Kurt Angle is a WWE Hall of Famer, and he recently spoke about deciding to work with TNA in 2006. Kurt Angle was actually a WWE wrestler before he joined TNA. He was one of the most popular WWE wrestlers at the time he left the company in 2006.
He was well-known for being one of the only Olympic gold medalists in the WWE when he made his debut. He went on to face some of WWE’s best wrestlers in the early 2000s.
Kurt Angle Speaks About Joining TNA Instead of WWE in 2006
Kurt Angle signed with WWE in 1998.
According to reports, he made a million dollars in his very first year with the company. His WWE career took a very bad turn when he became addicted to painkillers. WWE sent him to ECW to become the face of that company after that.
He revealed during a previous interview that he actually left Vince McMahon a few threatening voicemails and text messages due to his addiction after which he decided to leave the company. On his podcast, Kurt explained why he didn’t sign with WWE after he overcame his addiction.
“The reason I signed with TNA, and there’s nothing wrong with this, but when you’re in WWE, it’s a huge company,” Angle mentioned. “It’s bigger than you. There’s nothing you can do.
You can have the greatest career of all time, you’re not going to make a bigger impression on the company itself. TNA, it’s a smaller company and you’re the bigger name in the company. You’re carrying the company on your back and making it into a WWE.
You have a purpose that way. When you’re in WWE, you’re never bigger than the product. When you’re in TNA, you are bigger than the product and what’s carrying that product to another level. There’s a bigger purpose in it”.
He revealed how he helped TNA reach new heights by being over there. He believes he couldn’t have made it that far without him. “It was about me proving myself that I could be a formidable player and make a company grow bigger than it was,” Kurt Angle said.
“I think I did a good job of that, it wasn’t just me. There were a lot of other wrestlers in that company but I wanted to show that I had a purpose in my life and that purpose was TNA. And I could make this company grow that never became as big as WWE, but there were times where the ratings started getting fairly close.
We were doing two million viewers a week, 2.1 million viewers a week, which was a big deal for TNA at the time. It made me feel very good as a representative of the company that I was one of the main reasons for it”.
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