Will Ospreay vs. Bryan Danielson Is a Lot of Things, But Is it Great?

March 3, 2024 was, in some ways, the end of professional wrestling for me. Sitting in the nosebleeds of the Greensboro Coliseum, I wept joyously over the retirement match of Sting, the wrestler who main evented the first wrestling show I ever went to. I got to interview Sting for Pro Wrestling Illustrated, we talked about how my dad took me to that show, about fatherhood, and then his sons played a central role in the match, as did Atlanta’s Plaza Theatre, one of my favorite hangout spots in Georgia, which I had just moved from. Also on the card was the final confrontation between Bryan Danielson and Eddie Kingston, not only the last match I’m likely to see Bryan Danielson wrestle in person, but a rematch of the bout that, way back in 2010, got me to go to my first independent wrestling show. 

That both matches were brilliant and that AEW Revolution 2024 was a perfect evening and introduction to the major leagues of the great sport of professional wrestling for my boyfriend is almost beyond the point: wrestling may be a mass medium, but one of the great tricks mass mediums play on the individual consumer is convincing them that the universes they conjure into being are somehow exclusively for them, and it doesn’t get much more “For Colette Arrand” than wrapping the story of a childhood favorite wrestler and the saga that drew me into wrestling as an adult on the same night. 

It took months for me to figure this out, checking in on shows here and there long after I stopped watching weekly, trying and failing to wrangle this or that wrestler for an interview, not finding the joy in a thing that has reliably brought me joy for most of my life. I’d call it burnout except that I am clearly not burnt out — I love going to my local indie, I listen to podcasts, I watch wrestling every day, but outside of BIG EGG, I’m not obligated to watch or puzzle over or write about any of it. As I found out over the course of Joseph’s picks for Hot Takes Month, that pressure creeps back in the closer to current whatever we’re watching for this website gets. 

This is, I know, extremely goofy. I’ve written recently about how I’m not even all that large of a fish in the extremely small pond that is critical inquiry into professional wrestling, but I am incapable of taking the pond’s existence or my place in it for granted. Wrestling means something to me. Moreover, I think it means something to the world. But every now and again, even the biggest sickos in the game find a logical jumping off point, even if only for a moment. For once, one offered itself to me that wasn’t a matter of politics or hard feelings about my former job or wrestlers I dislike thriving or creative decisions that made me feel some embarrassment for my insistence upon wrestling as an artform as capable of astonishment as poetry, but was, instead, an evening that was beautiful and affirming of everything I loved about this great sport. 

Then, like a fool, I kept watching.

Honestly, I wish this match had as much weight to it as the last sentence suggested it might. I wrote the intro before rewatching the match as a means of setting the stakes for myself, as if any one match between a wrestler I love and a wrestler I've never appreciated could be the reason I find myself disenchanted with wrestling, or, for that matter, that a positive revisit could bring me back around to it. There isn't a podcaster or wrestling personality whose whole income doesn't revolve around wrestling who is brave enough to say this, but thankfully I am a music publicist so I will go ahead and do so: Sometimes you just don't like the goddamn things you love and nobody's at fault.

That said, I had a real journey arriving to this point. Having worked the indies in some small capacity during a time in which every small indie was trying to beat PWG to the punch with this or that first time ever match, I think "Dream Match" branding is strictly for dorks, especially when there's nothing complicated or absurd to the notion of the match at hand. Bryan Danielson vs. Blue Panther in Arena Mexico? That's a dream match. Bryan Danielson vs. Will Ospreay? I'll cop to my biases being something of a factor, but their being contracted to the same promotion takes a bit of the romance out of the whole thing. The only complication here is the issue of who, of the two, is the Best Wrestler in the World, and that being a subjective title no wrestling match would likely cause anyone to change allegiances over, unless you're into both wrestlers, "Dream Match" is a bit of a stretch, to say nothing of "Best Match Ever."

I spent a lot of time last year annoyed by how quickly many hailed this match as just that, as it didn't make me feel much of anything in the moment. Given how passionate I am in my praise of one wrestler and the high degree of skepticism with which I view the other, it's kind of incredible that I landed on ennui, but not much of a shock that I slid into outright annoyance: when you're not having fun with something, it kind of sucks to see others having fun with it.

We're a year removed from the match now, and while I don't recall seeing anything in that period of time rise to challenge its acclaim in the pages of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Twitter, or Cagematch, the constant churn of professional wrestling and the ecosystem in which wrestling criticism exists means that even an accolade like "Best Match Ever" doesn't keep a match in the zeitgeist the way a great film or album released in March or April will continue to get press throughout the year. Blogs, tweets, podcasts — everything except Justin Roberts' "Absolute Dream Match" billing and the incessant chanting of the St. Louis crowd has faded into oblivion. It's just me, the Best in the World, and "the best in the world" in here. I neither despaired over what I was watching, nor did I find reengaging with the match to be a healing experience. It was wrestling. It was a lot of wrestling, but unlike Tam Nakano vs. Giulia, it didn't inspire a moment of existential crisis.

With the exception of Bryan Danielson, everybody in the arena is a little sweaty for this to be a classic. That’s fine, and I think the early atmosphere even works to tell the story of how different Ospreay and Danielson are as wrestlers. With St. Louis losing its shit, the two circle the ring, Ospreay turning to soak in and egg on the cheers while Danielson remains locked on Ospreay. Danielson cracks a smile now and again, but however special this kind of fervor is, he's experienced it before. Ospreay's wrestled to huge crowds before, but there's a difference in how this level of anticipation expresses itself in America and Japan, and I'd wager to guess that no Ospreay match in Japan was anticipated as this, even if I'm still gonna grumble about dream matches as a concept.

I'm not a fan, but Don Callis is great on the call here, pointing out his charge’s exuberance and Danielson’s skill at turning that against a wrestler just as Danielson responds to an OSPREAY chant loud enough that he has to pause and take stock of it by taking its recipient down with a headlock takeover. Perfect, simple response to an audience that’s already in overdrive by both wrestlers, working holds and counterholds while they settle in for the meat of the thing. There’s a moment where Danielson takes Ospreay’s side and looks like he’s considering driving a knee into it, only to reconsider and go for the bow and arrow, which leads to a standoff. It’s a smart, thoughtful opening movement that, rather than being at odds with their audience, attempts to work their raw emotion into the story they’re trying to tell beyond the its obvious trappings.

Once they’ve succeeded, they open things up a bit, Danielson following up his headlock takedown with some open palm strikes to Ospreay’s ear, sprinkling strike attempts in as they counter in and out of each other’s holds. Danielson’s scouting out the Oscutter and Ospreay’s roll out of the LeBell Lock both look great, as do the kicks Ospreay has to block as Danielson throws them, but by the time Danielson rolls out of the way of a pair of wild Ospreay kicks and we hit our third or fourth staredown, I wish they’d hurry up and hit second gear. When they start landing significant strikes, the crowd pops and claps, and it’s nice to hear something that isn’t a chant. It is also nice, as always, to hear the rough smack of muscle on flesh when Danielson’s strikes land. 

Something I truly loved about Bryan Danielson’s AEW run is how complex the company allowed his offensive attack to be. Not that he wasn’t a tremendous offensive wrestler in WWE, but that promotion's approach to wrestling is built on recognizable momentum swings and familiar moves, a narrative built around pops as opposed to fighting logic. After Ospreay goes for a springboard double axe handle and gets kicked in the stomach for his trouble, Danielson notices Ospreay pointing to his side and goes to work on the target his opponent has offered up. Kitchen sink. Knee strike. All smart “wear your opponent down” stuff that the Great Submission Wrestler would do, but then he takes it up a level, tying Ospreay into a leglock and turning him over so he can take free shots at Ospreay’s stomach or head, whichever is free. They are mean, too, as are his follow-up stomach punches in the corner, but he’s still playing it down the line, no hint of malice beyond wanting to prove he’s the better wrestler. It recontextualizes Ospreay’s more dazzling attempts at offense, like the handspring kick he cuts off the Daniel Bryan backflip/running attack sequence with, into desperation, something he needs to work because he’s at his limit and will otherwise break.

A lot of stuff I’ve historically disliked about Ospreay begins to rear its head during this portion of the match, too. He’s all over the place on selling his abdomen, which is only really notable because after his initial oversell to make it an issue worth pointing out, he does some really lovely stuff while Danielson is straight-up wearing him out. But when he’s done with that shit, he is done, shrugging off a gut punch to do hit Danielson with an enziguri to get him outside the ring, then rolling to his feet immediately after hitting a corkscrew moonsault to the outside for the sake of the camera shot. The number of spots Ospreay does specifically so he ends up in something of a hero pose has been the worst aspect of his in-ring work over the course of his career, the one instance where I think even the most odious trolls who’d call him a “video game wrestler” have a point because it’s very much drawn from Assassin’s Creed.

I think his constant plays to the audience are still wonky and show where his priorities lie in constructing a match, letting you know that he’s creating a moment instead of just doing the damn thing. Also, it didn’t really strike me until this match, but a lot of his Best in the World gimmick revolves around doing moves made famous by other Best in the World candidates, even beyond the King’s Road stuff. I know he’s a fan and it’s a nice shout, but it’s weird that he regularly utilizes the Phenomenal Forearm and Styles Clash considering that AJ Styles is still an active wrestler using those moves in high profile matches in WWE.

The reason I’m thinking about this is admittedly a bit unfair, but every time I get an ad for that Logan Paul show on Max, it could not be more obvious that Paul is WWE’s way of saying “We have Will Ospreay at home … and he’s a global celebrity.” The way Paul hot-swaps moves and spots from other wrestlers and matches into the miserable ballet his matches constitute is rightly called out by folks who have no reason to say dumb shit like “well, you have to give Logan Paul credit for being so good so quickly” is something Will Ospreay is guilty of to a lesser degree. When he does it, it’s a shout out to his roots as a fan, his legitimate love of the game, and it ends up feeling far more organic than what Paul does because Ospreay can actually wrestle — you can see the thought behind what he does, even if you don’t agree with it. 

Why it’s a problem is because Will Ospreay has been wrestling for 14 years, and it still feels like he’s searching for his own identity. Maybe that’s a bit on how turbulent the NJPW main event scene was when he was hovering around the IWGP Heavyweight Championship, his stables and finishers formed and created in response to the identities of other wrestlers, and maybe it’s a bit on how awash wrestlers of his generation are in every possible form of wrestling and can, supposing you’re as much of a freak athlete as Ospreay is, cherry pick from the best. Again, there’s too much thought to what he’s doing for me to call it emulation, but it doesn’t feel necessary or clever or all that much like him, whereas what Danielson brings to the table indelibly bears his mark. Like, there is a signature to Danielson’s punches in this match. I don’t often feel that way with Ospreay, and on the moments where I do – when he follows Danielson into the ring to hit him with an elbow blow to the neck from the top rope – he takes a moment to do one of the other things that take me out of his work even when he is operating at his peak. 

Is this peak Ospreay? For me, probably, but that’s not the story I’m interested in. What’s of more interest to me, now that Bryan Danielson has retired from full-time competition, is where this fits in from what I’ve seen of his 2024, in which he managed to call back to his past, work through a remarkable amount of his bucket list, set-up the immediate term future for AEW, and offer a taste of what the next five to seven years of wrestling would look like were he able to maintain full-time schedule. It’s not this match that’s tantalizing, but Danielson’s continuing evolution in a wrestling landscape that is ceaselessly changing. One of Bret Hart’s biggest regrets about his time WCW, besides signing to WCW, was how infrequently he was able to test his skills against a roster that was unreasonably stacked. There’s some great stuff in there, particularly against Chris Benoit and Booker T, but if you look at the WCW roster in 98-99 and think of the sheer amount of TV and PPV time they had, it’s criminal how few interesting or unexpected or even fresh opponents he was given. Beyond Booker, Benoit, Goldberg, and Sting, there’s Fit Finlay and Will Sasso and that’s kind of it if you’re looking for deep cuts.

The romance of Bryan Danielson’s last year in wrestling is that he made an issue of testing himself against as many different wrestlers, as many different styles of wrestling, as he could. There is something for everyone from his 9/3/23 return to his 10/12/24 exit, from bloodbaths to epics to lucha multi-mans to freak shows, some light and some heavy journeys into the hearts of the sort of men who are called to do this sort of thing for a living. I would call this an epic. I would also say that it’s kind of light. The in-built atmosphere is doing a lot of the emotional work here, which is an accomplishment in and of itself, and the Bushiroad epic style and pace suit it well, but it’s my least favorite style Danielson worked that year, and Ospreay’s interpretation of it has never really spoken to me. It’s an exhausting match before Danielson’s top rope tiger suplex triggers an unrelenting bomb exchange, and even when Ospreay finally starts wrestling for a win, there isn’t a really meaty nearfall until Danielson hits the knee and manages to immediately go for the pin. 

The best stuff, to me, is the moment-to-moment scrappiness, when the two are just hand fighting, sneaking in punches and elbows, looking for tiny advantages here and there, but in a match where a shoulder capture suplex results in the victim fighting spiriting his way up immediately for his own finisher, who could possibly care about Danielson’s gut punches or Ospreay gutting things out to elbow Danielson in the face as many times as he could? 

The finish, with Ospreay and Danielson charging at each other like two bulls with their respective taunts and strikes before Ospreay takes it home with the Tiger Driver and a final Hidden Blade, takes the theory behind Ricochet and Ospreay’s BOSJ posedown to an extreme I could have never imagined. Without the play for the all-time staredown highlight reel it works, but I think you’d also have to cut the Tiger Driver and the final Hidden Blade to really bring it home. There’s a whole story that’s told around the Tiger Driver to come, but now you’re talking about the narrative necessity of three seconds of a match … at which point why not pin the motherfucker immediately and really ratchet up the tension of the moment by forcing Ospreay to reckon with the fact that the doctor has been called in to check on things? You’re left with a good match that has a sour finish, one that leans in too far towards Ospreay’s instincts for how to create a lasting impression than Danielson’s and suffers for the spectacle. There will come a day when a Will Ospreay match makes me feel something more than frustration for having spent so much time on a Will Ospreay match, but today ain’t it.

Rating: *** & 1/2