By Jason Powell, ProWrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)
Cody spoke with TalkSport.com’s Alex McCarthy and was asked about CM Punk’s negotiations with AEW. “As far as the CM Punk negotiations go, everyone heard the famous ‘he got a text from us,'” Cody said. “Yeah, of course there were negotiations and he did ask for a great amount of money and Punk is worth a great deal of money. But you also have to – and this isn’t speaking to Punk specifically, this is speaking to recruitment and what we’ve learned in wrestling in general – a lot of people think ‘these wrestlers are running this wrestling company’.
“These wrestlers are doing everything they can to run the creative, the brand and the marketing and things, but there are some very smart and fiscally conservative people who surround us and flank us because this isn’t my money. At all. And I don’t want a situation that happened with WCW or Jim Crockett promotions where we think we’re flying so high that we can do anything. No – this is a business. And we have to turn a profit. The fact we were able to turn a profit as a company within only two years of being alive, very few other companies within wrestling – it’s real limited, you can count on one hand who’s been able to do that versus who has bled money – but in that situation the negotiations, I don’t think they ever got too serious.
“Doesn’t mean they won’t one day, but they never got entirely too serious. I think there is a good relationship there. I think I have a good relationship with Phil, I believe Tony does too and I’m not sure really when it comes to him, it’s not so much about the money. It’s about are you interested in doing this? Because the price tag becomes a lot more justifiable if you’re genuinely interested in what we’re doing at the high speed we’re doing it. And again, that’s not even specific to him, just in general, if the passion is not there, the money is not there.” Read the full interview at TalkSport.com.
Powell’s POV: As much as I would enjoy seeing Punk return to a pro wrestling ring, I can’t blame any company that doesn’t want to break the bank for him if he’s not mentally invested in the business or his in-ring work. Punk fell out of love with the pro wrestling business and only time will tell whether he’ll ever rediscover his passion. Cody covered a lot of ground in this interview. He admits that Brian Cage wasn’t his “cup of tea as a wrestler” and yet he’s been proven wrong every week. He also spoke about facing Sonny Kiss on Wednesday’s Fight For The Fallen edition of AEW Dynamite and his choice words for homophobic fans.
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