5 Forgotten WWE Debuts Of Indie Superstars

Long before he became "The Best in the World", CM Punk was just beginning his WWE journey back in 2005; preparing to make the slow transition from independent mainstay to bona fide WWE Superstar.

The first step on this journey was the April 11th edition of Sunday Night Heat, where Punk would find himself teaming with Russell Simpson to take on the mismatch duo of Simon Dean and Maven.

In a bizarre turn of events, the match itself was plagued with confusion from the commentary booth as Jonathan Coachman and Todd Grisham both seemed to be under the impression that the overall team name was "CM Punk" rather than just Phil Brooks himself.

Instead, Punk was referred to as Chad Collyer (a fellow ROH regular at the time); however, this may have simply been done as inside joke by Punk to rib his indie compatriot, which wasn’t unusual practice at the time. Either way, it makes for extremely confusing viewing today.

In hindsight, the commentary confusion is hardly surprising as Grisham and Coach veer their conversation wildly from the match at hand throughout. Despite the match lasting just three minutes, the future ESPN pundits opt to chatter about everything other than the ensuing bout like two kids with ADHD flicking through the music channels.

In the end, CM Punk (the man that is, not the team) would avoid the actual job duties, with Simpson left counting ceiling tiles after a Double Spinebuster from Dean and Maven. A far from emphatic start to what would become a spectacular career for Phil Brooks.

Punk would appear once more on Heat the following month, this time in singles competition against Val Venis, before disappearing from WWE TV for over a year. Punk would resurface with the rebirth of ECW on Sci Fi, making his awesome main roster debut against Justin Credible at the Hammerstein Ballroom on August 1st, 2006.