Multiple subjects delved into by Danielson.
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada is playing host to AEW’s Collision and Rampage shows on 5/11. To promote the events, Bryan Danielson sat down with Justin Dhillon of TWC Show.
He was asked what’s left on his wrestling checklist and he mentioned competing at Wembley Stadium. Bryan then revealed that his AEW contract expires before All In at Wembley in August. He added that it would be nice to wrap up his full-time in-ring career at WrestleDream when AEW runs the Tacoma Dome in Washington on October 12th.
The big one is Wembley (that is left on my wrestling checklist). I wanna make it to Wembley. My contract actually expires before Wembley. But I wanna make it to Wembley… I’m not sure if I’ll make it, but one thing that would be a nice way to kind of close everything out for me is to do my last match as a full-time wrestler at WrestleDream at the Tacoma Dome — we’re doing the Tacoma Dome — because that’s the first wrestling show I ever saw. It was WWF and it was Ultimate Warrior versus Rick Rude in the main event and it’s the first time my sister ever saw a male butt cheek. My dad talked about it till the day he died. The Ultimate Warrior sunset flips Rick Rude, Rick Rude’s back and butt are facing directly towards us and then Ultimate Warrior pulls down his pants, we see his butt-cheeks and my sister’s cheeks go bright red. My dad howled about that until the day he died.
Continuing on the topic of Wembley, Danielson spoke candidly about the idea of wrestling Nigel McGuinness at All In. In March, McGuiness revealed that he got back in the ring and felt ‘perfectly okay’.
Danielson admitted that he’s concerned about fans’ expectations for what a present day Danielson versus McGuinness match would look like compared to what they’ve done in the past. Expectation-wise, he felt the same way after wrestling Kazuchika Okada at AEW x NJPW Forbidden Door II. He feels that after a long show and having to follow Kenny Omega versus Will Ospreay, he did not deliver on those expectations.
He tried to lobby for Omega and Ospreay to main event that show. He said the nice thing about a match between himself and Nigel at All In is they for sure would not be headlining. Danielson tells Tony Khan all the time that he’d like to go on early.
Yeah, hmm, it’s interesting because… I would love to wrestle Nigel (McGuinness). I get afraid of fan expectations of what it would be… And I don’t know how many people have actually seen our matches but it’s like, they were very physical matches. That’s the thing that I would be afraid of is people’s expectations of what they think it should be. Not that they would do it now, but if they did it when they were like 55, Ric Flair and Ricky Steamboat. By the way, I would bet at 55 with both of them, it would be fantastic. Ricky Steamboat is just unbelievable still. We’ve had him. In the Strap match (in AEW) and he was just there at Revolution for Sting’s last match. He’s great! Just great and he’s in great shape, all that kind of stuff… I’m sure he could (still do a great arm drag). I bet he bench presses more than me. So yeah, he’s in great shape but, I guess that would be my big fear is fan expectation.
And this is what I felt with the (Kazuchika) Okada match, the first Okada match at Forbidden Door is that after the shows are so long and then after you see a match like Will Ospreay and Kenny Omega and the fans are drained, it’s very hard to get them to the next level and internally, I don’t feel like I did. If I were to look at that, I was like, okay, I didn’t do what a main event needs to do and I don’t politic much, but I politicked so hard for Ospreay and Kenny to go on last, right? Because I was like — yeah (I can’t follow it). It’s such a hard thing to follow so it’s like, I guess that’s the thing. You do Wembley and something like that, if you were to do Wembley with me and Nigel, the nice thing is we wouldn’t be the main event for sure (Danielson laughed). So if we could go on first or second, oh! That’d be great. That’s honestly — that’s my favorite thing. I tell Tony (Khan) that all the time is, ‘Oh, I’d love to go on first’ or not even first, because if you’re not last, first is the best.
What I love is to be able to go on early and then to watch the rest of the show. It was such a blessing at Revolution. I wrestled Eddie Kingston and I forget what number we were. We were maybe second or third, I don’t remember. But, I got to go out and stand kind of in the crowd to watch Sting’s last match and be a fan and just experience it as a fan in the arena would experience it. As opposed to being like, I was backstage at Sting’s last match. No, I was in the arena watching it live. That’s awesome.
One of the highlights of Danielson versus Will Ospreay at AEW Dynasty included Ospreay giving Bryan the Tiger Driver 91. After Ospreay picked up the win, the medical staff were surrounding Bryan to check on him.
Danielson stated that his neck is hurt, but it happened when he gave Ospreay a frankensteiner and landed on his head coming down. He doesn’t think anyone noticed it in real time. He got an M.R.I. and it showed that he’s okay. Danielson went on to add that he gets ulnar nerve pain as well in the C6/C7 vertebrae.
My neck hurts (following the match against Will Ospreay at AEW Dynasty) … So yeah, I’m having some issues with my neck. There was a thing when I gave him a frankensteiner and he landed on his feet and in the background, nobody noticed it I don’t think at the time… I’m not on social media much but, yeah… But when I did it, I just landed right on my head and I was like, oh my gosh, and so, I’ve needed some time after that. The M.R.I. (shows) I’m okay. But how do I feel on a day-to-day basis? My neck is like, ah… And I don’t know if this is good or this is bad but you come to see pain as just perception. It’s a perception… And especially like, for example, in mediation, so, I get a lot of ulnar nerve pain which is I think you have C6/C7, when those are compressed, pain that comes down the back of your arm into your pinky and all that kind of stuff and so when you’re sitting in meditation, that doesn’t go away and you go to examine what is that? What is that? And we identify it as bad, negative. But those are also mental constructions of what it is. It’s just a signal that something is… I’ve started to see pain as that more and more as I’ve gotten older and that sort of thing and I find it to be a very useful paradigm as far as how I look at pain because it can also be like, okay, that means this needs to be fixed or it means this needs to be done differently or all those different sorts of things. Yeah, it’s a signal.
On the 5/11 Collision, Danielson will be teaming with Claudio Castagnoli to take on Top Flight (Dante Martin & Darius Martin).
There is going to be a review of the show here on POST Wrestling that can be found at this link.
If the quotes in this article are used, please credit TWC Show with an H/T to POST Wrestling for the transcriptions.
