[Afterlife]

Originally Posted by BigDaddyCool Still, no one has been able to explain how the champion losing is title because ORton beat him up before a match makes Punk look good, and why it was a logical choice at all. Also, if CM Punk lost a hard fought match, that would make him look stronger than getting beat up by a bunch of thugs and being defacto stripped of his title.

I don't think anyone is saying the kick in the head made him "look good". They're saying that taking a 4 on 1 beat down was a good excuse to take him out of the match, and that losing his title would have been the bragging rights of JBL, wether he won or not, for calling Punk a fluke. If he had lost, cleanly or otherwise -- even though "cleanly" might be hard to define under the rules of said match -- then his title reign is capped off by the naysayers being right and any momentum he'd had would be DOA.

This way, he has a reason to gun for Orton -- a former champion himself -- and go over him. This will start to give him solid credibility without keeping him wrapped up in the title scene and drying him up on fan energy for the duration. It does make sense, when you really look at the big potential picture.

Am I saying it's a perfect situation? Absolutely not. But I definitely see the value in the process and the justification in rthe booking.