Wrestlers are often required to get to each town and find accommodation on their own, with rental cars and carpools being the most common means of transportation. To save money and the hassle of figuring out how to make each town and where to stay, road families are formed, where the same group of people travel together to shows and events. This was the experience of CM Punk, who remembered his old WWE road family on "The Rich Eisen Show."
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"My first road family is Doug Basham and Kevin Fertig [Mordecai/Kevin Thorn]," Punk said, "They're both Louisville, Kentucky guys, we all lived down in Louisville, so it was literally just like a, 'You wanna ride with us?' And I was like, 'Yeah, great,' because they were vets in a way that I wasn't. You could argue, 'Oh, well I have the same amount of shower time as you,' but they were already in the system. Basham did his stuff on [WWE] SmackDown, so he's been up and down. Fertig has done his stuff on SmackDown, so they obviously have perspective, and I was just like, 'Yeah, I love it, let's go.'"
Punk was travelling with Basham and Fertig in 2004 and, at that time GPS was an uncommon, luxury item. Punk remembered that one of the three would have MapQuest directions printed out and at times, and he would travel with a road atlas. Since then, Punk has used his experiences to help other talents on their travels.
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Traveling is expensive, meaning that wrestlers take measures to ensure that they can save as many pennies as possible. As such, Punk and his travel buddies experienced some uncomfortable trips.
"It was all about saving money, so it was the three of us in a car driving, three of us in a hotel, somebody's either sleeping on the floor, or you flip one of the mattresses over, somebody's sleeping on a box spring or you get a cot, and you just split everything three ways, you 100% made it work," Punk remarked.
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After WWE moved on from Basham and Fertig, Punk was left without a road family. However, as he now had more experience and was in the place Basham and Fertig were in with him, Punk became a "den mother" to the group of Deuce, Domino, Cherry, The Major Brothers (Matt Cardona and Curt Hawkins), and Hornswoggle.
Punk also brought up how the WWE Draft broke-up road groups by changing travel schedules, remembering the 2008 edition and stepping up to help a (then) up-and-comer. "I get drafted to a different show, and then Kofi [Kingston] gets called up, and I immediately first day go to Kofi and be like, 'You got any buds here? Is there anybody you're gonna ride with?' Punk recalled, "He's like, 'No man. I don't know anybody,' and I was like, 'Alright, you're riding with me.'"
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Kingston was happy to see Punk return to WWE, suggesting that those early interactions established a bond between them. These days, Punk also uses his industry wisdom to help "NXT" stars, many of whom grew up watching him.
If you use any quotes from this article, please credit "The Rich Eisen Show" with a H/T to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.
