In announcing his new deal to enter the Octagon and test himself in athletic competition without a pre-determined result, CM Punk is shooting for fighting at middleweight (185 pound limit) with the possibility of welterweight (170 pound) when he tries out the weight cut.
His new boss, Dana White, is making it clear that that's not the only thing that will be different between Punk and the last WWE Superstar to try his hand in MMA, Brock Lesnar. White told ESPN.com:
He wanted to fight here. He wanted to give it a shot, so we gave him an opportunity. It's not like Brock Lesnar. We're not going to throw the kitchen sink at him. Lesnar had a wrestling background. (CM Punk) going to fight a guy who is 1-0, 1-1, 2-1 -- something like that.
Which makes this much more of a situation where Punk gets to stay in the spotlight doing something he always wanted to and UFC gets to try to pop a buy rate with a unique attraction, as opposed to what they were looking at doing with Brock the first time around when they tried, and succeeded in, promoting a dominant fighter.
The question, outside of "how badly might Punk get his ass kicked?" is whether or not the UFC brings Lesnar back for one more go round, and if he'd be handled any differently after exiting the promotion with two bad defeats followed by a three year layoff.
Time will tell, Cagesiders. The MMA and WWE rivalry just got a lot more interesting.