Booker T On His Opinion Of CM Punk, Recalls Working With Him On WWE Backstage

On the latest episode of the Hall of Fame podcast, Booker T talked about the narrative that he doesn’t like CM Punk based on his past comments about him, what it was like working with him on WWE Backstage. You can check out some highlights below:

On disdain for CM Punk: “’m not saying that about this guy or anything like that, but everybody has some disdain for this guy. So we had to get rid of him. And I say this once, I say it a thousand times… many people say ‘Booker T hated CM Punk.’ And that’s not the case at all. I never really hated CM Punk or anything like that. But I got to say, you could be good at what you do and if people like you, you stick around forever. You can be great at what you do and if people don’t like you, they will somehow bounce your ass up out of there. And that’s this situation right here, right now. CM Punk left a whole lot of money on the table, on the other side of the fence. And he just left a boatload of money on the table again. And people can say what they want, but we’ve seen this story before. This is the same story, almost in a nutshell. Right now, we’re speaking facts, and we don’t have no reason to hold it back. Now, I’ve easily held my tongue for the last three years. And I’ve given the benefit of the doubt. I’ve never spoken from a personal perspective. This is business right here. Everything’s on the table right now. So, like you said, let’s talk about it.”

On working with Punk at WWE Backstage: “He was easy to work with, but he was kind of standoffish. Him and me was acquaintances. And I guess we would be called that in the workplace. co-workers. And we handle business just like what you said a second ago. You don’t have to like who you’re working with to work with them. I don’t think Punk looked at me as one of his buddies or anything. I’ve never been one of the guys to call Punk on the phone. Punk and I, we’ve never broken bread or anything like that. And this is one of those deals where I understand that he understands that. And we both play our roles, and we play our roles to the best of our ability. I think on that show, what happened didn’t get in my way. I didn’t get in his way. And I think that’s the way it should always be when you’re working in the workplace because like I said, you could be working at McDonald’s and the guys that’s flipping burgers and the guys doing the fries, they can’t have beef. You order these out, man. Yeah.”

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit the Hall of Fame with an h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.