Ricky Starks wishes he was able to step into the ring with CM Punk.
CM Punk was ready to face all challengers throughout his AEW career and worked with plenty of the newer talent when he first arrived to the company. Punk has matches with talent such as Darby Allin, Powerhouse Hobbs, MJF, and Lee Moriarty en route to his AEW Title victory.
In one promo, Punk called out Ricky Starks, and asked for HOOK to be sent, as he welcome any challenger from Team Taz, but the match never came to fruition.
"The Punk thing helped," Starks said in an interview with DAZN about Punk's callout and whether it helped his momentum. "Him saying those things about me really helped. What would have been great was to actually have a match with him. Things were kind of leading up to that, I thought; that's one of the minor things that I'm actually annoyed about is that I never actually got to have a match. It's not to stroke my own ego, but it's about iron really sharpening iron. I'm the type of person who would be able to benefit from that, in terms of excelling in my talent. At the time where Hobbs turned on me, I think we were already there [crowd reacting favorably and momentum] and it was already a rolling boiling. Things had to have happened in that sense. Otherwise, to go another six or eight months and really just floating in limbo would not have been very beneficial to me, I don't think."
When asked if he thought he may still face Punk at some point in the future, Starks replied, "I would hope so, I really do. I thought Punk, (William) Regal, these people that came in were great additions to the locker room. Great additions in terms of what they provided. I know, personally, I was able to talk to Punk a lot and get help on my promos and things like that. Same with Regal, because I've known him for so long. It was kind of a blow that both of these guys left. I am hopeful that down the line I do get that matchup. If not, I get it, that's how the business is, but it would be nice. It would be nice to be able to work with somebody of that caliber because I've yet to work with, besides Sting, I've yet to work with somebody of such a high caliber, and the Sting match was a year or two ago."
Punk hasn't been part of AEW programming since AEW All Out when he won the AEW World Title, but suffered an injury and was suspended for his role in an altercation with The Elite (Kenny Omega and The Young Bucks) after his post-match press conference where he made disparaging remarks about the trio and others.
Starks is set to challenge MJF for the AEW World Title and Dynamite Diamond Ring at AEW Dynamite Winter is Coming on Wednesday. Fightful will have live coverage of the event beginning at 8 p.m. ET.
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