On how he went from Bryan Danielson to Daniel Bryan: "For years, I wrestled on the independents as Bryan Danielson, which happens to be my real name. So, the creative geniuses at the WWE -- to own the intellectual property -- have switched my name around to Daniel Bryan.
"It could have been much worse because they left it up to me to come up with a list of names as far as what I could have been. I did not come up with Daniel Bryan, William Regal did. I actually had a list of names that included Buddy Peacock and Lloyd Bonaire. [Laughs.]
On being more injury-prone on the independents on the Jerry Lawler incident: "Oh, yeah, I did so much stupid stuff and on top of that, there are no doctors there. Or, not really good ones. For example: the whole issue that happened with Jerry Lawler where he had the heart attack -- Dr. Sampson is an amazing doctor. I think they gave us a statistic that maybe one out of 260 people that go through what Jerry Lawler did make it through it.
"... I'm not exactly sure on the details of it but Dr. Sampson was literally 5 feet away and there's all this emergency staff and all kinds of stuff. So, you have the best medical staff there. On top of that, we have trainers and masseuses at television.
"So, if you have injuries and stuff, they kind of take care of you. On the independents, you don't even have a shower. You're driving 200 miles all sweaty, still in your spandex. You're huddled next to two other dudes, also in spandex. [Laughs.]"
On being a smaller wrestler, wrestling much bigger men: "I actually detached my rhetina against this 350 pound Japanese man who was punching me in the face. But the first time I was in there with Big Show, I really had the feeling of being a helpless baby.
"Before I was ever signed with WWE, I was doing a tryout wih them in 2005 or something like that. My friend Brian Kendrick was just standing outside the ring. Big Show was in the ring, reaches over, grabs him by the wrists and lifts him up like it was a lateral raise over the top rope and sets him in the ring.
"Granted, Brian Kendrick was only 175 pounds. But, when you think of lat-raising that...I lat raise maybe 25 pounds and it's tough. I'm doing my sets at the gym like, 'Ahh, I'm so strong!' And then there's Big Show who is lifting a human with one arm over the top rope."
On being vegan and having to ditch veganism while on the road: "When I got signed by WWE in 2009, I had a litany of health issues. So, my doctor recommended that I go vegan. ... Oh, my gosh, it's so tough. The doctor who had me do it gave me a lot of books. 'Read this, read this, read this, because especially for your needs, you're going to need a lot of nutritional help.'
"Actually, I just recently stopped being vegan because I developed a severe soy intolerance. When I'm at home, I still eat vegan because it's easy to do stuff at home when you're making it yourself. But the only vegan stuff at a lot of places is tofu stuff, all soy-based products. I need protein. [Laughs.]
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