As you may have already heard, former WWE Superstar and disgruntled professional CM Punk will be joining the UFC in his debut match in 2015. While CM Punk isn’t the first professional wrestler to step inside the octagon, his history and personality are unlike anything the world of MMA has seen. He made this announcement last night at UFC 181.
After the announcement, Jason David Frank threw his name into the possible list of candidates. The internet has been abuzz over the possibility of seeing Frank — an iconic TV superhero from their childhood turned MMA fighter and Comic-Con staple — fight CM Punk, pro wrestling revolutionary who walked away from an illustrious career.
I tried to avoid writing about this story because of the absurdity and, let’s be honest, complete unlikeliness to occur, but something I read on Fox Sports completely changed my tune.
From Fox Sports:
UFC president Dana White stated on Saturday night that Brooks’ first fight will come against someone with equal footing in the fight game, most likely a fighter with one or two professional fights on their record.
Could CM Punk actually fight Jason David Frank in the UFC?
Let’s back up.
Who is Jason David Frank?
Jason David Frank practiced martial arts since childhood, and at 18 he used those talents to star in TV’s Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers on the FOX Kids network. He was the central character to the defining five-part episode, “Green With Evil” that introduced the evil Green Ranger, which I think alone cemented Power Rangers as the ’90s icon as it is fondly remembered today.
He had his own unique costume. He had his own unique weapon. He had his own unique giant robot. He had his own unique theme song. Twice.
Kids loved Power Rangers because of Tommy, and it was because of Tommy they loved Power Rangers. It was a feedback phenomenon that fueled each other to become the great merchandise machine of the early ’90s. But at the cusp of that success in season two, the Tommy character was to be written off. Jason David Frank was set to star in a brand-new series from Saban Entertainment, tentatively titled Cybertron. An adaptation of the Japanese series Metalder, the show was primed for Frank to star as a solo act. It was also to star in a minor role, I’m not kidding, Jamie Kennedy.
This is noteworthy because this was 1994, and not 2014 when you can influence consumer products with a single hashtag. In 1994, parents called in by the truckload, by the sheer thousands on behalf of their kids to keep Tommy on the show. The plans were quickly changed, with Tommy later becoming the equally iconic White Ranger and actor Brad Hawkins taking over Jason David Frank’s departed role. (Cybertron would later be retooled as VR Troopers, which at this time you can watch in its entirety on Netflix.) Frank did a total of five and a half seasons of Power Rangers, plus two Hollywood movies and two direct-to-video instructional karate videos that all kids had, all under the Power Rangers banner.
For a generation, he was a superhero.
In later years, Jason David Frank started his own chain of martial arts schools, Rising Sun Karate, across the country. In 2003, he was inducted into the World Karate Union Hall of Fame. By 2010, Frank would go on to a buzzworthy MMA career, with an undefeated amateur record at 4-0 and a professional record of 1-0. That is impressive, considering MMA did not become both the refined sport and phenomenon it is now until well into the mid-’00s. But after 2011, Frank was comfortable traveling to comic book conventions, selling off his name to 8×10’s, DVDs, and whatever new anniversary-edition toys Bandai releases. That’s not a knock on him: His age caught up with him, and if he can still maintain an undefeated record but still make a comfortable living selling his image, that’s not a bad business plan. Also, I know he’s well off because one look at his very active social media will tell you that.
http://instagram.com/p/vjxbJWjssy/?modal=true
Currently, Jason David Frank continues to operate his martial arts schools, has a YouTube reality series My Morphin’ Life (yes, really), and travels frequently visiting fans at conventions. He’s a mainstay at the Wizard World convention circuit, where he once met the man named CM Punk.
CM Punk and Jason David Frank in 2012.
Who is CM Punk?
CM Punk, real name Phil Brooks, is a former professional wrestler who started in the backyards of Chicago to headlining sold-out arenas worldwide. He gained notoriety and crossover appeal — the first for pro wrestling since the days of “Stone Cold” Steve Austin — for letting his true feelings known about his employers on a crazy Monday night in June 2011. Disgruntled about his place in the hierarchy, CM Punk took a live microphone and unleashed a barrage of harsh words, “a lifetime’s worth of frustration” to a live audience in Las Vegas.
He would later hold the WWE Championship for an unprecedented 434 days. I was there for night one in Madison Square Garden.
For one moment, CM Punk defined a wrestling generation.
For a generation, CM Punk started a revolution.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Ms0DFxpptk
For the less-familiar it might come off like a guy who is just sour he wasn’t the star he thought he was, but longtime fans know how deserving CM Punk was at that time. He was legitimately the people’s choice, and the WWE refused to let that happen until Punk began to speak. Years removed and you will find people’s opinions change. Such is the inevitability of these things. The WWE-produced 2012 documentary, CM Punk: Best in the World, is required viewing (it’s pretty great) and will give you a complete understanding of who CM Punk is and was.
But just know: For a generation, Punk was a revolution.
In January 2014, CM Punk left the WWE without warning. He opened up his feelings about this in a much-talked about recently episode of Colt Cabana’s (also a friend and former WWE Superstar) Art of Wrestling podcast.
https://soundcloud.com/coltcabana/aow-226-cm-punk
Since leaving the WWE and the pro wrestling industry, CM Punk married, worked with Chris Hardwick’s The Nerdist, and is set to make his Marvel Comics writing debut with Thor Annual #1 early next year. Fans noted how happy and cheerful he was in these environments compared to the grouch he was during his time in the WWE.
And yes, CM Punk does have legitimate fight training. He is close friends with the Gracie family, the name in Brazilian jiu-jitsu. He trained with them on and off during his wrestling career, and almost non-stop since he retired. Has he ever fought an MMA-sanctioned match? No. But I wouldn’t underestimate him either.
After making a second appearance on Colt Cabana’s Art of Wrestling, any potential of CM Punk returning to the WWE went from slim to now near impossible. And if you were to ask him, CM Punk probably wouldn’t mind. This past Sunday night, CM Punk showed up at UFC 181 to make his announcement.
Will CM Punk vs. Jason David Frank happen?
Nah.
Probably not.
For the last year and a half, Jason David Frank has egged CM Punk into fighting under MMA rules ever since some fans decided to make that dumb connection at Wizard World.
We are at a point, culturally, where worlds colliding happen more than ever by absurd circumstances. I remember in the early ’00s distinctly how much people blew up when Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, and Madonna performed at the MTV VMAs. Not that that was a pinnacle moment in our pop culture, but in the last decade we have gotten used to seeing strange bedfellows.
Jay and Silent Bob attended Degrassi. Freddy fought Jason. James Bond escorted the Queen to the Olympics. The fucking Avengers. The professional wrestling world above all, even more than comic book fans, should be used to these things. From the Invasion storyline of 2001 (where WCW and ECW wrestlers waged war with then-WWF stars, to mediocre results) to the Big Show fighting Floyd Mayweather Jr., it is now just kind of a thing to happen. People attending comic book conventions are used to fighting games which almost always feature a crossover character, so of course someone would bring up Jason David Frank fighting CM Punk like as if life was a video game. It’s not, but don’t tell them that.
Jason David Frank has milked the buzz for as long as he could. You could say it’s Jason David Frank trying raise his own stock — and again, I wouldn’t fault him for it, if I were him I totally, 100% would. He’s done everything from posting photoshops made by fans to creating his own ripoff t-shirts.
Weirdly, Frank’s efforts may have paid off. After reminding his 600,000+ Facebook followers, 98,000+ Instagram followers and however many watch his YouTube show about his desire to fight Punk for over a year and a half, it hit a fever pitch starting last night when Punk announced his intentions to step into the UFC octagon. As of now, social media is buzzing about the potential (I say that word cautiously) bout. People are actually picking up on the story now.
But will it ever be a story?
CM Punk, since meeting Frank at Wizard World, has largely ignored Frank’s taps on his shoulders. Beyond the Wizard World comment of “Yeah, sure, why not?” when asked if he’d fight Frank, there has been nothing but silence. No acknowledgement, no reference, no funny tweets. Speculatively, CM Punk simply does not see Jason David Frank as a legitimate competitor. Is it age? Is it Power Rangers? Is it fight experience?
The whole of UFC is eyeing CM Punk, thinking he isn’t one either. Once again, MMA has a wrassler who thinks he can fight. While Brock Lesnar bore the brunt of the “wrestlers can’t fight” paradigm and nearly shifted that whole by himself, there are still a lot of doubters against Punk. Many believe that he never earned his UFC slot, no matter how big his profile. But since the impossible has happened, he now needs a competitor on his level. And, despite odds, I don’t think Jason David Frank is that guy.
Jason David Frank’s MMA background more than qualifies him for a UFC debut alongside CM Punk, and decades of martial arts experience to prove otherwise, but people simply can’t get over the Power Rangers thing. Power Rangers occupies such a weird fucking place in our culture that the mere mention of it can spook people silly. I recall speaking to several Power Rangers actors at Power MorphiCon this year, and they told me about their struggle of finding work after the show when casting directors see it listed on their resume. Jason David Frank milks his Power Rangers past to financial benefit, but it may have killed his chances at earning legitimacy in the world of combat sports.
It’s unfair, for him and maybe for many of his fans, but I do not believe the UFC would like the absurdity of a TV actor fighting a wrestler in their arena. No matter their legitimate fight experience, Dana White isn’t the kind of guy to bill a fight purely for the LOLs. It sounds harsh, and as a fan of pro wrestling, martial arts, and yes, Power Rangers, I also know that Dana White is not a circus promoter.
So nah. It probably won’t happen.
I eagerly look forward to CM Punk’s first UFC fight next year and seeing Jason David Frank at Comic-Con.