KEY POINTS

  • Kurt Angle reflected on his formative years in the WWE
  • Angle explained how Vince McMahon used on him a strategy that "backfired" on The Rock
  • The 52-year-old admitted he loved playing the role of the bad guy

Vince McMahon once had the same gameplan for Kurt Angle and The Rock.

On the latest episode of “The Kurt Angle Show” podcast, Angle looked back at the time WWE CEO McMahon was trying to figure out which type of character would best suit him.

According to the five-time Grand Slam champion, McMahon used on him the same strategy that failed to give The Rock a “babyface” image. However, the only difference was that the WWE boss had initially thought that The Rock blueprint would not work well for Angle.

“My character in WWE when I started, it was a bit white meat [and] babyface but there was that little thing where you were like, is this guy for real?” Angle recalled. “Is he feeding me b------t or is he the real deal? I preached all the time, it was Vince’s [McMahon] idea to have that.”

“When The Rock was trying to be a babyface the first time and it backfired, Vince used the same mold for me but he knew it was going to backfire on me,” he revealed. “He didn’t know it was going to backfire on The Rock, so he used that same mold to make me who I was. It worked extremely well, I became the top heel in the business within my first year.”

Kurt Angle
Kurt Angle's completed his WWE in-ring career with a fight against Baron Corbin at WrestleMania 35. Here, Angle poses while attending the 2017 Paris Games Week, at the Porte de Versailles exhibition centre in Paris, Nov. 4, 2017. Getty Images/THOMAS SAMSON/AFP

Throughout his WWE career, Angle has had several heel turns, and it seemed to have done him good. For the “American Hero,” playing the role of the bad guy and being hated by the fans actually made him love his job.

“It was pretty quick and I couldn’t be more excited about it,” the 52-year-old said of his first heel turn. “I looked forward to going to T.V. every week. My character when I started, I loved doing it. I loved making an a-- out of myself, I loved the crowd booing me and not respecting me. I loved having these matches and cheating to win and preaching that I don’t cheat to win. It was a really cool thing to do and I was a bit overwhelmed my first year.”

Angle made his debut in the WWE in 1998, bursting onto the pro wrestling scene as an incredibly fit American Olympian. He was best known for his epic rivalries with some of the biggest WWE superstars such as Brock Lesnar and the late Chris Benoit.

In March 2017, Angle was finally inducted into the WWE Hall Of Fame after winning a staggering 21 championships to his name.

RELATED STORIES