Roundtable: Thank You, Kurt Angle

Who should Kurt Angle face in his farewell match?

Steven Jackson: The news that Kurt Angle will face Baron Corbin in his farewell match has already been announced. Excuse my French, but like a lot of other fans on social media, I say this is a load of bull! There are so many people Kurt could have an amazing farewell match with and WWE has chosen Baron Corbin. Now I understand the booking side of things, passing the torch, etc., but come on! My choice for Kurt’s final opponent would have been Matt Riddle. I feel they could have had a real classic before Kurt hung up his boots and had a real passing of the torch moment. But alas, let’s all enjoy Baron Corbin.

Neal Wagner: Anybody other than Baron Corbin. But seriously, Cena would make sense being Cena’s first main roster match and Kurt’s final main roster match. His greatest rivals were Undertaker and Lesnar, so they would be a perfect send off, too. To even raise another wrestler and give the moniker of “I ended Kurt Angle’s career,” Shelton Benjamin would be an excellent pick, too, considering the storyline in 2003 with those two and Charlie Haas almost being Evolution before Evolution was even a thing.

Juan Bautista: It should be Shelton Benjamin, maybe Matt Riddle, not Fucking Baron Corbin. There is an argument for John Cena, but that’s more part of Cena’s story than Angle’s. If there was better character build up and logical storytelling, you could have EC3, Samoa Joe or Bobby Roode.

Jack Goodwillie: All the young guys I’d seemingly like to have Kurt Angle face are already booked, and there’s not enough time to tell a story with someone from down in NXT endeavoring to retire Kurt, so I’m going to have to defer to nostalgia and go with John Cena, indisputably one of Kurt’s five greatest rivals ever (a new editorial inbound, perhaps???) Alas, we the fans are again going to get the dog’s dinner when it comes to Kurt Angle, as he’s currently slated to go one-on-one with Baron Corbin. If that match sticks, pencil it in as the worst retirement match a wrestler of Angle’s ilk has ever received. Ric Flair? He got Shawn Michaels. Terry Funk? He got Bret Hart, Too Cold Scorpio and Faarooq, Tommy Dreamer, Jerry Lawler and probably many more. Undertaker? Well, he hasn’t retired…yet. I’m just saying, a Baron Corbin match at WrestleMania short changes everything Kurt has accomplished in one of the most unique careers a wrestler has ever had.

Sam Gladen: It should be a NXT call up. Not Gargano, Ciampa, Black or Ricochet, but one that the main audience hasn’t seen before or the NXT audience hasn’t seen much of. Maybe Dijakovic? Or maybe this could be the way to bring Lars Sullivan back to WWE, as we haven’t been informed of his release yet. Either way, it would need to be someone imposing who could handle the immediate comparison to Cena without also being Cena.

David Gibb: If you don’t need to give him a win, facing Brock and going out on his shield competing for the Universal Title would be a great end for Angle. In a world where the fans need to be sent home happy, just give him an opponent he knows well, like AJ Styles, and let them have the best possible match to honor what Angle was all about.

John Corrigan: Stephanie McMahon. Listen, Angle doesn’t need one last great match – his legacy is already solidified. I would have booked his farewell match along the same lines as Roddy Piper vs. Adrian Adonis at WrestleMania III: a short, yet entertaining spectacle that gives Angle a proper sendoff. From his first year in the company flirting with Steph to being ruled under her thumb as Raw GM, Angle has been involved with the Billion Dollar Princess for a large part of his WWE career. What better way to get some closure than by making her tap out? Plus, Steph usually takes one bump out of the year and unless she’s getting speared by Batista, I don’t see a spot for her on the WrestleMania 35 card.

Matthew Smith: Gable should have been the pick here. They could have built a nice storyline around Gable trying to prove that he is the next Kurt Angle. Honestly, I wouldn’t have minded another Brock Lesnar vs. Kurt Angle bout to send him off, although Kurt isn’t the same performer he once was.

How would you judge his return to WWE since April of 2017?

Jackson: Very well done. I have enjoyed how he has been used, and I like that he has had occasional matches, but thankfully, he has slowed down after life-threatening injuries. It is always a pleasure seeing Kurt on my TV screen, and seeing him back where he made his name, in WWE, has been great!

Wagner: Being back as general manager made sense and mixing it up a few times, whether it be last year with Ronda against HHH and Stephanie or representing RAW against SmackDown, made sense, too. However, losing so much on RAW and having lackluster and meaningless matches against Corbin and McIntrye has sadly ruined Angle’s return. He has almost become an afterthought of Raw every week and is almost floating in the area below midcard level along with Apollo, Tyler Breeze, etc.

Bautista: It’s what we expected. Being the Raw GM was perfect, but WWE shenanigans kinda derailed that. The matches were decent, but Kurt gave his heart to Impact. You could even argue that Impact got the best of what Angle had to offer and there wasn’t much left for him to give in WWE.

Goodwillie: It’s a C- for me. Listen, Kurt proved to be an upgrade in the Raw GM role over Mick Foley, as his comedic timing and ability to improvise helped save a lot of segments that would have otherwise been plagued by piss poor writing. His emergency return as a member of SHIELD? I loved that, too! But ever since then, he’s been booked as an over-the-hill, has-been wrestler, and in pro wrestling, that’s just not something you see. The fans don’t want to see Kurt Angle doing jobs for Drew McIntyre and Baron Corbin on Raw. They want to see him beating guys, even if he’s not quite what he used to be. Trust me, Kurt has begun to show his age in there and the time is ripe for his in-ring retirement, but WWE making Kurt Angle “just another guy” on Raw is NOT what the fans had in mind. Remember all those dream matches people had lined up when he was in talks to return?

Gladen: I much preferred him as a GM over an active roster member in his new run. However, he has used his status to put as many guys over as quickly as possible without losing too much credibility. So B+.

Gibb: I’ve been happy to see him have a job where he’s featured on TV without the constant expectation of great matches week-to-week. With that said, it’s also been bittersweet because Kurt’s face, body language and verbal cadence are all pretty stark reminders of what the wrestling business can do to people who let it consume them.

Corrigan: Awful. His GM run seemed promising, but just like with his predecessor Mick Foley, the entire gig was based around being undermined and humiliated by Stephanie McMahon. Then, WWE fumbled his return match by having him fill in for Roman Reigns with 48 hours’ notice. Since then, he has been trotted out like an old mule for meaningless matches on Raw. Does Vince McMahon forget who Kurt Angle is?

Smith: From an on-screen GM role, he did very well. WWE favors on-screen evil authority figures way too much, so to have Kurt bring some balance back was a nice change. His in-ring performance was not as good to me. All of his movements just seemed so much more sluggish and the strength he once had was clearly not there anymore.

What’s your favorite Kurt Angle moment/angle?

Jackson: Kurt debuting in the Impact Zone back in October 2006 and headbutting Samoa Joe. I still remember jumping up and down and screaming at the TV like the fans in the arena when it aired. Fantastic!

Wagner: The two that always stood out to me were his battles with Austin during the Invasion, especially winning the WWE Championship at Unforgiven in his hometown of Pittsburgh. He became an “American Hero” just weeks after 9/11. Plus, his 2003 summer battles with Brock that culminated with the Iron Man match in September on SmackDown.

Bautista: His New Year’s Resolution 2006 promo before the Elimination Chamber. (See above.)

Goodwillie: Kurt’s best Angle…it has to be him singing “Sexy Kurt” with Sherri Martel on the road to WrestleMania 21. I used to see Kurt as this irredeemable bastard, but that was probably the first time his character had made me laugh since I started watching wrestling. Of course, Angle had as many memorable moments as anyone. Remember that skit when he and Brock Lesnar were chugging bottles of milk backstage? Or how about when he got his little cowboy hat from Stone Cold and Mr. McMahon? Or when he got into a woo-off with Ric Flair? Or when Edge embarrassed him with those nostalgic “photos?”

Gladen: I’ve been watching a ton of classic IMPACT recently and I’ve really enjoyed his run as the Triple Crown Champion, holding the Heavyweight, Tag Team (as a singles competitor) and X-Division Championships at the same time.

Gibb: His TNA debut and initial rivalry with Samoa Joe.

Corrigan: “I’m just a sexy Kurt.” He deserved an Emmy for transitioning from a delusional buffoon into a psycho in the blink of an eye.

Smith: Can we lump in the whole feud with Edge? From the chanting during his music to the pictures Edge gave him, so many of my favorite moments of his career because it helped Edge be taken seriously as a single’s performer and showed us a new side to Kurt making fun of himself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6D9NSkA25Cs

What’s Kurt Angle’s greatest match?

Jackson: I thought picking my favorite Kurt Angle moment was hard – now I’ve got to pick Kurt’s greatest match!? Holy cow, this is tough. I mean really tough. Probably the toughest question I have had to answer since contributing to roundtables for The Wrestling Estate. My choice for Kurt’s greatest match might surprise a lot of people: Kurt Angle vs. Mr. Anderson from Lockdown 2010. Much like Shawn Michaels excels in ladder matches and Mick Foley excels in hardcore matches, Kurt Angle excels in steel cage matches, and none more so than his match against Mr. Anderson. I remember the internet going crazy over this match after it happened, and you can see why. It is literally the perfect cage match. The violence, the psychology, the risks, the finish and the culmination of their feud all came together flawlessly.

Wagner: His back-to-back WrestleMania matches with Eddie Guerrero and Shawn Michaels. The Shawn match just barely edges out the win, but both were almost perfect matches.

Bautista: It’s hard to choose one. Two matches in the running are his WrestleMania 21 match with Shawn Michaels and the WWE Championship match with Chris Benoit at Royal Rumble 2003.

Goodwillie: Nobody worked as well with Kurt Angle as Chris Benoit did. These guys had to have worked double-digit television matches between 2000 and 2003, and that doesn’t even include their run together as a tag team (which, by the way, was a stroke of genius from Paul Heyman). My favorite Kurt Angle match has to be Angle vs. Benoit from Royal Rumble 2003. It was almost as if these two guys took all of the lessons they learned from working together through the years and left it all in the ring that night, giving the fans an instant classic and a Match of the Year candidate at the very first PPV!

Gladen: Easy – Angle vs. Michaels at WrestleMania 21.

Gibb: I was a huge fan of his cage match with Jeff Jarrett. In my mind, that’s maybe Angle’s last truly great singles match.

Corrigan: His classic with Shawn Michaels at WrestleMania 21. When I first saw it, I was hopping around my basement anxious for Michaels to finally tap in that neverending ankle lock. Nowadays, it does seem ridiculous that he hung on for so long, but I won’t let that tarnish such an amazing battle between two of the best of all time.

Smith: The 60-minute Ironman match with Brock. That is still the best match in SmackDown history. At the time, the two guys were untouchable as performers and made you forget they were wrestling for 60 minutes. I know I was hoping for at least another 15.

What is Kurt Angle’s legacy?

Jackson: Where do you start? Kurt is one of the few wrestlers I can watch and talk about forever and never get bored. Whether it is a singles match, a tag team match, a steel cage match, a ladder match, a submission match, a battle royal or any other match you can think of, Kurt always delivered above and beyond what fans expected to see. Versatile in the ring and on the mic, he used his amateur credentials and meshed them perfectly with the styles of professional wrestling. Every wrestler who stepped into the ring with Angle came out better for it. He has become the most accomplished professional wrestler of the 21st century. Part of the reason we are pro wrestling fans is down to Kurt Angle’s contributions to this great art, and all I can say to close are three final words…Thank you, Kurt!

Wagner: Kurt’s legacy will go down as one of the best in the business when it comes to delivering the best matches in the ring and being so versatile in promos, whether serious or comedic. Kurt has been part of some great storylines and some really bad ones, but always appeared to give his best to the audience every single time. His return has been horrible, but it doesn’t take away from his previous run with WWE.

Bautista: Kurt Angle will go down as the greatest pure wrestler – a 13-time world champion to go along with an outstanding amateur and Olympic career. He is an Impact and WWE Triple Crown Champion, even holding Impact’s titles at the same time. He also illustrated the perfect blend of comedy and seriousness. It didn’t matter where he went – you got the best of Kurt Angle.

Goodwillie: The most popular wrestler to ever go from “amateur to the pro ranks,” as Jim Ross would say. Seriously, without Kurt Angle, there’s probably no Brock Lesnar, as he really set the bar for guys who are interested in making the transition after their amateur careers are over. Amateur wrestling or not though, he absolutely has an argument for the best all-around wrestler of all time. He had an ability to work with everyone, had the athleticism for days and to top it all off, had the charisma and acting chops to take his star even further. If you could make a pro wrestler in a factory, Kurt Angle is probably what you get.

Gladen: If the world is fair and just and wrestling fans are not – to borrow a phrase from Daniel Bryan – fickle, Kurt Angle should rightfully go down as one of the greatest in-ring performers of all time. He is certainly the greatest homegrown WWF/WWE talent to ever get in the ring. As for his legacy, he will be remembered as a guy who fought for his place in this business and built a living legend around what he was willing to do to keep that legend once he got there.

Gibb: He was the standard bearer for “wrestling” within the wrestling business for two decades. He helped bring competitive, athletic storytelling back to wrestling after the Russo/Attitude Era and innovated the “best match machine” persona that wrestlers like Okada and Omega use today. From 2005-2010, he was probably the best professional wrestler in the world on most levels.

Corrigan: In seventh grade, we had to do a book report on any autobiography. My teacher specifically banned pro wrestling autobiographies because the content was so obscene for children our age. I protested and offered Kurt Angle’s “It’s True, It’s True,” which she scoured and couldn’t find a single issue with. In a nutshell, Angle brought legitimacy and respect back to pro wrestling in the midst of the Attitude Era.

Smith: From Olympic star to wrestling superstar, his legacy is that he came in as just a really good technical wrestler and, right before our eyes, blossomed into an all-around draw. From his comedic timing, the intensity in everything he did and the passion he had for us, there will never be another Kurt Angle and as a fan I’m thankful I got to be a part of the ride.