Finn Balor Buries “Horror Stories” About CM Punk in Emotional Callback to Their Feud

Finn Balor has credited CM Punk for the most memorable night of his wrestling career.

Finn Balor Buries “Horror Stories” About CM Punk in Emotional Callback to Their Feud

Finn Bálor and CM Punk on Raw [via- WWE]

Finn Balor returned to his home country of Ireland earlier this year. Even though he unsuccessfully challenged CM Punk for the World Heavyweight Title on Raw in Belfast, he later acknowledged while speaking to the crowd in an off-air moment that it was the most memorable night of his career thus far.

‘The Prince’ looked back on it during his latest sit-down interview with Chris Van Vliet. Balor revealed that he had never really met Punk other than the two of them being at Samoa Joe‘s wedding circa 2002. When Balor joined WWE in mid-2014, Punk was no longer there.

The Irishman was not immune to all the “horror stories” about the ‘Second City Saint’ being big-headed and difficult to work with. However, Balor thought that Punk couldn’t have been any nicer than he was since returning to WWE in 2023. The former Judgment Day member deemed the Chicago-born wrestler polite, humble, and keen to work with people.

Finn Balor even went on to say that he was pretty sure it was Punk only who went to the office and made their Belfast match happen. The inaugural Universal Champion didn’t think it was the other way around. And once Balor dove into that aforementioned clash with Punk in Belfast, he couldn’t help but get emotional.

It meant the world to him that he had his family nestled in the front row. Balor recalled getting slightly anxious at first upon being called out by Punk to the ring after their match. ‘The Irish Captor’ was out of sorts as to what he was going to speak and admitted that he doesn’t like talking in general, let alone cutting promos.

However, in hindsight, the former Bullet Club leader would forever be grateful that Punk made him come out after the show went off air. Balor got to thank the fans, and he sang along with them for his mother’s belated birthday. Finn Balor shed happy tears once again while remembering all that with Van Vliet saying those were one-of-a-kind moments.

Balor concurred and talked about running it back with Punk a couple of weeks later in his hometown of Chicago at the Elimination Chamber. ‘The Prince’ genuinely believed that night meant as much to Punk as it did to Balor in Belfast.

While the latter couldn’t capture the world title from Punk on either occasion, that brief feud with the ‘Best in the World’ paved the way for him reverting back to being a babyface, something that the fans had been wanting for a long time.

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Finn Balor sustained a rib injury right before this year’s WrestleMania

Shortly after getting done with the CM Punk feud, Finn Balor got stabbed in the back by Dominik Mysterio and the rest of the Judgment Day. The genesis of it was Punk telling Balor during their feud that the Irishman needed to ditch the Judgment Day to get back to winning ways. Balor eventually getting kicked out of the faction led to him taking on Mysterio at WrestleMania.

Finn Balor
Finn Balor [via- WrestlingInc]

The 44-year-old brought back his ‘Demon’ persona for the match, which was turned into a Street Fight the day of the show. There was a pretty specific reason for that. Balor revealed in the aforementioned interview with CVV that he had popped a rib three weeks before WrestleMania. It happened mid-air as he did the jump on Dominik Mysterio and JD McDonagh to the outside.

Balor had a baggier T-shirt on that night, and he hadn’t dived like that in quite some time, so he felt the need to jump a bit higher and tuck early than he usually did. As he mentioned, the thing with rub injuries is that there’s usually no rehab, and one cannot do anything to make them heal faster.

As there wasn’t much time left until WrestleMania, it was kind of touch-and-go for Finn Balor. And that’s why WWE added the stipulation to Dom vs. Finn so that the veteran wrestler could use the weapons and get through the match as opposed to dealing with a regular match that would’ve caused problems for Balor.

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