During his recent Grilling JR podcast, Jim Ross talked about WWE’s criticism of CM Punk and here are the highlights courtesy of 411Mania.com:
On creative and the roster not thinking Punk was ready for the championship: “I never heard senior members of the roster complaining about Punk in that regard that Hayes described. I’m not calling Hayes a liar, ’cause I wasn’t there. He was embedded in all that creative writing bulls**t with those guys. Bottom line is that objectivity is sometimes a lost asset within pro wrestling. Objectivity, it becomes more personal. I just saw that, I think some of those guys looked at Punk and said, ‘Well he doesn’t look like us, he’s not WWE main event material.’ So your question is well-put and probably has a great deal of validity to it. But I say, you know, I never had a talent come to me and say anything about this in passing conversation, about Punk in a negative way ever. Only a few guys thought his body was not good.”
On Triple H thinking Punk’s ass was too big: “I remember someone saying, ‘Well, his ass is too big. His ass is too big, and it’s too soft.’ Wait a minute, where are we here? What are we doing? The crowd is telling you, this guy’s over. Our job is to put an ass every 18 inches in the stands! … [It was] Hunter. It was all about the workout s**t, man. Or how he looked in an 8×10 or whatever. He’s not gonna look the same because he’s not the same, and if all you’re gonna do is put out androids that all look alike, then what the hell do ya got? You’ve got no uniqueness. You’ve got no individuality. So that was the whole deal. I think that the consensus was, ‘This guy may not be in great shape because he looks soft.’ And I’m saying that his softness as far as his ass is concerned — his ass issue, which is a non-issue, in my view — is basically based on the fact that the perception was, he had an oversized, soft ass, silly as it sounds. It’s so absurd, it doesn’t make any sense. And I swear to God, folks, I’m not making this up. But that was the whole deal. And finally, through hell and high water, he plowed through this bulls**t and became the star that he is.”
