Mike Jackson continues to tformer WWE champion CM Punk.
Jackson and Punk meet at UFC 225 on June 9 in Punk’s hometown of Chicago; and the welterweight is promising a worse outcome this time around for the former pro-wrestling superstar. Jackson is looking to knock him out. There is no bad blood there, per Jackson, but “The Truth” is irked that Punk (whose real name is Phil Brooks) called him “a can” after Gall beat him in 2016.
“I’m not going in there to submit him,” Jackson said.
“I’m not going in there to choke him out. I have no animosity or ill will towards Phil. For me, again, he called me a can. It wasn’t like it was someone of stature calling me a can, I can laugh it off, OK whatever.
“Again, he has never been in a fight. He has never been in a fight before the Gall fight, an actual unscripted fight. For someone like that to call me a can, I take that as disrespect. That’s like me deciding one day I want to be a wrestler and I walk into Vince McMahon’s office and I’m like, ‘Alright, I want to go wrestle Brock Lesnar for the belt and I want you to put me over.’ I wouldn’t do that. I would have to pay my dues and work my way up.”
In 2016, with Punk’s debut in the UFC on the horizon, the UFC set up a fight between Jackson and Mickey Gall, a legit prospect who came out of UFC president Dana White’s Lookin’ for a Fight show. The winner would fight Punk. Gall beat Jackson in 45 seconds with a choke.
After Punk's loss to Gall, he made it known that he wanted a second chance in the UFC and if he didn’t get it, he would go fight elsewhere. He has continued his MMA training at Roufusport in Milwaukee. The UFC granted him another shot and Jackson believes he was the right opponent from the jump.
The idea of Punk calling Jackson a can despite having never fought in MMA before Gall still irritates Jackson. And that will be one of the things fueling him in June.
“For that person to call me a can, I took that as a sign of disrespect,” he said. “Again, we’re in the fight business and you disrespect somebody that just happens to be in your weight class, we’ve gotta fight.”