I’m pretty sure this story has made the rounds before, possibly even from the same source. That would be Kevin Nash, who told it again on the latest episode of his Kliq This podcast
, out today (Feb. 9).It’s from the oft-maligned follow-up to CM Punk winning the WWE title from John Cena at 2011’s Money in the Bank. Nash had cost Punk the title at SummerSlam, but the follow-up led to match against Triple H rather than Nash. Punk lost that, which Haitch would go on to work his own program with the former
Diesel (which The Game also won).
One version of why things happened that way that I’d heard was that Nash wasn’t cleared when they wanted to do the Punk match. That is not the WWE Hall of Famer’s version. Here’s Big Daddy Cool:
“When I was supposed to wrestle CM Punk after I cost him the belt, he said something that pissed off Paul about something with him and Stephanie. And it wasn’t on script, and it pissed Paul off, and Paul came back and basically said, ‘You’re not wrestling Punk. I am. I’m beating that motherfucker.’ He was that hot.
“Paul [Levesque, Triple H’s real name] isn’t a bitch. It was like, ‘Oh, okay, motherfucker.’ Basically, like, ‘Oh, okay, Kliq rules.’ Like, ‘You want to pull them out, measure them. Here we go. Suck on that.’
”I know how fucking much Paul cares for him now, and to bring him back and everything that happened, and Paul to entrust Phil [Brooks, aka CM Punk] with everything that he’s done, and vice versa for each other… So that’s what people don’t understand that aren’t in the business, is you can have that kind of fucking heat with somebody 10 years ago, four years ago, three years ago — but, when you got to make money and make music together, fucking how quickly that dissolves.”
Whatever your take on Nash’s explanation for why WWE changed plans from him facing Punk in September of 2011 to Trips beating Punk at Night of Champions and then beating Nash at TLC a few months later, the present day part of the story is well-documented. Since Punk’s 2023 return to WWE, he and Haitch have spoken glowing and often about one another.
You can give the entire new Kliq This a watch or listen here.
