It’s been 16 months since former WWE World Heavyweight Champion CM Punk signed on the dotted line with the UFC, and it still looks like we could be waiting quite a while to see him inside to octagon, as he recently underwent successful back surgery to repair a bulging disc.
Punk is currently scheduled to fight the 2-0 Mickey Gall, who made his UFC debut back in February, defeating Michael Jackson via submission in the very first round. Punk and Gall faced off following the fight, and at the time, it was expected that the former WWE Champ would finally make his debut this June at UFC 199.
Then, news broke that a lingering back injury from Punk’s professional wrestling days required surgery to repair, which then changed the presumed debut date to UFC 200 on July 9. But, according to Punk, there’s only about a 10 percent chance that he’ll be fighting on July’s super-card.
The former WWE star spoke with Ariel Helwani of MMA Fighting on Monday, and he was asked about when he’ll recover and when he’ll fight. Punk didn’t want to commit to a date, but he did say that he plans on fighting twice this year, with his second fight being at UFC’s first event at Madison Square Garden in New York.
“I’ve learned from my past mistakes, and I’m not going to say a date that everyone’s going to get married to, and then I’m going to have to hear about how I’m never going to fight. I’m going to fight. It’s going to be this year. And like I said, I see the doc tomorrow, and I’m going to talk with him about all kinds of other extracurricular things I can do to probably speed this along. See if I can start doing acupuncture again, things like that. In my mind, that card at MSG (possibly in November) would be a nice second fight, but I don’t know how realistic that is, because again, I don’t want to say things that people are going to be taking to heart.”
Mickey Gall, who, as previously noted, will be Punk’s opponent whenever the ex-WWE star is ready to fight, did an interview with The Fan Garage , and he admitted that Punk may be a tough guy, but he also said that he’s “not a legit UFC talent.”
There’s really only one way to find out if the former WWE star is a legit UFC talent, and that’s to see him fight inside the octagon. The surgery that Punk underwent was minor and he said while speaking with Helwani that he was told he’d be fully recovered in four to six weeks.
Originally, Punk said that he wanted to not have the surgery so he could fight Mickey Gall as soon as possible. But, the UFC brass, Dana White and Lorenzo Fertitta, told him that he needs to get the surgery that he needs, so he can be 100 percent healthy for his UFC debut.
There’s been some talk of Mickey Gall fighting one more time before Punk is ready. So far, there hasn’t been any official word on whether or not that’ll happen. But given the fact that Gall finished his last opponent relatively quickly and suffered no damage, he’s probably ready to fight whenever the UFC is ready to have him fight. But, it’s likely that he’ll hold out as long as he has to, because he doesn’t want to lose out on a big money opportunity.
[Featured image via Esther Lin / MMA Fighting ]
