Bryan Danielson Says He’s At Peace With Retirement Should He Loses At AEW All In

Bryan Danielson previously revealed that he will be finishing his full-time wrestling career this year, but he intends to still participate in a handful of matches annually.

Danielson is scheduled to compete against Swerve Strickland for the AEW World Heavyweight Championship at All In. The twist is that if he loses, he will have to retire from wrestling permanently. His wrestling contract with AEW was recently concluded earlier this month.

During an interview with BBC Radio (per Fightful), Danielson stated that he is fine with retiring if he doesn’t come out on top in the title match. Here are the highlights:

On the possibility of retirement: “Yeah. Yeah, I am. If I wasn’t at peace with it, we wouldn’t have done that, right? [laughs] I also think that, I’ve been wrestling for 25 years at this point. To me, it’s now or nothing as far as winning the AEW World Championship. I came in and I said I was going to kick people’s heads in and win the AEW World Championship. I’ve kicked a lot of people’s heads in, but I haven’t won a single title.”

On losing nineteen straight matches: “I think it was Alex Marvez, he’s our guy that knows all the stats and stuff like that. [He said], I don’t know if you know this, but you’ve lost, even going back to WWE, I haven’t won a title match in my last 19 attempts. So it’s like, I’m at peace with it. My life is different now. When I was forced to retire, I wasn’t ready. 2015 was kind of my last match, but I was forced to retire in 2016. At that point, I’m 35 years old and I’m just like, this doesn’t feel right. I also didn’t have anything else to put my attention and focus towards and now I do, I have a wonderful family that I’m excited about spending time with and everything. So yeah, it’s a very different place when it’s by choice and you’re not forced.”