Four Years After The Pipe Bomb

It has been about 4 years since CM Punk started that storyline that made him a legend. How are things today? CM Punk still has not returned to the WWE. Daniel Bryan, another guy that emerged as a hero against the unfair status quo the WWE upholds, has injury issues that might put an end to his career. AJ Lee, the bride of Punk, left the company. It might seem like everything is sad.

The WWE has signed more wrestlers that fans eager for change love. You got Samoa Joe popping up recently. Kevin Owens is being featured on the main roster. Seth Rollins is holding the WWE Championship. Of course, just having these guys is not enough. It is about how they are featured and how well they are getting over. Despite all this, the WWE has shown signs of wanting to develop Roman Reigns, a guy that is not a favorite of these rabid fans, as the new centerpiece. The diva division has remained inefficient. The entire product remains inefficient. Well, aside from NXT.

Aside from the WWE being eager to welcome more talent that wrestling fans love, fans seem to be more vocal. CM Punk was supposed to be the voice of the voiceless. He certainly motivated these rabid fans to be even more vocal. It isn't that they never protested anything. Fans voiced their displeasure at Matt Hardy being fired many years ago. Fans were unhappy when Mickie James got released as a part of spring cleaning the year prior to CM Punk's pipe bomb. Fans wanted Daniel Bryan back after he was fired a few months after that.

Problem is, these fans can be too demanding and sometimes unfair. I have pointed out the unwillingness of many to even give Eva Marie a chance to show whether she has genuinely improved. Some of them got unruly the night Roman Reigns won the Royal Rumble. And you can sometimes get lost in the noise they are making and start believing some wrestlers are more over than they really are or less over than they really are. A guy like Seth Rollins is great. He can one day break out like CM Punk did. But as of right now, does he really have the overness to be an A+ player?

Should the WWE regret ever having CM Punk do those promos? It didn't lead to a ratings boost. It helped to make CM Punk huge, but then he walked out on the company. They are left with rabid fans that can sometimes be too demanding. They are signing all these guys that have not really gotten too over prior to the WWE. Great wrestlers, but how well can they connect with the wider audience? They are still very inefficient with how you handle the main product. A lot of things have only gotten worse and the fact that fans are more critical of them makes it worse. If CM Punk had never energized them, things might be different right now. Better? Maybe not. But possibly a little smoother.