Bryan Lloyd Danielson (born May 22, 1981) is an American professional wrestler. He is currently signed to All Elite Wrestling (AEW), where he performs under his real name and is a member of the Blackpool Combat Club. He rose to fame for his time in WWE, where he performed under the ring name Daniel Bryan from 2009 to 2021. Noted for his technical wrestling style, ability to transform his on-screen character with ease, and popularity with fans, he is widely considered one of the greatest professional wrestlers of all time.
Danielson began his professional wrestling career in 1999 on the independent circuit, and signed an 18-month contract with the World Wrestling Federation (WWF, now WWE) in 2000; he later went on to make uncontracted appearances in WWE until 2003. He joined Ring of Honor (ROH) in 2002, wrestling in the main event of the promotion's first event; considered a mainstay of ROH, he stayed with the company until 2009, winning the ROH World Championship and ROH Pure Championship once each. He unified the championships at one point and was also the inaugural winner of the annual Survival of the Fittest tournament. In 2022, he was named as part of the inaugural class of the ROH Hall of Fame. He also wrestled extensively in Japan, winning the GHC Junior Heavyweight Championship in Pro Wrestling Noah and the IWGP Junior Heavyweight Tag Team Championship in New Japan Pro-Wrestling. He won numerous titles on the independent circuit, including two PWG World Championships and the FIP Heavyweight Championship and the wXw World Heavyweight Championship once each.
Danielson again signed with WWE in 2009, but was fired for three months after an incident in 2010. Upon his return, he went on to win the WWE Championship four times, the World Heavyweight Championship once, and the United States and Intercontinental Championships once each. He also won the WWE Tag Team Championship (as part of Team Hell No with Kane) and the SmackDown Tag Team Championship (with Erick Rowan), becoming WWE's 26th Triple Crown Champion and 15th Grand Slam Champion. He also won the 2011 Money in the Bank ladder match and the "Superstar of the Year" award at the 2013 Slammy Awards, and headlined several major WWE events, including the 2014 and 2021 editions of their flagship event WrestleMania.
Danielson retired from wrestling in 2016 due to injuries arising from multiple concussions, which led to seizures and a brain lesion. He then took on a non-wrestling role for WWE as the on-screen General Manager of SmackDown and remained in the role until 2018, when he was unexpectedly cleared by doctors to return to in-ring competition. His WWE contract expired in May 2021, and he made his AEW debut four months later.
Early life
Bryan Lloyd Danielson was born in Aberdeen, Washington, on May 22, 1981, the son of therapist Darlene and lumberjack Donald "Buddy" Danielson. His mother was pregnant with him for over 10 months. He has an older sister named Billie Sue. His father's job moved the family to Vernal, Utah, then to Albany, Oregon, before they returned to Aberdeen. His parents divorced over his father's alcoholism when Danielson was a child, though they remained on good terms. During his childhood, Danielson was shown a professional wrestling magazine by a friend, and has been a fan of wrestling ever since. He considered himself shy and antisocial as a child and teenager, but still competed in sports such as football and track and field. To help his mother support the family after his parents' divorce, he and his sister both delivered newspapers as children, and later worked at McDonald's as teenagers. For a brief time in high school, he lived with his father in Castle Rock, Washington.
Professional wrestling career
Early career (1999–2000) During his sophomore year of high school, Danielson decided to pursue a pro wrestling career and attempted to train at Dean Malenko's wrestling school in Florida. However, by the time Danielson graduated from Aberdeen High School in 1999, Malenko's school had closed down. Following a friend's suggestion, he instead began training under Rudy Gonzalez and veteran wrestler Shawn Michaels at the Texas Wrestling Academy (TWA) in San Antonio, Texas. After his wrestling debut in December 1999, he toured Japan with Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling (FMW) alongside Lance Cade, a fellow trainee from the TWA, and they competed in several tag team matches. He won the TWA Tag Team Championship with Spanky on March 21, 2000, defeating The Board Of Education (Jeromy Sage & Ruben Cruz), but they dropped the titles back to Jeremy Sage and Ruben Cruz two weeks later.