AEW Star Finally Returns to TV to Challenge Chris Jericho

Colt Cabana made his long-awaited return to AEW television on this week’s Dynamite, answering Chris Jericho’s open challenge for the ROH World Championship. Cabana had not been seen on AEW programming since November 2021, with rumors spreading that CM Punk tried to have him removed from the company over personal issues between the two. It was those rumors that prompted Punk to go on a rant in the post-show media scrum after the All Out pay-per-view in September, leading to the locker room brawl between Punk, Ace Steel, Kenny Omega and the Young Bucks. 

In meantime, Cabana had appeared a number of times at Ring of Honor pay-per-views, independent shows and non-televised AEW events. Cabana came up short in winning ROH’s top prize, taking a pinfall after getting hit with a Codebreaker.

Punk went into great detail about his issues with Colt during the rant, saying — “I haven’t had anything to do with Scott Colton in almost a decade. Probably wanted nothing to do with him even longer than that. It’s f—ing unfortunate that I have to come up here and speak on this when I’m on my time and this is a f—ing business. Why I’m a grown-ass adult man and I decided not to be friends with somebody is nobody else f—ing business. But my friends, if I fall backward, will catch me/ Scott Colton, I felt, never would have. My problem was I wanted to bring a guy with me to the top that did not want to see me at the top, okay? You call it jealousy, you call it envy, whatever the f— it is. My relationship with Scott Colton ended long before I paid all of his bills.”

“Now, it’s 2022. I haven’t been friends with him since at least 2014, late 2013,” Punk later added. “And the fact that I have to sit up here, because we have irresponsible people who call themselves EVPs, and couldn’t f—ing manage a Target, and they spread lies and bulls— and put into a media that I got somebody fired when I have f— all to do with him, want nothing to do with him, do not care where he works, where he doesn’t work, where he eats, where he sleeps. And the fact that I have to get up here and do this in 2022 is f—ing embarrassing. And if y’all are at fault, f— you. If you’re not, I apologize.”