The Promo by CM Punk: 2011 LDW Moment of the Year

"This is me winning my LDW Award"

I feel slightly sorry for The Rock. When he was announced as the host of Wrestlemania in February, the reaction in the arena was amazing; and even now when I watched it on You Tube this week, it still gives me goosebumps when his music hit.

If that happened in any other year, it would have won Moment of the Year. That all changed on RAW on June 27^th when CM Punk delivered one of the best (and probably honest) promos I have ever seen. It all started just over a week beforehand at Capitol Punishment when Punk was interviewed by Josh Mathews before his match with Rey Mysterio. At the end, Punk states that he defeats Mysterio, he will do the most honest thing the WWE Universe has ever seen, which made me curious. Punk defeats Mysterio, which was his first PPV win in over a year, then he becomes No. 1 contender to the WWE Championship by defeating Mysterio and Alberto Del Rio in a triple threat match. Afterwards, Punk announces that Money in the Bank is the last day of his contract and that he will be leaving with the WWE Championship. I (surprisingly) had never seen a story like this but, while WWE can be accused with not treating their titles with the respect they deserve, and I partly agree with that; I didn’t think that they would actually do that.

Punk’s promo was only just over 6 minutes long but its reaction lasted so much longer. It appealed to the crowd, who were cheering it and there was a great moment when Punk actually criticised them for it. Punk had a point because a lot of fans might be critical of the product (like Cena always being in the title picture), they still watch the show. However, for me, Punk’s promo not only made me realised what a tremendous talent that he is, but most importantly, it made me believe that he could actually walk away with the title.

While Punk can receive a lot of the credit for this, you have to give some credit to WWE for first of all, having the balls to do something like this. The WWE have done shoot promos before with Joey Styles and Paul Heyman being the most memorable ones. However, the way they done this was really good, especially when they cut Punk off and suddenly fade to black, ending the show. That helped to really blur the line between reality and fiction. It made so many people wonder if what they had seen was real or not.

The promo made mainstream media attention with ESPN radio host Jim Rome offering Punk 45 minutes in which he can continue his promo. If the WWE can do something that can have that kind of reaction, especially in the media, you know that it is a success and that is why it is the LDW Moment of the Year.