WrestleMania 18 between The Rock and Hulk Hogan where the crowd unexpectedly turned on The Rock in favor of Hogan.
Punk has only been in AEW for a few months now and has already mixed it up with a lot of wrestlers. The former WWE Champion spoke about what's next for him while giving a shout out to Jon Moxley.
"I look pretty far ahead but that's just me being greedy," Punk said. "Like, I want to wrestle you, you, and you. I know we're going to get to it all eventually, but sometimes I want to step my foot on the gas and go full board, but it's been pretty calculated. I wrestled everybody that had a different style, so yeah, I'm coming back and proving that I'm still that dude. I can do it all. Today wasn't a wrestling match, it was a fight. But things change.
"Shout out to Jon Moxley, he's getting better right now and when we lose a big piece of the company like that, we have to course correct and do different things. I think that's where I thrive because I'm challenged with last minute stuff and working on the fly. Everything going forward, I think everybody's going to be stoked that stuff is going to happen and plans change. I think we're beyond capable of, instead of just putting a bandaid on something, make them all think this was the plan all along."