WWE: Ranking the Top 10 Greatest Promos of All Time

The Miz Puts Daniel Bryan on Blast

At this point in time, Daniel Bryan was the General Manager of SmackDown Live after being forced to retire from in-ring competition. During this time, SmackDown was doing all it could to be different from its counterpart of Monday Night Raw. One of the things they were doing at the time that a lot of people enjoyed was the post show known as Talking Smack.

Talking Smack was a great outlet for guys on the roster to cut loose in a less scripted environment, and have a great opportunity to develop their character even if they weren’t on Television that week. And that’s where Miz comes in. As Miz would tell the story, he was not booked to be on TV that week due to SmackDown debuting their new Tag Team and Women’s Championships.

Miz, furious about not being booked even though he is the Intercontinental Champion, would demand to be on Talking Smack after the show. Miz would sit down for the interview with Renee Young and Daniel Bryan, and be set off by Daniel Bryan telling him that he wrestles like a “coward.”

This would set Miz on an epic rant on Daniel Bryan, telling him the reason he wrestles the way that he does is that he can do it year long with no injuries. Miz would turn this around, calling Bryan the coward for promising the fans he’d come back, even though he still hadn’t. Miz would tell Bryan that if he loves wrestling so much and wants to wrestle, why not just quit and go work on the indies?

Bryan would eventually have enough of this and walk off set as Miz would continue to go off on Bryan and the fans for calling him a coward. He would close this with an up close and personal rant looking into the camera, calling those competing for the Women’s, Tag Team, and WWE Championships “little kids,” while he holds the most relevant and prestigious Championship.

This promo was so great for many reasons, but one of them was the pure shock of it. I don’t think anyone tuning in to this episode of Talking Smack was expecting to see this sort of promo, and it really caught everyone by surprise.

Miz is one of those guys who is an elite level talker, and he really showed that off here. Miz genuinely seemed personally insulted during this promo, and really probably was. Him being able to channel that and produce the sort of promo he did here is truly a piece of art.

The other thing I really loved about this promo was how important Miz made the Intercontinental Championship feel here. He was on a mission during this time to bring that title back to the prestige that he felt it deserved, and I would say he did a very good job of doing that throughout his reign.