September 1 will be here before we know it, and with it the big decision on what Daniel Bryan is going to do with the rest of his career.  No one of knows what’s going to happen, and you should really disregard any ‘reports’ you see about what he’s thinking or how he’s feeling.  The people putting those out have a vested interest in him leaving the WWE, for click bait and/or because they prefer to see him outside of WWE.  ‘Daniel Bryan stays in WWE’ is not a story, and you can only get maybe one episode of your three hour whinefest YouTube asking why he stayed.  ‘Daniel Bryan leaves’ is gold for months of WWE bashing.  But aside from wanting to stay because it what’s most comfortable for you or wanting him to leave because you have fantasy booking dreams for him elsewhere, what are the possibilities for him in each case?  I played around with the choices and here’s what I came up with:

ROH

It depends on whether or not he works there full time, which of courses is unlikely.  But just playing along here let’s include it as a possibility.  My guess is that he would get hotshot to the top of the card pretty quickly and may even win the ROH World Title.  He could work with Jay Lethal, Dalton Castle, and all the Bullet Club guys who work there, among others.  Sounds really good and it would be really good at first.  But what happens after a year or so once he’s run the gamut of opponents there?  Is he going to hold their title in perpetuity until he decides to hang it up?

If he does ROH part time it becomes even more dicey.  Sure they can put him in the main event picture, but with him coming and going a serious title run is a no go.  Sure he could win the title but he’d likely be trading it off with other guys there along the way, while working tag matches, six man tags, etc.  If you’re a big Daniel Bryan fan is that the future you want for him, trading title wins with Castle, Cody Rhodes, and others?  And when the inevitable day comes that Castle, Rhodes, Lethal, etc go to WWE does he hang around and be the big fish in a little pond with no real competition?

In short, either way a hot start likely gives way to a not so hot middle and finish.

The Indie Scene

What if he primarily sticks to the indie scene?  To be honest I don’t see that happening.  The life of an indie wrestler after where he’s been in WWE can’t be that appealing.  He’s not Jack Swagger or Ryback.  Outside of the high profile stuff like PWG, and matches against the same guys he’d be facing in ROH and Japan, what else is there for him?  Do you really think he’s going to be out there in podunk towns working against local guys, or former WWE co workers, even for a big check?  If you’re a fan of his do you really want to have to hunt his indie matches down on YouTube or hope he comes through somewhere near you sometime, as opposed to being able to see him on TV every week?  You ready to go to an indie show to see him take on……..Joey Mercury?  I mean, if a match with Big Cass is an outrage what do you call that?  If he goes the indie route it will likely be along with working ROH or Impact and New Japan.  But I don’t see it happen outside of doing the prestige indie stuff.

Impact

No way this happens, but if it did it would be worse version of ROH.  There aren’t as many guys in Impact that anyone is dying to see him face.  Daniel Bryan vs Austin Aries?  Sure………   Right……..

New Japan 

I saved this one for a reason, because it’s not quite as simple.  Because of the way New Japan is set up, the hotshot scenario isn’t going to happen.  They have their main event guys in place for the next few years so they don’t need him to pop a buyrate or juice ticket sales, but there are a ton of guys there who could have some really good matches with him.  Okada, Omega, Naito, Tanahashi, Suzuki, Zack Sabre Jr, Will Ospreay, and many more.  He’ll have his dance card filled up for a while.  But New Japan books a lot of tag matches and six man tags, and tournaments to decide who gets the next title shot so the action he gets on a regular basis may not be what you expect.  He may also end up a fixture in the light heavyweight division instead of the heavyweight division.  You ok with that?  I’m guessing you wouldn’t be if he were to be moved to 205 Live in WWE.  Now don’t get me wrong, they’re going to get him in there with the big guns of the company, but those are going to be spaced out and a lot of it will be in tag matches……kinda like what’s likely to happen if he stays in WWE.

There’s a genuine allure to New Japan for Bryan and for us in that there are a lot of names to face and a lot of epic potential encounters that won’t be limited to 8 minutes on Smackdown or 15 minutes on a pay per view.  If and when Bryan takes on someone like Ospreay they’re gonna get 25 to 30 minutes to go, and if he gets Okada they could go an hour.  Which will make for a real interesting situation for Bryan’s fans who’ve only watched him in WWE, because if you’re not used to watching longer matches like that it can take some getting used to.    Which of course begs the question of whether you are a fan of Daniel Bryan, WWE superstar or Brian Danielson, professional wrestler.  If it’s the former then this whole New Japan thing may not be as enticing in practice as it is in theory.  But if it’s the latter, and you already watch and understand how New Japan works, then it’ll be Christmas in September for you.

And now for the last choice….

Stay in WWE

Now this may not look like a lot of fun to you right now.  You don’t like that they put him with Cass and you’re not confident that he’s going to get the return to the throne at WrestleMania that you think he deserves.  But if you’re a fan of Daniel Bryan and you’re concerned about Brian Danielson the man then maybe you should reconsider whether this is such a bad thing.  He’s likely to get the best medical attention right there.  Vince has all the incentive in the world to make sure he’s taken care of as much as possible so as to not jeopardize his future after retirement, because no matter where Bryan spends the rest of his career if something bad happens the news reports will read ‘former WWE wrestler Brian Danielson who performed under the name Daniel Bryan’ with little to no mention of the decade he spent outside the company taking all kinds of crazy bumps.  He’d still be able to use the name that he’s gotten most famous with.  (By the way, props to Vince for coming up with the much more chant ready Daniel Bryan for a name than Brian Danielson).  And on top of that if you want to see Daniel Bryan hold up a world major  championship belt in victory as the new champion, the place that is most likely to happen is in WWE.  Not New Japan.  Sometimes safe is the best choice.

So what to do?

Now what do I think he should do?  I’m 44 years old with two kids so I’m inclined to vote for the safest option.  But if he wanted to leave for a year to do some things and then come back that would be ok in my book.  I do think that ultimately what would be most satisfying to the fans of Daniel Bryan, WWE superstar would be for him to stay, even if you don’t like what he’s doing right this minute.  We’ll see what happens!