Daniel Bryan talks about Roman Reigns "having it easier" than him, facing Brock Lesnar at WrestleMania 31, and more

In a recent interview with Digital Spy, former WWE World Heavyweight Champion Daniel Bryan talks about Roman Reigns “having it easier” than him, facing Brock Lesnar at WrestleMania 31, and more (like why he believes he’s so popular with the WWE Universe). Bryan will be facing off with Roman Reigns on Feb. 22 at WWE “Fastlane” to determine which superstar will head to the “Showcase of the Immortals,” WrestleMania, on March 29.

Bryan opened up the interview talking about his roller coaster of a year in 2014, and what he expects in 2015, saying,

“I honestly don’t want that kind of roller coaster! A lot of very good things happened in 2014 but a lot of very bad things happened in 2014 for me, so I would like to keep the good things happening and limit the bad things!

If I could reach some of the highs I reached last year, that would be incredible.”

He goes on to expel what he thinks his dream scenario would be when it comes to working a match at WrestleMania 31, saying,

“…my dream scenario [would be] I wrestle Brock Lesnar in the main event of WrestleMania. That, to me, would be every bit as gripping as last year’s WrestleMania was.”

Bryan also talks about his “yes” chant and why he believes he’s so popular with the fans, stating,

“Part of the secret is people love saying ‘Yes!’. Even if people don’t like me, they have fun throwing their fingers in the air saying ‘Yes!’ So that is part of the secret, but another thing about John Cena and Roman Reigns – not that they’ve had an easy road to the top in WWE, John Cena was nearly fired before he became WWE Champion for the first time – but they probably had a much easier path than I did.

They are more of the prototypical WWE Superstars than I am, so when I came in I don’t think any of the top WWE people looked at me as, ‘Oh this is somebody who we look at as being a future main eventer for WrestleMania’ or even a future WWE Champion, or even a future Intercontinental Champion!

They looked at me like ‘Oh, this guy is good at what he does, he’s a good little wrestler, he can go out there and he can perform – he might get a little bit popular, but he’s never going to be The Guy’. Whereas somebody like Roman Reigns or John Cena – people look at them and they think, ‘Oh, this guy could be The Guy, let’s see what happens’, and that was never me.”

Bryan discusses the circumstances that took him to the main event of WrestleMania XXX as well, saying he was originally supposed to face Sheamus, and that CM Punk quitting the company also had some influence in the decision,

“Two major things happened that caused me to be in the spot I was at last year’s Wrestlemania: the fans rejected Batista as being the big returning hero that WWE wanted him to be and CM Punk left. These are two great big gaping holes that now have to be filled at WrestleMania. If you main event WrestleMania with just Batista and Randy Orton, the WrestleMania crowd is not going to like that. Then CM Punk was supposed to wrestle Triple H, and now you have this opening for Triple H.

So those were the two major things that caused me to be in the spot that I was for WrestleMania and neither of them had anything to do with me per se! I didn’t go out there and do anything, the fans took control of the one thing [Batista’s heel turn] and then Punk left and that took control of the other thing, and it’s like, ‘Well, what do we do for these two problems? Ah, well – there’s Daniel Bryan!’ So yeah that’s what happened, Punk was very accurate in what he said.”

When asked if “smart fans” are ruining the business, Bryan had this to say about it (like the fine readers of sites like WrestlingRumors.net! Keep on doing what you’re doing!),

“I honestly don’t think that it’s that different. A similar thing [to the 2014 Royal Rumble] happened at Royal Rumble in 1994, with Bret Hart and Lex Luger. Lex Luger was the guy that the WWE was really behind, they did the whole ‘Lex Express’ thing. But the fans wanted Bret Hart, and so it’s interesting that that kind of thing has happened before, it’ll happen again.

But I don’t know if the fans are ruining the fun!? For me they’re making it really exciting! Because honestly, without the fans doing what they did last year, I would have never main evented WrestleMania. The fans are the reason why I even got that opportunity.

That was never meant to be my spot, so I encourage that sort of thing! I might change my tune if it goes against me one of these days, but as for now – I like it.”

You can read the entire interview here.

Editor’s Note:
I love Daniel Bryan. Always shoots in interviews like this. It’s awesome.