It's been quite an eventful couple of weeks for the former professional wrestler known as CM Punk. After walking out on the WWE back in January, Phil Brooks had maintained radio silence on all issues both professional and personal up until the day before Thanksgiving. He then took to his close friend Colt Cabana's Art of Wrestling podcast to tell his side of the dramatic end to his tenure in Vince McMahon's organisation. He followed that up one week later with a second AoW instalment where he elaborated on many things already mentioned and added some additional dirt and gossip. This past Saturday at UFC 181, the blockbuster announcement was made that Punk has signed a multi-fight deal with the UFC, with plans to debut with his first professional fight sometime in 2015. Despite the fact that Punk is merely a white belt in jiu-jitsu with not even one amateur fight (unless you count a brief brawl with fellow pro wrestler Teddy Hart), this was still big news for fans of both MMA and WWE. CM Punk was one of the most beloved performers in all of wrestling, a controversial figure with a magnetic personality and unique charisma that will serve him well among the UFC's roster, if (and this is a monumentally huge "if") he can develop enough skills to justify his place in the company. Make no mistake: this is not Brock Lesnar. He isn't going to walk into UFC and be matched up with top competition on his way to winning a title in his first few fights. He's not a genetically unparalleled monster with freakish ability and world class pedigree. He's a 36-year old rookie with no combat sport experience whose body has taken quite the beating over the course of his nearly 15-year career. So what plans does the UFC have for the former WWE world champion, and how are they going to go about using him to get the most bang for their buck? Here's five different ideas for the best way to handle CM Punk's UFC debut.
Brad Hamilton is a writer, musician and marketer/social media manager from Atlanta, Georgia. He's an undefeated freestyle rap battle champion, spends too little time being productive and defines himself as the literary version of Brock Lesnar.
