10 Best WWE Kurt Angle Matches

Kurt Angle is easily one of the greatest performers in the history of professional wrestling. After winning an Olympic Gold Medal in the 1996 summer games for freestyle wrestling, Kurt would eventually make his way to WWE when he signed in 1998 and made his television debut on pay-per-view at Survivor Series 1999.

Kurt would go on to become a six-time World Champion, as well as an Intercontinental, European, United States, Hardcore and Tag Team Champion, as well as winning the 2000 King of The Ring. He would have a controversial exit from WWE in 2006 and joined TNA Impact Wrestling where he had an almost equally amazing career, wrestling some of the best matches in company history and winning every available Championship on multiple occasions.

With such a successful career, Kurt has had some of the best wrestling matches in history along the way, and here we will look at the top 10 best matches that our Olympic hero has had in WWE.

Honorable Mentions:

Kurt Angle vs. Chris Benoit vs. Chris Jericho - WrestleMania 2000, Kurt Angle vs. The Rock - No Mercy 2000/No Way Out 2001, Kurt Angle vs. Chris Benoit - WrestleMania X-7/RAW 2001/Unforgiven 2002, Kurt Angle vs. Stone Cold Steve Austin - SummerSlam 2001, Kurt Angle vs. Triple H - No Way Out 2002, Kurt Angle vs Edge - Backlash/Judgement Day 2002, Kurt Angle & Chris Benoit vs. Edge & Rey Mysterio - SmackDown 2002, Kurt Angle vs. Brock Lesnar vs. Big Show - Vengeance 2003, Kurt Angle vs. Brock Lesnar - SummerSlam 2003, Kurt Angle vs. John Cena - No Mercy 2003, Kurt Angle vs. Eddie Guerrero - WrestleMania XX, Kurt Angle vs. Shawn Michaels - Vengeance 2005, Kurt Angle vs.The Undertaker - SmackDown 2006 & Kurt Angle & Ronda Rousey vs. Triple H & Stephanie McMahon - WrestleMania 34.

#10 Kurt Angle vs. The Undertaker - SmackDown September 4, 2003

Taking place on the September fourth episode of SmackDown in 2003, The Undertaker challenged Kurt Angle for the WWE Championship, and it was one hell of a showdown.

This was the best match SmackDown had by this point in 2003 and one of the best matches of the entire year. The Undertaker himself later went onto calling it one of his all-time favorite matches and called Kurt one of the greatest wrestlers he had ever been in the ring with.

The match saw several finishing moves, reversals, fast-paced action, both men pull out everything they have to try and beat each other. The last five minutes or so are epic, with Angle desperately trying to make The Undertaker tap out to the Ankle Lock, and The Undertaker trying his best to survive, and take Angle down. The final moment saw Taker setting up Kurt for another Last Ride before Brock Lesnar ruined the ending by attacking both men.

This was easily the best match The Undertaker had in 2003 and the last and one of the best matches of his American Badass persona.

#9 Kurt Angle vs. Edge vs. Chris Benoit vs. Eddie Guerrero - SmackDown December 5, 2002

With these four world-class athletes, everyone watching that night was expecting a great match, but I don't think anyone expected it to be one of the greatest matches in SmackDown history.

A Fatal Four Way with the number one contendership for the Big Show's WWE Championship at stake, this one already felt like a Championship match. The action was fast paced the whole way through, despite Edge has been at the receiving end of a steel chair attack by Albert just prior to the bell.

All four men didn't slow down even once, and throughout several big moves, finishers, suplexes, and more thrilling action. Tag Champion Eddie Guerrero was the first to go, at the hands of his 'frenemy' Chris Benoit and his Crossface. Benoit was next after Eddie attacked him after his elimination, which was capitalized by a Spear from Edge.

This left Edge and Kurt Angle, who had several classic one-on-one pay-per-views matches earlier that year, and this felt like another one of them. The two had a battle, complete with several Angle Slams, spears, an Edgecution DDT, several suplexes from each, an Angle Slam from Edge to Angle, and finally, a top rope Angle Slam to Edge to put him away.

#8 Kurt Angle vs. The Rock vs. The Undertaker - Vengeance 2002

The 3 best WWE had at the time go at it!

Now this was a war!

After a mostly dismal 2001, The Undertaker was on top of his game in 2002, and this was one of his shining moments. The Rock was also at the peak of his career, while Kurt Angle was just always this damn good.

The audience was red hot for this, and rightly so. Some crazy cool moments including The Rock hitting The Undertaker with a Chokeslam, Rock uses Angle`s Anklelock until Angle reverses it until Angle hits a Rock Bottom.

Everyone is hitting their own finishers left and right with each man kicking out at every pinfall attempt. Rock pins Angle after a Rock Bottom for the three count and Taker's WWE Championship.

WWE and wrestling as a whole have had so many excellent Triple Threat matches over the years, but this one may just the best of all time.

#7 Kurt Angle vs. Brock Lesnar - WrestleMania XIX

A great match, even if Brock can't remember most of it

Everyone knew Brock Lesnar was winning this one. He was the handpicked next face of the company at the time and Kurt Angle shouldn't have even been wrestling due to his practically broken neck at the time, yet the two managed to pull off an outstanding match. WWE Hall of Famer Bret Hart has even referred to it as his favorite WWE match this century.

The Beast Incarnate kicked out of the Angle Slam and the Olympic Gold Medalist became the first superstar to kick out of the F-5. At one point Angle gave him a German Suplex and Lesnar sold it by flipping on his stomach, which was just an incredible sight.

The most famous and incredible moment came when Lesnar amazingly attempted to hit a Shooting Star Press and landed directly on his head, nearly killing himself. Bonus points for regaining conscious with enough time to hit one more F-5 for the win.

Angle hugging Lesnar after the bout and raising his hand was also a nice touch.

#6 Kurt Angle vs. The Undertaker - No Way Out 2006

WWE World Heavyweight Champion Kurt Angle and The Undertaker had an instant classic in the main event of No Way Out 2006, easily the best match of the year and one of the best match of either man's careers.

Almost every time Kurt and The Undertaker got in the ring together, they created magic, so it was no surprise that this match was yet another instant classic. One thing that was really great about this match was that despite a size difference and Taker having been very dominant in recent years, Kurt was treated as Taker's equal, and the two had a show-stopping affair where at no point did Kurt look like he would go down easy.

The two went back and forth, several reversals, Kurt hit the Angle Slam and Ankle Lock to no avail, Taker hit the Chokeslam and other vintage Deadman moves, but failed to win. At one point it looked like Kurt would take in a countout victory over the Deadman after an Angle Slam through the announcers table, but stops the referee from doing so.

The end of the match came when Kurt countered the Triangle Choke into a bridge pin for the victory. We had a cool respect moment from Taker after the match as he handed Kurt the World title.

#5 Kurt Angle vs. Shane McMahon - King of The Ring 2001

Now this match was just pure violence. It was just seriously brutal.

As a performer in the ring, if Shane McMahon knew how to do anything, it was taking one hell of a beating. An angry Kurt starts with a one-sided attack on Shane, throwing him around, still furious from earlier in the evening when Shane cost him the King of The Ring crown. After Shane fights back, Kurt messes around with him with some amateur moves, which Shane soon grows tired of and just goes dirty on Angle instead.

Now on the floor, Shane gets on the railing behind JR and Heyman and jumps over both them and the table to hit Kurt with a clothesline in a great spot. Some kendo sticks and trash cans are soon introduced for some fun. Now fighting up to the top of the ramp, Angle suplexes Shane over his head into one of the bullet proof glass walls (placed their by mistake instead of soft sand glass), and as it doesn't break, Shane lands very loudly on his neck.

That was one of the sickest spots ever. It is amazing how he didn't break his neck, like seriously. Vince almost put a stop to the match here but was convinced otherwise not to. Angle picked Shane up for another suplex, this time successfully breaking the glass. Angle does the same thing through the other glass and again, it doesn't break, but again, does the second time. Somehow Shane isn't dead. Back in the ring, after another amazing performance by Shane, Kurt hits an Angle Slam from the top rope, putting an end to this brutal war.

#4 Kurt Angle vs. Shawn Michaels - WrestleMania 21

While WWE often doesn't capitalize on promoting dream matches, when they do, they can be incredible matches. The Rock vs John Cena, The Rock vs Goldberg, Shawn Michaels vs Hulk Hogan, The Rock vs Hogan, they were all great in their own way, but none as perfect as Shawn Michaels vs Kurt Angle from WrestleMania 21.

This was truly amazing, as the gifted wrestlers lived up to the hype and then some. This was true wrestling, and the drama was incredible, with more than a dozen near falls, several Angle Slams, suplexes everywhere, a Sweet Chin Music that nearly took Angle's teeth out and what may be the longest Ankle Lock ever to secure the big win for the deserving Olympian. Match of the night, match of the year, and arguably match of the decade.

Kurt and Shawn would go onto have an almost as excellent rematch at Vengeance 2005 which was won by Michaels, a dazzling 30 Minute Iron Man on the RAW Homecoming show in October 2005 which resulted in a draw, and one final heart-stopping affair on RAW in January 2006 that was won by Michaels, which had also served as Kurt's last match on WWE RAW until 2018.

#3 Kurt Angle & Chris Benoit vs. Edge & Rey Mysterio - No Mercy 2002

This one was to crown the first ever WWE Tag team Champions of SmacDown (ironically these are the RAW titles today) Rey Mysterio was paired with Edge in an unlikely team who made it to the finals at No Mercy with another unlikely team, in then bitter rivals Kurt Angle and Chris Benoit.

The action here was simply phenomenal. Rey and Kurt started things off with a very fast pace of arm drags and takedowns. Angle and Edge had some nice mat wrestling, Kurt and Benoit both delivered a dozen suplexes each to their opponents as Edge and Rey battle back. We had an amazing spot of Edge hoisting Kurt on the top rope and would alley-oop Rey onto him into a Frankensteiner.

Some close near falls, everyone hitting their finishers and more double team moves before Angle forces Edge to tap out for the win.

An outstanding performance!

The two teams would also have an almost as excellent 2 out of 3 Falls match on SmackDown 2 weeks later, and a fantastic Triple Tag Team match at Survivor Series 2002, also involving Chavo and Eddie Guerrero.

#2 Kurt Angle vs. Brock Lesnar - SmackDown September 18, 2003

Taking place on the September 18 episode of SmackDown in 2003, this was the ultimate battle of speed vs strength. This 60 minute Iron Man match is easily the best match in the wrestling career of Brock Lesnar and arguably the best match that Kurt Angle has ever had.

We had some good back and forth action and chain wrestling to get us started. Kurt took the first fall pretty early on as Brock took a steel chair and got himself disqualified as he hit Kurt with it repeatedly. He had a good reason though, this weakened Kurt into giving Brock the next two falls, the second of which was Kurt tapping out to his own submission move, the Ankle Lock.

We got a fury of suplexes from both until Brock hit Kurt with an F-5 outside the ring, for his next fall. Kurt took the next one with an Angle Slam, followed by some brawling before the referee went down, allowing Brock to take another fall by hitting Kurt with the WWE Championship belt. They fought some more in and out of the ring until Brock got his fifth fall with a superplex.

Brock dominated Kurt until Kurt fought back and pinned Brock after a belly to belly superplex. More suplexes, DDT's and reversals until Kurt took a fall with the Ankle Lock once more. Now at 5 - 4 to Lesnar, we got even more suplexes and brawling outside of the ring before Kurt had Brock back in the ring, locked in the Ankle Lock for the remaining 18 seconds, which Brock survived and to home the WWE Championship.

Easily one of the best matches of Kurt Angle's career, the best match of Brock Lesnar's career and the best match in the history of WWE SmackDown.

#1 Kurt Angle vs. Chris Benoit - Royal Rumble 2003

I don't think many people will have expected this one to top the list, especially as it involves Chris Benoit, but the reader should have as it is one of the best wrestling matches of all time.

When it was first announced, many fans expected the match it to be very good, after all, Kurt Angle and Chris Benoit had been feuding on and off for 2 years and always delivered in the ring. That night, the fans cared more about Scott Steiner's return in his WWE title match against Triple H than Angle vs Benoit.

However, by the time the event was over, absolutely no one cared about the Steiner/Triple H match and all props came towards the Pittsburgh native and the Rabid Wolverine. A match that was completely different to their previous encounters, the two men pulled out enough suplexes to make Brock Lesnar blush and more than a dozen reversals of each other's key submission moves into a version of their own.

At one point, Benoit gave his trademark diving headbutt to Angle as he lay well more than halfway on the other side of the ring. A defeated Benoit was given a rousing standing ovation from the Boston fans and the match would win several Match of The Year Awards from various websites and magazines.