What will CM Punk do next?

This question, asked my any but which can only be answered by one man, has been the hot topic of the professional wrestling world, with fans, pundits, and workers alike all weighing in on what “The Best in the World” will do next.

Eric Bischoff, a man who doesn't know Punk but has been very critical of his time in AEW, was one voice in that expansive chorus on his 83 Weeks podcast, and in his semi-humble opinion, shut down many of the “Second City Saint's” potential options.

“I don't know the man. Never had a syllable of conversation with him, so I have no insight into his goals and aspirations are. And I think a lot of it has to do with how much money he has in the bank. If he's sitting on a pile of cash and he's not financially motivated, or doesn't feel the need from a financial perspective to make a move, well that's a factor in a variable. Doing your own thing, promoting your own show? I mean, if you're passionate about it and you really want to do it, it's fun for you and you like that sort of thing, have at it. But it'll last once or twice. It'll be a failed experiment. It just is what it is. The cost of doing it well and promoting it well. It's such a high-risk, little-reward opportunity that unless you're doing it because it's your passion, it's probably not going to be a long-term solution. I feel a little differently,” Eric Bischoff said via 411 Mania.

“And again, I don't know Phil. I know the characters CM Punk, but I don't know the person, Phil Brooks. I just think this is just human nature. If Phil wakes up this morning — and again, this is what I don't know — and says, ‘Wow, I'm – how old is he? 40 some, 30, late 30s. He's 44 years old. He's got another 25, 30 years of kicking around this planet where he's going to want to have some bucks in the bank. So unless he's got enough money sitting in the bank right now where he doesn't have to worry about the next 25 years, at some point he's going to wake up — trust me, I do it every day. You wake up and you go, ‘Oh, man, I've got to make something happen here.' Now, it depends on how intense that pressure is on him determines a lot. But if he comes to the realization that, ‘Okay, I can't live off of the mystique that I created in WWE any longer. The thing with AEW didn't work out. There's not a lot of other places to go.' I like the idea — you know, Impact and all that. Great. They don't have two nickels to rub together compared to what Phil was making in AEW, or probably what he made in WWE. It becomes a financial issue at some point.”

So what, in Bischoff's opinion, should Punk do if he wants to keep his professional career rolling? Well, he needs to put his ego aside and actually play ball with WWE.

Eric Bischoff believes that only ego can separate CM Punk from WWE.

Continuing his conversation a little further, Eric Bischoff noted that, with WWE maybe the final viable option for CM Punk at this stage of his career, the only thing keeping the pairing from working out is whether or not the “Best in the World” is willing to buy-in to the “WWE culture.”

“If Phil were to wake up and just have a cup of coffee and realize, ‘Okay, I kind of think I f**ked up a little bit. At least it's 50% of my fault. I could have done things better.' I mean, we can all say that. Every time we wake up in the morning, we could have gone through the day before and done it better if we really thought about it, right? So if Phil wakes up and says, ‘Okay, I'm 44 years old. I've still got three or four years in my tank of being able to go out and make millions of dollars a year if I can convince people that I recognize what I did wrong, I want to correct it, and I want to make the most of the last three or four or five — whatever he's got left in the tank. At least three years for sure,'” Bischoff noted.

“I think Phil sat down with Paul Levesque and had an honest conversation. And just laid it on the table and left his ego back in Chicago. And just really had a heart-to-heart, honest conversation and was able to convince Paul that he really did want to end his career on a high note? I think that that's a possibility. I really do. We've seen it before in WWE. The culture has established — the WWE culture, whether it's Vince, I think Paul Levesque. I've known Paul forever, but I don't know him that well. I just know that he's a really smart guy and he's seen a lot. And I think that Paul would be reasonable. And again, it would all come down to Phil Brooks being able to convince Paul that he's sincere. That's the part that's going to be the most difficult part of whether or not Punk has another chapter in his story or not.”

After how his run in AEW came to an end, would CM Punk even want to join WWE? That's debatable; in the ring, Punker looked totally fine and even had some very good matches during his run, like his strap match with MJF. Whether he wants to learn lines, work matches he has no say in, or tow the new WWE/UFC company line, however, remains to be seen, as no opportunity is seemingly too good for Punk to pass up.