It sounds like Tony Khan witnessed the entire backstage incident between CM Punk and Jack Perry

One big difference between CM Punk’s backstage fight with The Elite last year at All Out and his new backstage incident with “Jungle Boy” Jack Perry this year at All In is that whole lot of people witnessed the latter, because it happened in the Gorilla position, right near the curtains where the wrestlers make their entrances.

In fact, according to Wrestling Observer Live’s Bryan Alvarez, AEW President and Booker Tony Khan was right there when the altercation took place:

“There were a lot of people at Gorilla, and there were a lot of witnesses, including one Tony Khan, who was right there.”

Alvarez goes on to describe his best understanding of how the backstage physicality unfolded between Punk and Perry, based on the accounts of more than a dozen people in AEW who he spoke to about it.

Jack Perry was cut open in his pre-show match against HOOK where he used real glass for a spot on a car. That real glass was the crux for a verbal shot he took at Punk during the match. After Perry’s match was over, he walked through the curtain bleeding, and his cuts were being tended to by the AEW medical team. That’s when CM Punk walked by, as his match against Samoa Joe was slated to go next as the opener on the main card of All In.

“CM Punk walks by and he says, ‘Do you have a problem with me?’ And Jack Perry says something to the effect of, ‘Well, you heard what I said out there.’

...And then CM Punk, according to several people, said something to the effect of, ‘You know I can beat your ass, right?’

And then there was an incident. It was very quick. I don’t want to say one hundred percent, ‘cause maybe there’s somebody that denies this, but pretty much one hundred percent say that Punk made the comment, he either shoved or pie-faced Jungle Boy, grabbed him in the guillotine front headlock, and it was immediately broken up. Like, Samoa Joe’s right there, everybody’s right there. Nobody got their ass kicked, there was nothing like that...it started, and everybody was there breaking it up.

...[Punk] had [Perry] in the deal, and...they got close enough to Tony Khan that I believe monitors were knocked down onto Tony Khan. So he was right there, and he saw everything. And a lot of people were right there, and they saw everything. And so...they separate. Samoa Joe grabs him, and they get broken apart.

So now CM Punk is furious, and several people said he threatened to quit, and he didn’t want to go out for the match.”

It was at this point that AEW was scrambling for a backup plan, checking to see if FTR and Young Bucks were ready to open the show. Those teams were not ready, so the backup option ended up being the match of Kenny Omega, Hangman Page, and Kota Ibushi vs. Jay White, Juice Robinson, and Konosuke Takeshita. Ultimately though, Punk went out there and did the match with Joe, even though the show did start several minutes late due to the backstage incident.

“So they were getting ready to go out, and then I was told that Joe was just furious. You know, he’s at Wembley [Stadium], there’s 80,000 people there. He’s about to go out. And apparently he talked Punk into doing the match.”

With so many people playing witness to the backstage altercation between CM and Jack at All In, including Khan himself, hopefully the investigation into Punk’s incident this year will go much faster than the investigation after his fight last year with The Elite. As it currently stands, we’re still waiting to hear official word from AEW about the reported suspensions of Punk and Perry.

What do you make of this account of the backstage incident between CM Punk and Jack Perry, Cagesiders?