10 Things I Hate About CM Punk
2. He Gave Up
I don't mean he gave up trying to change WWE: that was clearly a work for the purposes of the character he played in 2011, the 'voice of the voiceless'. That CM Punk character took a stand against things he didn't like about his job and about the company he worked for. Phil Brooks did what wrestlers usually do: turned his real life up to eleven and played a caricature of himself, a scowling, inked-up Don Quixote, forever tilting at corporate windmills, demanding ice cream bars he knew he'd never get.
Part of the reason I latched onto CM Punk all those years ago was his ferocious commitment to what he did. That whole iron man of the indies things wasn't just about wrestling sixty or ninety minutes with Chris Hero - it was about being the hardest working guy in wrestling, deliberately seeking that mantle, being perversely proud of being so obsessed with the business that he'd sacrifice everything else in his life to it.
It was about being old school in a time when that was old fashioned... after all, no one cared less than Phil Brooks about what other people think, but no one cared more about professional wrestling. To find that Punk simply didn't care anymore, and hadn't for a while - as a fan, that was like finding out that the Easter Bunny didn't like chocolate. It seemed implausible. Caring too much about pro wrestling was what CM Punk did.
Looking back, the signs were all there. There was that unexplained gap after WrestleMania XXIX, where he just upped and walked out of an in-ring promo after failing to break the Undertaker's streak, and didn't come back until Payback in June, two months later. In interviews, he'd started using phrases like 'not my hill to die on' when talking about backstage arguments that he just stopped having. His promos were becoming a little listless, his in-ring work suffering (although illness played a part there).
One of the most vital aspects of Punk's personality was the explosive refusal to lie down and eat sh*t when he felt he could change things. It's always disconcerting when someone you admire stops exhibiting the behaviour that made you admire them in the first place.