10 Superstars who never reached their full potential

#9 Daniel Bryan

Daniel Bryan

The only wrestler on this list whose comeback is even remotely possible, Daniel Bryan is a star whose best years seem to have been robbed from him by injury. His high-flying style was simply too much for his body to take and he did not really get to live up to even a quarter of the obvious potential that he had.

Coming into WWE as possibly one of the most beloved indy darlings, Bryan Danielson, better known now by his WWE name Daniel Bryan, he did not immediately make a mark on the proceedings. Those hardcore fans who knew who he was, loved him for it, but to the majority, he was still a non-entity, a wrestler with a scrawny body who would never amount to much. They should have known better.

Daniel Bryan may not be the strongest or largest wrestler, but there is no doubting his unmitigated charisma. His time as a Heel World Champion and later as a part of Team Hell No, which gave rise to a fervour that WWE could never have predicted. Sorry Rock, Daniel Bryan was the new People’s Champion. The only problem? He was hardly ever Champion.

WWE is not a company known for their faith in slimmer superstars. They tend to go for muscled monsters, and while some work out well, like Braun Strowman, the others are just experiments that went awry, such as Heidenreich.

Daniel’s injury put him on the shelf much sooner than anyone in WWE had realized, just as he had broken through the glass ceiling and it looked like WWE was set to push him. Sure, he had the Wrestlemania moment, but very soon he had to give the teary retirement speech and just like that his career was over at 34.

Since then he has become the SmackDown General Manager and it looks like he may have an in-ring return after all, but the WWE doctors were adamant that he will never be medically cleared to wrestle again. Either way, let’s hope the choices that are made are good for Daniel’s career and more importantly, his life.