CM Punk's first reign on Raw, why was he such an after thought?

[seabs]

Straight off of his first Money In The Bank win the straight edge superstar seemed to be well on his way to cementing his place amongst The Raw elite as he defeated Edge to become the Worlds Champion and ensure Raw had a Major title on it's brand as HHH had been drafted over to smackdown holding the WWE strap.

[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXJrDa2qoT4[/yt]

Punk cashes in on Edge to secure his first World title reign.

Later on in the same night he would defend successfully against former WWE champion John Bradshaw Layfield, he was off to a good start as the fighting babyface Champion.

Sadly this was as far as young Punk would go and it was nothing but down hill from there. He defended against the ever popular Dave Batista at the Great American Bash, neither man showed signs of a heel turn and young Punk wasn't ready to clash with the leviathan

[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4LeTG5NPyk[/yt]

[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DypQxzsVpnI[/yt]

This was sadly the beginning of a very dull reign for Punk, he was never made to feel like a main event player.

He didn't even lose the belt, he simply forefitted after a backstage attack by Orton.

[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=On_Ak-S9ipg[/yt]

So why did they push Punk to the title only to give him such a meh reign? He got decent responses but it's like there was no plan with him during this reign, he felt secondary.

 

[Danielson]

I may be wrong, but someone was in line for a push and messed it up, so they just let punk have it for awhile. I could be wrong.

 

[Crayo]

This was mentioned on Punk's DVD I think, but I can't remember what exactly was said. CM Punk was mad due to the lack of faith WWE seemingly had in him, and it was literally a sudden decision to strip him and give it to someone new.

 

[Mustafar Reginald]

Where to begin . . . CM Punk was never initially planned to win Money In The Bank in the first place. He completely lucked into that situation due to Jeff "Fuck Up" Hardy who well, fucked up and got suspended during the build of WrestleMania XXIV, effectively removing in from the Money In The Bank match. It's pretty obvious by looking at who was booked in the match, and how Jeff was booked once returning that he was intended to be the original winner. Why they decided to give Punk the victory probably just has to relate to his popularity, not being one of the many obvious never had a chance like Benjamin or Carlito, and honestly probably not having a definitive plan like with Jericho or MVP.

Anyway, him cashing in on Edge, while a great moment, was never going to be a way to get him over or be anything other than a placeholder. The way I look at it, besides being a placeholder, it was mostly just a way to give Raw a World Championship (along with given Edge some karmic retribution), as Triple H obviously wasn't going to lose the WWE Championship to a Raw guy. So obviously, he was secondary to them, there were plenty of other stuff going on in the WWE that WWE placed higher priority than Punk and the belt.

As for him losing it by forfeit, taken from the mouth of CM Punk, he was told when he arrived for the PPV that he wasn't on the card and told that the Jericho/Michaels feud needed the title. I have no idea why they did it like that, besides it giving Jericho a pretty easy in. I figured they did it too keep him looking strong, not being able to defend due to a backstage sneak attack from Legacy, but the most that ever came out of that was the Punk/Orton feud at WrestleMania XXVII, so I really don't think that's the case. It did kind of lead into him teaming with Kofi to win the tag titles from Legacy. Which kind of says it all considering where WWE ranked Punk and why his title was booked like that.

That all said, I know I'm in the minority here, I actually kind of liked the reign (without watching the PPVs). Punk & JBL had some pretty good promos together, and with the exception of Jericho/Shawn [on most weeks], Punk's part of the show were the highlight for me. I don't even hate how it ended, it was unique, I never saw it coming, and I honestly think the Scramble match worked better because of it. The story of not knowing who was going to replace Punk and seeing Jericho winning and they way he way was personally really interesting to watch (granted, I knew Jericho was the one coming out because I watched it post-Unforgiven but it was still fun how they played it up on commentary). Then again, I was also a lot less developed in my wrestling tastes back then, less cynical, and honest to god just happy to see my guy hold my favorite Championship. I guess you can say I was blinded by bias, but I did enjoy it. While I see the problems now looking back, my thoughts on the reign will always be more positive than negative.

 

[Leo C]

Yeah, I think him being Hardy's replacement was a very important point. I suppose they just had to get his reign out of the way.