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The main event of the April 25 edition of ROH on HDNet will feature "American Dragon" Bryan Danielson vs. Tyler Black. Danielson is the dean of ROH. He main-evented the first ROH show in February 2002 and has been a top star ever since. Let's take a walk through Danielson's stellar ROH career:

- A Founding Father of ROH: Danielson main-evented the first ROH show, The Era of Honor Begins, taking on Christopher Daniels and Low Ki in a three-way match. The match was a masterpiece that set the tone for ROH as a promotion where the in-ring product would be first rate. The three wrestlers in the match became known as the Founding Fathers of ROH.

- Elevating Other Stars: Following the first show, Danielson started an angle with Spanky (a/k/a The Brian Kendrick) over who was the best graduate of the Sean Michaels Texas Wrestling Academy. Unfortunately, the angle was cut short when Spanky left ROH for Japan and then WWE. Danielson then spent the next couple of months feuding with Christopher Daniels's heel faction, The Prophecy. Danielson put The Prophecy over to build them up for their later feuds with other babyfaces, and never really got over on them himself.

Late in 2002, Danielson had a pair of fantastic matches with Paul London and AJ Styles over the Number One Contender's Trophy for the ROH Title. These matches were both awesome, and significantly elevated London and Styles in ROH. Early in 2003, Danielson helped establish Samoa Joe with a pair of matches during the build to Joe winning the ROH Title. These early Danielson-Joe matches unfortunately do not measure up to their later encounters, mostly because they were trying to make Joe look like a monster in advance of his title run and lacked much of the drama of their later encounters.

Danielson then took a six month hiatus from ROH, but not before putting over London in a tremendous two-out-of-three falls match at The Epic Encounter in Philadelphia.

- Part-Time Run: The six months Danielson spent away from ROH in the middle of 2003 would turn out to be his longest absence from the promotion to date. He returned on a part-time basis in late 2003 with a phenomenal match against A.J. Styles at Main Event Spectacles in Elizabeth, N.J. Since he was part-time, Danielson was not involved in any major angles in late 2003 or early 2004, but still managed to have some great matches against the likes of Jay Briscoe and C.M. Punk.

In June of 2004, Danielson won the first ever Survival of the Fittest one night tournament. His main event showdown with ROH-rookie Austin Aries launched Aries to main event status, and set up a phenomenal two-out-of-three falls rematch between the two at Testing the Limit in August. As a result of winning Survival of the Fittest, Danielson got a World Title match against Samoa Joe at Glory By Honor III in September, and the two had a great match (far superior to their matches in 2003).

- Feud with Homicide: Late in 2004, Danielson returned to full-time action for ROH and started a feud with Homicide's heel faction, The Rottweilers. This led to a best-of-five series between Danielson and Homicide with a different stipulation in each match, culminating in an incredible steel cage match in May 2005 at Final Showdown in Dayton, Ohio. Danielson changed his look during this feud, going with a bald-headed long-bearded ascetic look that symbolized the psychological turmoil he was going through from Homicide's tormenting.

- Winning the World Title: After winning his feud with Homicide, Danielson got a title shot the next night against champion Austin Aries. After losing to Aries, there was an angle where Danielson snapped and stormed out of the promotion.

Four months later, he returned a changed man, now clean shaven to symbolize his break from the crazed maniac that his feud with Homicide had made him. He also unveiled new entrance music, the now iconic Final Countdown by eighties synth-metal greats Europe. Danielson captured the World Title from James Gibson in his return match at Glory By Honor 4 in Long Island, N.Y.

- Early World Title Run: Early in Danielson's title run, ROH ran an angle where he put out a series of open contracts for World Title matches. The promotion then brought in a series outside talents to face Danielson, most notably Naomichi Marifuji from Japan at Final Battle 2005 and Lance Storm at Better Than Our Best. Danielson also feuded with Roderick Strong and members of Prince Nana's Embassy faction early in his title reign.

The open contract angle led to the start of the ROH-CZW feud when Chris Hero of CZW took up one of the open contracts. After this, Danielson was mostly uninvolved with the CZW feud until the penultimate Cage of Death match between the stars of the two promotions. There he turned heel with a cheap shot on Samoa Joe's knee. Danielson had been gradually turning heel for a while, but he sealed it here by deliberately injuring Joe to eliminate him as a challenger for the World Title even though it put ROH at a disadvantage in the Cage of Death. This was part of a fantastic conclusion to a fantastic angle.

- Later World Title Run: In the latter half of 2006, Danielson feuded with Samoa Joe, building on the events in the Cage of Death, as well as Pure Champion Nigel McGuiness. His matches with McGuiness in the late summer were must-see classics. Unfortunately, Danielson then suffered a shoulder injury in a title defense against Colt Cabana on August 26 in Chicago. Amazingly, he still managed to wrestle to an hour draw with Cabana after suffering the injury early in the match.

Danielson's shoulder injury limited his title defenses in the fall, but he still managed to have a phenomenal match with KENTA at Glory By Honor Night 2 in New York City. However, the blow off cage match of Danielson's feud with Samoa Joe was hurt by Danielson's injury limitations, and his title defenses became more infrequent. He finally dropped the title to Homicide at Final Battle 2006, and took a couple of months off to heal.

- Return After Injury: After a five month absence to heal up his shoulder, Danielson returned in May 2007. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, and the fans gave him a huge babyface reaction when he returned. That summer and fall he had a heated feud with World Champion Takeshi Morishima. This would continue after Morishima dropped the title to Nigel McGuiness and not ultimately be resolved until Final Battle 2008. Danielson also chased McGuiness for the title through much of 2008, and the feud culminated in a spectacular match on the Rising Above pay-per-view that aired in January 2009.

Watching Bryan Danielson develop in ROH since 2002 has been one of the greatest pleasures of following ROH. In 2002, he was already a great in-ring worker, but his promos were weak. Now his promos are outstanding, and he has only gotten better in the ring. He is constantly advancing his style, and his psychology and fan interactions have gone from good to outstanding as well.

Danielson is now the Shawn Michaels of ROH. His matches are consistently outstanding, and he doesn't seem to need the World Title in order to have tremendous credibility with the fans. If the rumors about Danielson leaving ROH to pursue a MMA career when his contract expires are true, his loss will be a major blow to ROH and the entire wrestling industry.

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