Dave Meltzer Discusses The Dichotomy Of AEW's Bryan Danielson

Bryan Danielson has put his career on the line at AEW All In, promising to retire if he doesn't defeat AEW World Champion Swerve Strickland in the main event at Wembley Stadium. On the latest "Wrestling Observer Radio," Dave Meltzer said that there is more truth to Danielson's recent complaints about his physical condition than many thought.

"The deal with him doing the interviews about him not wanting the championship ... that wasn't a swerve to make people think he wasn't going to win," Meltzer explained, noting that Danielson's less-than-stellar record in AEW has been by design. "In AEW, one of the reasons he's lost as much as he has is he just wanted to put people over." According to Meltzer, Danielson feels that putting over as many people as possible is better for strengthening AEW, which Danielson feels is better for the wrestling business as a whole. Danielson has been very open about how difficult it is to recover from injury at his age, especially with young children who don't know their own strength. With AEW showing a goodbye video to Danielson on this week's "AEW Dynamite," a grim finality surrounds the match.

"In real life, the real life Bryan Danielson is not somebody who has to win a world championship ... The storyline Bryan Danielson is," Meltzer said. Danielson signed with AEW in 2021 following a decade with WWE, but since arriving in the promotion has not won a single title, despite being a world champion in ROH and WWE, and a many-time AEW World Title challenger.

Please credit "Wrestling Observer Radio" when using quotes from this article, and give a H/T to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.