thelesterlee
For decades you could’ve asked any American professional wrestler getting into the business what their goals for their career were and every single one would tell you becoming WWE world champion and/or headlining Wrestlemania.
Unfortunately, the machine that Vince McMahon created made it nearly impossible for anyone to reach those heights if they weren’t literally Hulk Hogan’s height. If you didn’t have steroids running through your veins and could lift a Volkswagen over your head then you had virtually no chance of becoming a star in WWE.
3 men—CM Punk, Bryan Danielson, and Kenny Omega—became the biggest stars in wrestling by taking on the system in their own ways to the dismay of the McMahon cut and paste formula that we had all become accustomed to.
CM Punk was the first of these three men to find success.
When he joined the struggling Ring of Honor wrestling promotion, he and Samoa Joe put Ring of Honor on their backs with amazing match after amazing match after amazing match. He proved he can wrestle the best technicians in the world but where he separated himself from the pack was his mic work. No one talked shit better than him. No one commanded an audience better.
“I’M BACK.” – @CMPunk
(via @AEW)pic.twitter.com/l0YpjKtq5m
— Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) August 21, 2021
All peaking with the 2005 ‘Summer of Punk’ where he signed a WWE development deal while still being the ROH champion thus keeping fans in a state of limbo. Fans truly believed Punk was taking the title to WWE and that’d symbolize what made him so great. In a modern era where everyone can read rumors and contract signings online, CM Punk managed to still make wrestling feel real and unpredictable.
His rise to the top of WWE was purely the result of CM Punk being CM Punk. A straight edge asshole who wanted the workers to have more control.
He wasn’t a jacked monster like his peers. He didn’t have the push of the McMahon family behind him like clean cut John Cena. Punk had tattoos and piercings and was half Cena’s size.
He would eventually quit unexpectedly in 2014. Years of rubbing up against the company had beaten him down physically and emotionally.
Enter Bryan Danielson, the greatest professional wrestler I’ve ever seen.
CM Punk kept Ring of Honor afloat but Bryan Danielson was the one who transformed it into the number one indie promotion in America. Every single time he stepped into the ring you could safely assume a 5-star match was about to take place.
Unfortunately, his rise to the top of the WWE was far rockier than Punk’s. Danielson is listed at 5-foot-10 but he’s more like 5-foot-8 which means Vince McMahon never wanted him to sniff the main event.
He spent the beginning of his WWE career being humiliated then fired then re-hired and then humiliated some more and Danielson took it all on the chin. Where CM Punk would’ve raised hell backstage, Danielson stayed the course and inevitably reached the pinnacle. Wrestlemania 30 was basically an entire show about Danielson finally winning the WWE title in a night where he was tasked with beating Triple H, Batista and Randy Orton.
Kenny Omega had a wildly different journey than these previous two men while also having an incredibly similar one.
Unlike Punk and Danielson, Kenny Omega was actively persuaded by the WWE in the early 2000’s but after being shit on by the trainers there, Omega decided he would never sign with the company and instead, created a brand new path for himself by becoming the American face of Japanese wrestling.
Kenny Omega would become the ‘Best Bout Machine’ winning match of the year damn near every single year for the last decade. He made New Japan Pro Wrestling pay per views trend in the States. Only the nerdiest of nerdy American wrestling fans paid attention to NJPW until Omega shattered that window wide open.
Fast forward to 2021 and all 3 men find themselves as the biggest names in the same wrestling promotion that’s currently competing with the WWE as far as eyes and social relevance. WWE finally has its first rival since WCW and it should surprise no one that it’s head by these 3 men.
But the fascinating comparison between these men isn’t their beef with the WWE but the way they handled their own careers in relation to the corporate structures that were dead set in their ways and wanted nothing to do with change.
When we discuss revolution for workers, there are always 3 ways people tend to go about that radical change.
CM Punk wanted to change the way WWE handled its talent and who gets to be labeled as a star. He attempted to change everything from the inside. Prove his worth and hopefully get a seat at the table.
Bryan Danielson was the good soldier who let his great work speak for him. The company shit on him for years but he kept his nose to the grindstone and was finally awarded the respect he always knew he deserved.
Kenny Omega was treated cruelly initially and realized right away that it didn’t behoove him to stick around and fix the company from the inside. His hard work wasn’t going to make him outshine anyone there. He built his own brand elsewhere growing so much on his own that he would be able to create his own wrestling promotion, AEW.
All 3 men made it to the top of their profession. They’re all rich. They all have the respect of their peers and fans. They have creative freedom to produce whatever art they please. And all 3 are objectively the best at what they do.
If you’re asking me personally what I believe to be the best path to power and liberation then it’s clearly the Kenny Omega road. I mean, Omega is the Vice President of the company that sends CM Punk and soon, Bryan Danielson, direct deposits. He found liberation. He is the actual boss while they remain employees.
I’ve never believed in fixing a broken system from the inside. By simply participating in the broken system, you are helping maintain that system. It’s why people like AOC start off as well-meaning freedom fighters only to become the lazy indifferent establishment they were originally fighting against.
There are people who think their work will prove their worth despite the system being against them. Getting beat down for years in hopes of liberation but at the end of the day, most people aren’t the Bryan Danielson’s of their respected fields. He rose because he is quite literally the best at what he does. Most of us aren’t.
I could sit down and write a 1,000-word article to send to some bigger company that has a team of shitty entitled editors or has a terrible (usually racist) boss that I feel embarrassed working for. OR I can build Deadseriousness from the ground up with complete creative control where I can write nerdy wrestling articles.
