Judgment Day Star Reveals WWE Didn’t Tell Him About CM Punk’s Survivor Series Return Till the Last Minute

One of the biggest returns in WWE history has to be CM Punk’s return at the 2023 Survivor Series WarGames. The return had caught fans off guard as WWE and the star hid the return very well, amidst all the rumors.

However, it was not just fans, the stars performing at the event were pretty oblivious too. A member of The Judgment Day stable, JD McDonagh shared when he and other stars were informed about the Second City Saint‘s return.

JD McDonagh shares when he got to know about CM Punk’s return

Talking with Alex McCarthy of Mail Sports, The Judgment Day member shared how chaotic Punk’s return was for the stars within the promotion. Upon being asked whether the stars were informed about Punk’s return at the last moment, McDonagh confirmed the fact that his return was kept a secret from everyone. He further added, “I was just looking at the crowd seeing who was reacting how hard they were reacting,” realizing he was about to become a part of history.

McDonagh then said that he was distracted by how loud the audience was cheering. “It was just background noise to me and I was like, OK, cool. I need to focus up on what’s going on here.” Further talking about his return, he said that he understands that it is business and he is okay with it. He said that it was pretty much evident from the social media numbers.

“If you look at the social media numbers from the weekend, if you look at the viewership on RAW this week, the dude makes money for the company, he draws eyes to the product.” McDonagh then said that it would be exciting to work alongside him on the same show.

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McDonagh highlighted the fact during the interview that the numbers spoke in favor of the former AEW star. Unsurprisingly, the viewership following the Survivor Series saw a huge jump in numbers thanks to Punk.

Numbers advocate for CM Punk’s return

According to WWE’s Chief Content Officer, Paul ‘Triple H‘ Levesque, CM Punk’s return turned out to be a social media phenomenon. The Best in the World was a hot topic following his return on various social media platforms. The clip of his return which was uploaded by the promotion on its Instagram account garnered a total of 29.1 million views as of December 8, 2023. Apart from that, the clip garnered a total of  40 million views across all social media accounts just 24 hours after being posted.

Apart from that, the Monday Night Raw episode following his return saw a huge jump in viewership. According to reports, the viewership numbers jumped by 29% as compared to the episode preceding Survivor Series. A total of 1.88 million viewers were tuned in to watch Punk cut a promo which he did at closing time. While his promo was bold, to say the least, it did garner some unwanted attention. Regardless of that, fans still can’t get over the fact that Punk is back. Do you think WWE did a good thing by keeping his return a huge secret?

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