Colt Cabana: What I Knew About Punk's RAW Promo
Colt Cabana appeared on Busted Open with Doug Mortman and Dave LaGreca, which airs Mondays and Wednesdays from 2:00 to 4:00 p.m. on Sirius 92 and XM 207. Highlights from his interview are as follows:
Colt Cabana on knowing about CM Punk's promo in advance: "I knew his contract was expiring and I basically see Punk everyday when he's not on the road and he constantly told me his frustrations for what was going on, how he felt disrespected. All these things he let loose on air. And he kept on telling me about the power of a live microphone and how important it was....and a couple of weeks later he says a microphone in anyone else's hand is a microphone but in his hand it's a pipe-bomb. So for when he was ready to go, I knew it. I knew it was gonna happen.
"He kind of said, 'Hey make sure you watch tonight. It's gonna be fun.' In the first segment he was out there with Shawn Michaels and he got a couple of rips on Shawn Michaels and he was joking around in the ring and looked really loose and natural and I thought it was awesome?but then two hours later at the end of the show and I was like 'Oh, that wasn't what he was talking about! This is gonna be amazing!' and then he sat down and went to work. It was so cool and it's like you said, he's all the talk right now because of him. It was nothing nobody wrote for him, no storyline that somebody was trying to get across. It was him, people listening to his words, hearing his frustration. It's made for great television and it's made for people to watch wrestling again."
Colt Cabana on Punk speaking from the heart and no catchphrases: "We talk about it all the time when writers will come with ideas and he'll just be like 'Nope?I'll say what I want to say.' And they're like 'Oh, okay.' And obviously that's how it determines the storyline and what-not. So for years now almost on TV when Punk, as soon as he kind of got comfortable with the suits and all that stuff, he says his own words and it's really his own promos. He puts them the way he wants to do. He's a magician on that microphone. His ability to talk has always been top notch. Even the first year of shows we were doing in Milwaukee or Minnesota he's always great on the microphone.
"So for anyone to write that would be crazy?anyone except him. He's the only one possible to do that. But yeah, nobody knew it. I know for a fact it was, 'Hey I'm gonna get the microphone and just say what I want.' And he did and it was amazing. There wasn't any catch phrases, you know that's what I don't think people realize. He didn't come back and say 'La la la la la' or 'I'm Awesome' or whatever. There was no catchphrases, and nobody saying 'What?!' and nobody singing along. It was people sitting down and listening to him talk. Just like a real f'n person. And because he just spoke his mind without catch phrases it was just the way he thinks, it blew up the internet, it blew up Twitter, it blew up YouTube, it blew up Facebook and it blew up the wrestling world."
Colt Cabana on being a free agent, open to going back to WWE and hates that his WWE Legacy is "Scotty Goldman": "I have zero contract with anybody right now. I'm a free agent, I'm like an underground band, I'm a cult's wrestler if you will. I'm really on the underground and I would be more than open to talk with the WWE and really right that wrong. I almost want to go back there because I can't live with the fact that was my run in WWE. It really eats at me. Don't get me wrong I am so happy right now in my career mentally, physically, financially; everything is going great it's everything I've ever wanted.
"But that fan of the Junkyard Dog when I was eight in me still isn't happy with what Scotty Goldman was on WWE Television. So a little bit of me would be happy. If not, fine. I'm doing great with myself right now. Either way, I just want to make sure that I'm still in wrestling, that I'm still relevant, that people are checking out my web series, people are listening to my podcast and they're digging me. And right now they are. If you want to judge that, or if there needs to be a table, I have 40,000 Twitter followers or what-not, and I know that's a lot more than some of the guys from WWE. So right now Colt Cabana is pretty powerful than most of the guys on the television there at least on the undercard."
Colt Cabana on the world looking for something different in wrestling and CM Punk is that: "I thought it was stale for a bit, but now Punk is really reviving some interest in it?I think the world needs to realize it, is that CM Punk is a six-foot whatever, tattooed, the guy never showers....you know just a punk kid and he's the number one thing in wrestling right now. And it doesn't have to be 6'4" full of muscles, tribal tattoos or whatever it is, six pack, eight pack abs?I think the world is looking for something different and I think that if they realize that 'Wow here's our new leader' you know and he's nothing like there has ever been before.
"And if the world of wrestling realizes that, then I think wrestling will be okay. But until then, and this is not just WWE but everybody else is the world of wrestling, if they keep on going back to what worked 30 years ago and go backwards instead of going forward, then God save us all. But hopefully he's starting a new trend. Like he said, he's the voice of the voiceless, and hopefully he can speak loudest for the misfits in this world who are capable of a lot more than people give us credit for."