He’s Done: CM Punk Officially Announces Retirement (Just Not How You Think)

Everyone does it eventually. Wrestlers are not like most people, but they are like most athletes. As amazing as they may seem most of the time, at some point they are not going to be able to get in the ring any longer. That means something has to change, and their career is going to end in one way or another. We saw that again with a wrestler, but not in the way you might think.

According to MMA Fighting, AEW’s CM Punk has officially announced his retirement from the UFC and mixed martial arts. Punk has been removed from the USADA drug testing pool and will be moving back into his professional wrestling career. Punk fought twice in the UFC, losing via submission at UFC 203 in September 2016 and fighting to a no contest at UFC 225 in 2018. There had been nothing to suggest that Punk would be fighting again prior to his announcement.

Punk did indeed try. Check out some of his MMA work, plus his pretty awesome return to wrestling:

Cm punk 2nd Fight in UFC

EXCLUSIVE! What did CM Punk, Christian Cage & Kaz have to say after Rampage? | AEW Rampage, 8/27/21

CM Punk Has Arrived in AEW! | AEW Rampage: The First Dance, 8/20/21

Opinion: I don’t think this is the biggest surprise, as Punk’s short run in the UFC has not exactly been brought up again in the three years since his last fight. It certainly was impressive of him to at least try something like this and good for him for getting in there, despite the results. This closes a chapter for him, even if it was a chapter that had been all but finished for years now.

What do you expect from Punk? How will his AEW career go? Let us know in the comments below.

Thomas Hall has been a wrestling fan for over thirty years and has seen over 60,000 wrestling matches. He has also been a wrestling reviewer since 2009 with over 6,000 full shows covered. You can find his work at kbwrestlingreviews.com, or check out his- Amazon author page with 30 wrestling books.

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