It’s been well documented that there is history between The Miz and Daniel Bryan.
Now that Bryan has been cleared to return to in-ring action, it’s just a matter of time before the WWE books Miz and Bryan in a program on the blue brand. If you recall, Miz was Bryan’s coach on the very first season of the NXT reality series. They have wrestled some matches while on the main roster together.
The Miz spoke to Sports Illustrated’s Extra Mustard section last week. During that interview, he was asked about the potential feud with Bryan, which was when Miz started to make headlines.
“Daniel Bryan could have quit and went and did all his indies and did all the bingo hall things, but he wanted to fight for his dreams,” Miz said. “But that day, he didn’t fight for his dreams. He walked away like the coward he was calling me. Now you fast forward and everybody wants to see Daniel Bryan vs. The Miz, but the fact is Daniel Bryan isn’t at the caliber I am at. I am sick of people sitting there saying, ‘Daniel Bryan vs. The Miz.’ He doesn’t deserve to be in the ring with me. He’s not at the level that I am. I am showcasing top-level talent, and maybe in a year or maybe in two years, he’ll be at that level. But right now, he’s not at that level. He’s just going on the fame he had four years ago. Things changed. So when Daniel Bryan is ready, and I feel that he is ready, that’s when the match will happen. Until then, he’s not ready for me.”
Miz regularly appeared on Talking Smack while he was on the blue brand and had a famous segment with Bryan on the show. If you recall, this most memorable moment took place on the August 23rd, 2016 edition of Talking Smack. The Miz went off on Bryan after being called a coward for his wrestling style.
It was one of the most memorable promos of the past few years and fans were left wondering if it was scripted or not.
SPORTbible was able to speak with Bryan and get his response to The Miz’s comments.
“If you were to look at Miz’s matches since I’ve come back, he’s got a point,” Bryan admitted. “His match with [Seth] Rollins at Backlash, that was by far the best match on the pay-per-view. When I lost to Rusev, he wrestled Jeff Hardy – which was a fantastic match. The knock on Miz for years was that he was a great talker but so-so in the ring. This happened with [John] Cena too where people were like, ‘This guy can’t wrestle’ and while they are saying they can’t wrestle, they learn to wrestle and learn to be the best as far as in-ring stuff.”
“On the independents when I was with Ring of Honor, people thought I was the best wrestler in the world – fans would chant it and I think the fans would believe it because they want to believe that their guy is better than the WWE guys,” Bryan responded. “But never once have I considered myself the best – I look at AJ Styles and I look at Rollins right now. I say these matches with Miz were great but Rollins is in those matches – and I don’t know what is different but now he’s clicking on every level. It almost feels like it was for me in 2013 where he’s not the top guy on Raw but he’s starting to get those top guy reactions, more so than other people. You look at these people and think, ‘Ah, he’s better than me at this.’ So if Miz says I’m not on his level, I look at it like, ‘Maybe I’m not’ and that motivates me – how do I get on his level?”
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