5 Potential Opponents to Defeat Daniel Bryan for the WWE Championship
On March 20th, 2018, the announcement of Daniel Bryan being medically cleared to compete in a WWE ring was revealed. After years of waiting to make his return, Daniel Bryan's dreams had finally come true, with him finally being allowed to wrestle after some had thought he wouldn't be able to perform again.
Bryan's return was a huge moment, and it led to a tag team match at Wrestlemania 34 as he teamed up with Shane McMahon to defeat Kevin Owens and Sami Zayn. However, after that, Bryan was immediately put into a lackluster rivalry with Big Cass, where despite Bryan gaining the victory in all matches, his momentum was ruined heavily.
On the November 13th, 2018 episode of Smackdown, we witnessed Bryan turn heel as he had hit AJ Styles with a low blow in a match before covering him to win the WWE Championship. It was a shocking moment for some, but the outcome was that we received a "New Daniel Bryan."
So here are 5 potential opponents that could possibly dethrone Bryan to win the WWE Championship.
#5. AJ Styles
The Phenomenal One is a currently a two time WWE Champion, and he is set to face Bryan in a quest to regain his WWE Championship at the Royal Rumble 2019. We have already seen the duo face each other before many times on Smackdown, where they exchanged victories, and they also faced each other at TLC 2019 in a match where Bryan managed to gain the victory again.
With AJ Styles being the top face of Smackdown, there is the chance that we might see him win the WWE Championship for the third time. There is no doubt that Vince McMahon is high on The Phenomenal One after we witnessed Vince wanting to see "The Animal" in AJ Styles on the December 25th, 2018 edition of Smackdown.
This led to a huge moment where Styles brutally attacked McMahon, and it was a moment that Vince clearly seemed to love. This was exactly what the CEO of the WWE wanted to see, and it paves the way for a more aggressive and brutal AJ Styles to face Daniel Bryan at Royal Rumble.
However, it seems highly likely that we won't see Styles win at Rumble due to the fact that Bryan has only just recently won the title, but with Styles continuing to be booked very strongly, you can't rule out a victory for The Phenomenal One so that he can reclaim his WWE Championship at Royal Rumble 2019, because after all, Smackdown Live is the house that AJ Styles built.