What’s the story?
Former WWE and TNA superstar Kurt Angle was recently interviewed by Lilian Garcia on an episode of her podcast, Making Their Way to the Ring. The conversation saw him speak about a number of things including the superstar he would like to have one last match with and how he was offered a 10-year WWE deal after he became an Olympic Gold medalist at the 1996 Summer Olympics.
In case you didn’t know…
In an announcement made by the WWE today, Kurt Angle was named as one of the inductees in the WWE Hall of Fame Class of 2017. This decision comes more than a decade after Angle left the company in 2006 and joined Total Nonstop Action Wrestling. ‘The Wrestling Machine’ has been included in many a Hall of Fame in the past including those for TNA, National Amateur Wrestling and USA Wrestling (governing body for wrestling in the United States) as well as in the International Sports Hall of Fame.
The heart of the matter
Angle told Lilian Garcia that he wanted to have one last match with none other than current WWE Champion AJ Styles. Comparing Styles to the legendary Shawn Michaels, he claimed that wrestling against ‘The Phenomenal One’ was easy as he was the one who did all the hard work. Here’s what Kurt Angle had to say:
“The one that I would really love to have a final match with right now is the kid that's the hottest right now in WWE and that's AJ Styles. I wrestled AJ in TNA, and I can tell you that he is every bit as good as Shawn Michaels.
The thing with AJ Styles, and I want everybody to realize this--you don't have to do anything with him. He does all the work. So it's an easy match for you. He flies around the ring. He does all the bumping.”
In praise of AJ Styles, ‘The Only Olympic Gold Medalist in Pro Wrestling History’ added:
“AJ is a special individual where you can go in that ring and literally just stand in the middle and he does everything for you. I have never had a match with anybody that's been so easy, and every time I worked with him it was a five star match. So AJ's that kind of talent. He only comes around once in a lifetime, so I'd really love to shake it up with him one more time if I could.”
Kurt Angle also revealed how Vince McMahon had offered him a 10-year WWE deal soon after he won a Gold medal at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, which he rejected at that point. However, he called Vince two and a half years later to ask if the deal was still on, only to be told that it wasn’t but he could come in for tryouts. According to Angle, that was a good thing for him as he may not have been as successful if he had taken the WWE’s initial offer. He stated:
“I didn't understand pro wrestling. I never watched it. I said, ‘Well you know Mr. McMahon, I'm an Olympic gold medalist. So I can never lose.’ Vince just looked down at the paper. He was like, ‘OK well ah, you go home and look at that contract’. I literally didn't hear from him again.
Actually two and a half years later I contacted him, and I said, ‘is that deal still there?’ He said, ‘no. But you can come up and try out’. Now I am grateful for that because nothing ever came easy for me. I think if I would've gotten a contract earlier, I don't think I would have had the same success as I did.”
What next?
An induction to the WWE Hall of Fame may be the beginning of a new association between Kurt Angle and the WWE and we could possibly see some in-ring action for the iconic superstar in the near future.
Sportskeeda’s Take
If someone like Goldberg, who had not wrestled for 12 years, can return to the WWE and headline a major pay-per-view like Survivor Series, Angle surely has the wherewithal to not only make a comeback but also have an extended run in the company as a wrestler.
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