WWE News: Daniel Bryan Still Wants A Match With Shawn Michaels — Will It Happen?
Ever since former WWE World Heavyweight Champion Daniel Bryan’s career started to really take off in 2013, wrestling fans all over the world have wanted to see Shawn Michaels, who trained Daniel Bryan, return to the ring and take on his former student at WrestleMania.
There’s no question that a match between Michaels and Bryan, who are the best in-ring performers of their respective eras, would have the potential to be one of the greatest matches in WWE history, and even though the teacher vs. student storyline has been done several times in movies, television shows, and wrestling, it’s unlikely that a Michaels vs. Bryan feud would be anything like previous trainer vs. trainee wrestling storylines.
Before last year’s WrestleMania 30, Daniel Bryan was hoping for a match with Shawn Michaels at the event. However, he was told by Vince McMahon that he would be wrestling Sheamus on the show, which left him extremely disappointed. Bryan goes into the details of his pre-WrestleMania 30 meeting with Vince McMahon in his Just Say YES! YES! YES! DVD that was released earlier this year.
Bryan hoping to hear that he was facing Michaels at WrestleMania 30 was obviously before WWE changed their plans for the event, and things ended up working out for Bryan, as he was put into the main event of the show, where he won the WWE World Heavyweight Championship.
Nearly two years later, Daniel Bryan still wants a match with Shawn Michaels, and during an interview where Bryan was promoting the upcoming release of the WWE 2K16 video game, he was asked about potentially wrestling “HBK,” and said that he would love to, but he thinks that there’s almost no way that Michaels will come out of retirement, no matter who his proposed opponent is.
“I would love to wrestle Shawn Michaels, but would Shawn Michaels love to wrestle me? Probably not. I think he’s too busy hunting. I don’t think he would want to stop hunting just to come back and wrestle me.”
Earlier this year, following the release of his book Wrestling For My Life, Shawn Michaels appeared on WWE Hall of Famer Jim Ross’s podcast, and he confirmed that WWE has already made him an offer to come back and wrestle at next year’s WrestleMania 32 in his home state of Texas. Michaels didn’t go into detail about the offer, nor did he say who WWE wanted him to wrestle. However, he did say that he declined their offer, and that he’s not interested in returning to the ring.
Michaels then later did an interview with Bill Apter, and named the three guys that he would want to wrestle if he returned, and Daniel Bryan was one of the three. The other two were Seth Rollins and CM Punk.
In an interview that WWE put up on their YouTube page last year, Shawn Michaels went into detail on why he’s staying retired, saying that he’s wise enough not to come back and try to top his retirement match with The Undertaker, because, in his mind, it was the perfect match, and there’s no way he can top it.
“Undertaker and I are two company figures, that have seen a lot come and go, and that [WrestleMania] match was special. That’s why it’s been so easy for me to not desire to come back. I don’t think I’ve ever done a perfect thing in my entire life, but, I’m at least wise enough to know there are things that I’ve done that shouldn’t be messed with.”
So, with Daniel Bryan’s wrestling future in doubt, and Shawn Michaels being as dead-set against returning as someone can be, it look like this will be one of the dream matches that WWE fans will never get, despite how many offers WWE makes, and how badly Daniel Bryan wants it to happen.
[Images via WWE]
