Bryan Danielson comments on the news of Ring of Honor going on hiatus.
Ring of Honor is the promotion that put Bryan Danielson on the map and eventually saw him leave to WWE where he spent 10 years as Daniel Bryan.
Now, nearly 20 years after its inception, Ring of Honor is going to go on hiatus and re-imagine what it can become as a promotion. Speaking about this news on Busted Open Radio, Bryan Danielson said that first and foremost he thinks about the talent that will now be in a more dire financial situation before moving on to the way he feels about the promotion itself.
" I was just sad. Especially, I guess what the hard part with all of it is, I think of the people and the jobs, right? They're not going to do the full-time contracts or anything like that anymore, that sort of thing. Then this is coming in the year where we've still got a pandemic going on, we've got a lot of people getting cut from the WWE sides, you know what I mean? There's not a ton of full-time jobs out there. You know, people sign these contracts, and they buy houses on these contracts. They think it's guaranteed money and all that kind of stuff.
"Where that really hits hard for me is like, I was fired twice by WWE. It's funny because both times I was fired shortly after I had bought a new car. None of these are nice cars, and they're used cars or whatever it is, you know what I mean? But like, in both of them, I wasn't able to pay it off in full, but, but like, the first time in 2001, when I got fired, I had a $350 a month car payment. All of a sudden that car payment really I was having to work two jobs between that and insurance and all that kind of stuff. I bought the car with the idea of being like, 'Oh, I'm gonna make $500 a week for the next three years, or whatever it is, you know what I mean? So, then all of a sudden, you don't have that guaranteed money coming in, and you're trying to find stuff and you don't have a college education, and you're making $50-$75 per indie show, and whatever it is, you know what I mean? Like, it can put you in a rough spot. Now, if those contracts are much higher, I assume than my developmental stuff, and that's why — the Ring of Honor, and the WWE cuts, people are buying houses based on that [income]. Then all of a sudden, they've got a mortgage, all that kind of stuff."
He added, "There's just a sadness there of like, if it weren't for Ring of Honor, I probably wouldn't be where I'm at today, because that was the main platform where people got to know me, and that was the main platform where I was able to show my ability to wrestle and all that kind of stuff. It makes me a little bit sad, but what I hope is that they'll come back with a sort of, like a reinvigoration kind of, with a plan and come back and be awesome, because I think the more awesome wrestling companies there are, the better it is for everybody. I think that's one of the things that's been great now is that AEW has been great for wrestling fans, but it's also been great for wrestlers, you know, it's been great for me, it's been good to be able to have like that, you know, that kind of choice when my contract was out because it stayed WWE or go do something else, you know. I think it would benefit a lot of people if Ring of Honor were to be able to stick around and then and then be a great promotion."
As far as who Bryan would like to wrestle from Ring of Honor, he singled out Jonathan Gresham amongst a list of many other wrestlers that he wants to step in the squared circle with.
"I've got some the one coming up that I'm super excited about is actually Hangman Adam Page, because I think he must have just turned 30. Like, he's young. I like these young guys that I've never been in the ring with that sort of thing and know we're going to be able to do a world title match, so that's really exciting. Like there's a lot of the young guys in AEW that I'm excited to wrestle like Sammy Guevara, I want to wrestle Darby Allin, I want to wrestle MJF I want to wrestle Daniel Garcia, I mean, there's all those kinds of guys, and then there's the people outside of AEW. I've wrestled Zack Sabre Jr. before, but I really, I'd really like to do a Zack Sabre Jr. match. I'd love to do a Will Ospreay match and obviously love to do an Okada match.
"These are just like, without me having put any forethought into it whatsoever. I probably just listed over 10 people that I'd love to. So it's like, you know, you know, out of the Ring of Honor list, I'd love to wrestle Jonathan Gresham. So I mean, there's so many. I think one of the things is there are so many great wrestlers out there now and so many that I've never wrestled before that it's just like, asking me who I want to wrestle, I just end up listening to so many people."
Darby Allin has openly stated that he would like to wrestle Bryan Danielson in Seattle, Washington. Learn more here.
Should you use any portion of the quotes above, transcription credit should go to Fightful with a H/T linking back to this article.
