User blog comment:Salubri/Aizen, Yamamoto and Wonderweiss/@comment-1297053-20100226160946

Bankai is seen as the pinnacle of zanpakuto mastery. Obviously it isn't the only thing that makes a shinigami good, but this battle has been hyped up into being 'if we lose here, everything is ruined forever'. If things really were that bad, then surely you would use everything you had to win? They have bankai, and they are quite obviously f**cked, so why not use it?