During the Royal Rumble kickoff show in January, WWE revealed CM Punk as the cover athlete of their upcoming WWE 2K26 game.
This was the second time Punk had been featured on a WWE game cover. Punk recently talked about how it feels to be on the cover in a podcast.
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CM Punk On Fighting For WWE 2K13 And Earning The WWE 2K26 Cover
On the No Contest Wrestling podcast, CM Punk said he feels honored to be on the cover of WWE 2K. Compared to the last time, Punk said the higher-ups in WWE are recognizing him as their top star. Here’s what The Cult of Personality said:
“I feel great. Like, it really is an honor, honestly. Two times. First time felt like a big fight. This time feels like the office is recognizing, ‘Oh yeah, you’re the man.’ To me that means something. It resonates, I think.”
When WWE 2K13 was released on October 30, 2012, things were a lot different. CM Punk was still a huge name for WWE, but he had multiple disputes with people in the back. Everyone remembers his real-life feud with WWE’s current Chief Content Officer, Triple H. Both stars hated each other back then and couldn’t see eye to eye.
Many fans believe WWE tried to suppress Punk’s growing popularity in the past, but they were far too loud to ignore. Punk’s first stint with WWE ended over a year after this. He left WWE in January 2014 and retired from the business altogether.
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He eventually made a comeback during Survivor Series WarGames 2023 after the main event. Since then, Punk has been a major name for WWE. So it wasn’t surprising that they picked him to be on WWE 2K26’s cover. Additionally, he is also featured in 2K’s Showcase Mode, where fans can relive some of his greatest moments in WWE. It’ll feature his matches such as the WrestleMania 41 triple threat bout with Seth Rollins and Roman Reigns, the WWE Championship match against The Rock at Elimination Chamber 2013, the WrestleMania 29 fight with The Undertaker, and even some fantasy matches against legends like “Stone Cold” Steve Austin and Eddie Guerrero.
CM Punk is currently focused on his upcoming WWE World Heavyweight Championship defense against Finn Balor at Elimination Chamber 2026. After that, he’ll have to shift his focus towards Roman Reigns, who won the Men’s Royal Rumble 2026 match and challenged Punk for the World Heavyweight Title.
Main image credit: Imago
Ishaan Sharma has been following wrestling ever since he was 8. That was over a decade ago. He loves to write about this pretend sport and has worked with online publications such as Sportskeeda and TheSportster, where he shared his insights about the wrestling business.