In an interview hyping the premiere of his ABC game show “Downfall,” Chris Jericho tells Fanhouse that Bryan Danielson’s WWE release will be a “blow” to the NXT group.
Although the NXT group’s scripted ambushes work “because it’s great right now when you have seven animals ganging up on one guy…that’s a great visual,” Jericho explains, “At some point, somebody’s going to have to wrestle. And Wade Barrett is good but Danielson was the gem and could go out there and have five star matches with anybody. And they don’t have that right now. That’s the one thing I think is a little bit of a weak link in the NXT chain is the fact that they don’t have that. So losing Bryan is going to be, it’s going to be a blow.”
Regarding rumors of the release, Jericho supports claims that his “tie choke” on Justin Roberts factored into the decision. He notes, “I think he got caught in a crossfire. I think he was the scapegoat for somebody getting angry at the choke thing. Obviously, that’s been a hot button topic for years. I don’t think he did it maliciously. I don’t think Vince (McMahon) fired him maliciously. I think it was one of those things where hands were tied and somebody got angry from somewhere and they had to make a knee jerk decision to do that.”
Hopeful that Danielson will be brought back soon, Jericho acknowledges, I worked with him for about six minutes on the first NXT but it was a great match and I would love to work with him more and I’m sure I’m not the only one who feels that way.”