Daniel Bryan Wasn’t A Fan Of Getting The SmackDown GM Job

Daniel Bryan has spent more than a year serving as the SmackDown GM, but admitted in a recent interview that he wasn't a fan of getting the job.

In an interview with Peter Rosenberg, Bryan said he originally came to WWE after retiring to only do color commentary for the Cruiserweight Classic alongside Mauro Ranallo. It was at that point when Bryan came back that he found out he would be serving as the general manager for the re-branded SmackDown Live.

"[WWE] asked me to do commentary on this thing they called the Cruiserweight Classic, which was on the WWE Network and they asked me to do that and I said, 'Yeah I would love to.' It's only 10 episodes. I only have to do it a couple of times and I get to help this young, independent talent because they were all unsigned talent at the time and I thought it was great. But then they told me, 'You're coming back as the SmackDown General Manager.' That's not a question, that's not an ask and I said, 'I don't know if I want to do this,'" Bryan said.  

Although being SmackDown's general manager isn't Bryan's cup of tea, he did admit that he enjoys some aspects of the job, but also said one thing the job has done is get Bryan that much closer to a wrestling ring.

"There are a lot of things that I love doing right now, but then one of the things that it has done is it's bringing closer to [wrestling] and made me want to wrestle more," Bryan said.

Bryan retired from in-ring action in 2016, becoming the general manager of WWE's blue brand later that year. The full interview, where Bryan also discussed concussions and being cleared by UCLA doctors to wrestle, can be heard at this link.