Pro wrestling veteran “The American Dragon” Bryan Danielson made his highly anticipated return to the company at Saturday’s AEW All In: Texas pay-per-view during the Texas Death Match main event, which featured the new AEW World Champion “Hangman” Adam Page and Jon Moxley of the Death Riders. During his return, Danielson participated in the iconic “YES!” chants with the fans. He mentioned in a panel at Starrcast over the weekend that WWE had previously requested he stop using those chants.
According to Fightful Select, this request dates back to his WWE exit in 2021 and was reiterated more recently in 2023. The report noted that Danielson mentioned he was asked not to use the chants in AEW as it could infringe on WWE’s intellectual property. While he has mostly avoided doing the chants, he filed a trademark for them in 2023. Subsequently, WWE opposed this trademark and sent him an email stating that he was infringing on their intellectual property.
The outcome of that situation remains unclear, but Danielson has occasionally used the hand gesture associated with the chants, though he has never marketed the phrase. His manager informed him about the opportunity to trademark it in 2023. As of now, there is no further information regarding communication between WWE and Danielson about the chants since then.
