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WWE News: Daniel Bryan to Return as Smackdown GM on Tuesday

By John Canton • Published 17th June 2017
TJR Wrestling

Daniel Bryan, the current General Manager of Smackdown Live, is set to return to television this Tuesday night June 20 in Dayton, Ohio. Bryan announced his return on Twitter on Friday night.

The reason for Bryan’s absence is the birth of his daughter, Birdie Joe Danielson. Bryan’s wife, Brie Bella, gave birth to Birdie on May 9 and WWE decided to give him over one month off to be home with his wife. Bryan has actually been off TV for over two months since his last appearance was after the Superstar Shake-up took place on April 11. That’s because Bryan wanted to be home in the final weeks of Brie’s pregnancy and WWE gave him that time off.

TJR Thoughts: While I’m sure Bryan will hate to be away from his family, it’s not a rigorous travel schedule when you’re just the on-screen GM. He’ll likely fly out on Monday nights or perhaps Tuesday mornings and then be back home on Wednesday morning. If he was an active wrestler it would be a much different story as some of the guys have kids and don’t get any sort of break.

Bryan does a good job as GM and he has been missed. With that said, WWE can book good episodes of Smackdown (like this past week) where Bryan and Commissioner Shane McMahon weren’t even there. The authority figure role really isn’t a necessity. It’s just there because WWE booking is so used to it after doing it for over two decades now.

I think Bryan has been missed on Talking Smack. They have put Shane McMahon and John Bradshaw Layfield in his seat alongside Renee Young, but neither one of them is as interesting as Bryan. I look forward to his return on Talking Smack as much as being on Smackdown.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfPitsis7Qc