Add as a preferred source on Google CM Punk and Cody Rhodes closed WWE SmackDown with a brawl in their final face-to-face before SummerSlam. The angle sent the go-home show off the air Friday at the Resch Center in Green Bay, Wisconsin, with the two throwing hands in and out of the ring.
Earlier in the night, WWE aired house show footage from Thursday in Springfield, Illinois, where the two beat Gunther and Sami Zayn in the main event before Rhodes caught Punk with an elbow during the celebration.
Rhodes told Punk he sees through the mind games and that after Chicago, the two aren’t running from each other anymore — they’re running at each other. That’s a callback to the July 6 Raw, where Gunther took Cody out of his title shot against Zayn and Punk stepped into the spot and won the Undisputed WWE Championship.
Punk said he didn’t come back to make friends and didn’t come back to lose them either, but if it came down to losing a friend or losing the title, tomorrow wasn’t going to be Cody’s night. Rhodes said that word bothered him and asked Punk what he wanted to do about it tonight.
Punk peeled off his jacket, set the title down, and put his hands up. Cody threw the first shot. Rhodes clotheslined him out of the ring and ran his face into the announce table before Punk cut him off from behind. Referees and agents came down to pull them apart and got nowhere, and the two were still going at it on top of the table when the show went off the air.
Punk defends the Undisputed WWE Championship against Rhodes on Night One of SummerSlam.