#15: Bryan Danielson

by Phil

Danielson is kind of an unusual case, for most of his career he has benefited from a really open artistic environment, he could pretty much wrestle any kind of match he wanted to. I am getting the sense that in the last year or so he is starting to choke on that freedom a bit, I would like to see what he could do with some restrictions, a run in Mexico or ECW where he has to temper his ambitions a bit.

Danielson is good enough that as long as he is wrestling, I have a hard time seeing him slip much below this spot, but in 2008 he was part of the ROH death spiral, and I don’t really see much left for him to do in the showcase indies. His 2008 was mainly rerunning matches with Nigel and Aries mixed in with underwhelming new dance partners like Claudio, Nakajima, Tyler Black , it is fun to watch him carry guys like that, but nothing we hadn’t seen before and better. 2008 also had the Nigel WXW match and the NYC Marifuji match which are by far the two worst matches I have seen him in. A great wrestler having a subpar year can’t be ranked above great wrestlers having great years

Recommended 2008 Matches:

~vs. Low-Ki (PWG, 1/5/08)
~vs. Nigel McGuiness (ROH, 2/23/08)
~vs. Tyler Black (ROH, 5/8/08)
~vs. Katsuhiko Nakajima (ROH, 9/30/08)
~vs. Chris Hero (PWG, 11/2/08)
~vs. Nigel McGuinness (ROH, 11/22/08)
~vs. Claudio Castagnoli (ROH, 12/6/08)

Career Recommended Matches:

~vs. Low-Ki (ECWA, 2/24/01)
~vs. Low-Ki (ECWA, 7/21/01)
~vs. Samoa Joe (ROH, 10/2/04)
~vs. Nigel McGuinness (ROH, 8/12/06)
~vs. Homicide (ROH, 12/23/06)
~vs. Takeshi Morishima (ROH, 8/25/07)
~vs. Takeshi Morishima (ROH, 12/29/07)

2009 Outlook:

Pretty poor, he was great in the Chikara King of Trios, but ROH is a pit now, and he is stuck working clowns like Kenny Omega and Chuck Taylor in PWG. Could still see him pulling out some big performances in the end of the year, but it wouldn’t surprise me to see him drop out of the top 20