World champ Kurt Angle is a real-life Olympic gold medalist, content on staying healthy and carrying the ball for WWE SmackDown (8 p.m. Fridays, UPN).
Angle talked shop following the WWE Royal Rumble press conference Tuesday, Jan. 24 at Bongo's adjoining the AmericanAirlines Arena, home of the 2006 Royal Rumble in Miami.
• Gaining the title and staying healthy
``Well, 2 ½ years of proving to the company I can be durable, and I am now the world champ. I've been full time 2 ½ years. It's taken me a long time to get back to the top.
``This was a last second decision. I've been fighting and fighting and fighting and fighting. When I feel like I'm due and it's my turn, I'm going to speak up, and it's been my turn for the past 1 ½ years.
``I had to prove to everybody in the company that I could grab the title and hold it. You have to understand the last two times I had the title I got injured. Is it a liability? Of course, it is. Here I am. I get the title and a week later I bang up my neck.
``What I need to do as champion is be responsible for the company and myself. Just because I don't do an Angle-slam off the top rope is not going to make a difference in a match. I'm robbing these fans by being injured. If I don't show up on TV every week and every pay-per-view, then I'm robbing these fans of seeing Kurt Angle. I'm not talking about me. I'm talking about the character. I don't want to do that to them anymore.
``I've wrestled [sports entertainment] six years, and two of them I've been injured. I've actually only wrestled four years. People think I've been around forever. I'm fairly new. When you compare me to John Cena, he's been wrestling two years longer than I have. People think he is the new guy. I am the most inexperienced main eventer in the business. Even Mark Henry has been in the business 10 years.
``I picked it up a lot quicker, and obviously my amateur wrestling helped me. Like I said, it is my calling. God blessed me with a gift to entertain people and do it very well, and now it's my responsibility to stay healthy, especially when I'm champion. I don't want them to have to make other moves and say `Oh gosh, we got to find another guy who can carry that title the way Angle can.'
``Batista was making his way through, and it looked good, and then he got hurt. God bless him. I hope he comes back because I'd love to go a few rounds with Batista. It would be great.
``Right now it's my responsibility to stay healthy and injury free and carry this title the best way I can. I have to go out there and be smart about what I do. I got injured both times against Brock Lesnar. He's a big guy, and he was throwing me around a lot, and we were doing things I didn't necessarily have to do. It was stupidity on my part. I'm not going to do that again.''
• Shocking fans by winning the world title upon his SmackDown return
``I saw an opportunity, and Vince McMahon knew it was my turn to carry the ball. He was going to do it on Raw. Then this unfortunate incident happened [Batista injuries], and he brought me to SmackDown.
``I look at it like this. Raw is on Monday, and it's probably a better night, but Fridays are starting to turn out to be pretty well. People just have to adjust to the programming, and it's up to me to make SmackDown the better show, and I will.
``When Brock Lesnar and I were on SmackDown, we always did higher ratings than Raw. It's up to me to get the ratings back higher than Raw again. I'll do that. It's going to take me a little bit of time, but I'll do that.
``For me, it's a test because switching SmackDown is a day later [taped Tuesdays] and obviously a lot of injuries -- with Batista and Booker T and Mr. Kennedy's out five months and losing Eddy, God bless Eddie -- something had to spark on SmackDown. This is my time to shine. It's my responsibility to make this program better than it ever was, and that's what I plan on doing.''
• Doing things his way
'For the first time in my life, Vince McMahon is letting me be me -- not some dorky goof ball, not some nerd. I've always played another person. For the first time, Vince McMahon gave me the microphone and said, `Say what you want to say. Do what you want to do.' It gave me a Stone Cold Steve Austin effect. It was a snowball effect. I was a bad guy but blown bigger and bigger, no matter who I faced: Shawn Michaels, John Cena, Triple H. The fans were cheering for Kurt Angle.
``So Vince McMahon said how do we get these fans to hate you? Vince McMahon likes me as a bad guy. So he came up with the anti-America thing. Basically, it wasn't so anti-America.
``I can say whatever I want to say, and fans would cheer me anyway. So that's why I brought up that stuff to get fans to boo me. I'm very, very pro America. Vince wanted to see if doing a little bit of the anti-America thing with my character -- which is being a cocky, arrogant, intense character who can say anything he wants and the fans still cheer for him -- hopefully, the fans will boo me because of that.
``But it's a respect factor. When you've been in the business a certain amount of time and accomplished so much, and you're a very good wrestler, eventually the fans aren't going to boo you anymore. Look at the Undertaker. It doesn't matter what he does. When he comes back, he's a crowd favorite. I'm starting to get into that persona, too.
``I may not be a bad guy anymore. I don't know, but I'm getting that kind of respect. That's okay. I'll play whatever part the fans want me to play. I enjoy either one, and I'm good at both. You just have to let me do it the way I want to.
``Vince McMahon the first couple of times made me the dangerous dork, and then I was a gullible guy as a babyface. It worked, but it wasn't that great. This time he's going to let me be me. Hopefully, he will continue to do that because I like to say what I want to say.
'When people tell me, `Kurt, we want you to say it this way or that way,' I can do that, but I always wanted to see how the character I bring up from here [heart] would do. That was me playing Kurt Angle the last 1 ½ years, and it worked really well, but obviously it worked the wrong way. It turned me into a good guy, but that's a good thing. Good guys make money. That's where I want to be.''
• Timeline
''I plan on going another five years, God willing,'' said Angle who's had a few neck operations.
``I just have to be careful. I do a lot of crazy stuff, jumping off the top rope, moonsaults, diving out of the ring. I have to be very selective in what I do. Instead of doing that four times a week every week, I need to gear down and do that strictly for pay-per-views and sometimes on TV.
``I have the best matches. Anybody here will admit that. I'm the best wrestler in the company. That's what I do -- wrestle. Sometimes I go out of my style to impress other people by doing things I shouldn't be doing.
``What I'm going to do is go back to my style of wrestling and entertain fans the way I can because my style is very real. The other guys know when they wrestle me, they're going to get a little banged up, and they know they're going to get really tired. That's how I am, very vicious, intense, and I'm going to stick to that because it will keep me around longer. I'll be more selective in what I do.''
``Last week I did an Angle-slam off the top rope against Shawn Michaels, and I landed on my head and banged my neck up a little bit. Those kinds of things I have to be a little more careful.
``I'm just going to keep going and stay healthy. God forbid, if I have to have surgery, I'll only be out for a month or two. Then, I'll come back, but I don't plan on doing that for a long time. Eventually, in a couple of years, the disc will wear-n-tear a little bit, where I will have to have some of it cut out.
``That doesn't bother me. A lot of people think it's dangerous. It's not real dangerous. Fusion is actually more dangerous.''
``Some days I feel like a million bucks, and some days I don't feel so good. It's just one of those injuries I have to be careful with.''
• Winning Olympic gold and WWE gold
``I won a gold medal, and there's nothing in this world I can do better than that. I have more respect for wrestlers and this [world] title than just about anything except the gold medal.
``What I found it is this [sports entertainment] is my passion. Winning a gold medal in a real sport is the ultimate best thing you can do. It's true, but it also sent me here.
``This is my calling. I'm a great sports entertainer. I enjoy it. A lot of people think I'm the best at it. They rank me up there with Triple H and Ric Flair. It's a honor especially only being in it six years to be ranked among the best. It was my calling. I was meant to do this. Although I won the gold medal and that is the greatest thing I could do, it brought me here.''
• Being the best
``I take pride in having the best match on the card, especially at WrestleMania. I think Shawn Michaels and I proved that last year. Eddy [Guerrero] and I proved it the year before, but I think [on that same card] that triple threat match with Benoit and Shawn [Michaels] and Triple H was pretty good, the best triple threat match I ever saw. Another time Brock Lesnar and I proved it. Chris Benoit and I proved it. One year, Kane and I did a tremendous job. I've had some great matches at WrestleMania.
``It is who you wrestle because you want to steal the show. This year I don't know who it's going to be. It could be Undertaker. It could be Randy Orton. Who knows who's going to come to the limelight. All I know it's probably going to be a pretty good wrestler, and we'll have a really good match.''
• Kurt Angle defends his world title against the world's strongest man and former Olympian Mark Henry during the WWE pay-per-view Royal Rumble on Sunday, Jan. 29 at the AmericanAirlines Arena in Miami.
Angle talked shop following the WWE Royal Rumble press conference Tuesday, Jan. 24 at Bongo's adjoining the AmericanAirlines Arena, home of the 2006 Royal Rumble in Miami.
• Gaining the title and staying healthy
``Well, 2 ½ years of proving to the company I can be durable, and I am now the world champ. I've been full time 2 ½ years. It's taken me a long time to get back to the top.
``This was a last second decision. I've been fighting and fighting and fighting and fighting. When I feel like I'm due and it's my turn, I'm going to speak up, and it's been my turn for the past 1 ½ years.
``I had to prove to everybody in the company that I could grab the title and hold it. You have to understand the last two times I had the title I got injured. Is it a liability? Of course, it is. Here I am. I get the title and a week later I bang up my neck.
``What I need to do as champion is be responsible for the company and myself. Just because I don't do an Angle-slam off the top rope is not going to make a difference in a match. I'm robbing these fans by being injured. If I don't show up on TV every week and every pay-per-view, then I'm robbing these fans of seeing Kurt Angle. I'm not talking about me. I'm talking about the character. I don't want to do that to them anymore.
``I've wrestled [sports entertainment] six years, and two of them I've been injured. I've actually only wrestled four years. People think I've been around forever. I'm fairly new. When you compare me to John Cena, he's been wrestling two years longer than I have. People think he is the new guy. I am the most inexperienced main eventer in the business. Even Mark Henry has been in the business 10 years.
``I picked it up a lot quicker, and obviously my amateur wrestling helped me. Like I said, it is my calling. God blessed me with a gift to entertain people and do it very well, and now it's my responsibility to stay healthy, especially when I'm champion. I don't want them to have to make other moves and say `Oh gosh, we got to find another guy who can carry that title the way Angle can.'
``Batista was making his way through, and it looked good, and then he got hurt. God bless him. I hope he comes back because I'd love to go a few rounds with Batista. It would be great.
``Right now it's my responsibility to stay healthy and injury free and carry this title the best way I can. I have to go out there and be smart about what I do. I got injured both times against Brock Lesnar. He's a big guy, and he was throwing me around a lot, and we were doing things I didn't necessarily have to do. It was stupidity on my part. I'm not going to do that again.''
• Shocking fans by winning the world title upon his SmackDown return
``I saw an opportunity, and Vince McMahon knew it was my turn to carry the ball. He was going to do it on Raw. Then this unfortunate incident happened [Batista injuries], and he brought me to SmackDown.
``I look at it like this. Raw is on Monday, and it's probably a better night, but Fridays are starting to turn out to be pretty well. People just have to adjust to the programming, and it's up to me to make SmackDown the better show, and I will.
``When Brock Lesnar and I were on SmackDown, we always did higher ratings than Raw. It's up to me to get the ratings back higher than Raw again. I'll do that. It's going to take me a little bit of time, but I'll do that.
``For me, it's a test because switching SmackDown is a day later [taped Tuesdays] and obviously a lot of injuries -- with Batista and Booker T and Mr. Kennedy's out five months and losing Eddy, God bless Eddie -- something had to spark on SmackDown. This is my time to shine. It's my responsibility to make this program better than it ever was, and that's what I plan on doing.''
• Doing things his way
'For the first time in my life, Vince McMahon is letting me be me -- not some dorky goof ball, not some nerd. I've always played another person. For the first time, Vince McMahon gave me the microphone and said, `Say what you want to say. Do what you want to do.' It gave me a Stone Cold Steve Austin effect. It was a snowball effect. I was a bad guy but blown bigger and bigger, no matter who I faced: Shawn Michaels, John Cena, Triple H. The fans were cheering for Kurt Angle.
``So Vince McMahon said how do we get these fans to hate you? Vince McMahon likes me as a bad guy. So he came up with the anti-America thing. Basically, it wasn't so anti-America.
``I can say whatever I want to say, and fans would cheer me anyway. So that's why I brought up that stuff to get fans to boo me. I'm very, very pro America. Vince wanted to see if doing a little bit of the anti-America thing with my character -- which is being a cocky, arrogant, intense character who can say anything he wants and the fans still cheer for him -- hopefully, the fans will boo me because of that.
``But it's a respect factor. When you've been in the business a certain amount of time and accomplished so much, and you're a very good wrestler, eventually the fans aren't going to boo you anymore. Look at the Undertaker. It doesn't matter what he does. When he comes back, he's a crowd favorite. I'm starting to get into that persona, too.
``I may not be a bad guy anymore. I don't know, but I'm getting that kind of respect. That's okay. I'll play whatever part the fans want me to play. I enjoy either one, and I'm good at both. You just have to let me do it the way I want to.
``Vince McMahon the first couple of times made me the dangerous dork, and then I was a gullible guy as a babyface. It worked, but it wasn't that great. This time he's going to let me be me. Hopefully, he will continue to do that because I like to say what I want to say.
'When people tell me, `Kurt, we want you to say it this way or that way,' I can do that, but I always wanted to see how the character I bring up from here [heart] would do. That was me playing Kurt Angle the last 1 ½ years, and it worked really well, but obviously it worked the wrong way. It turned me into a good guy, but that's a good thing. Good guys make money. That's where I want to be.''
• Timeline
''I plan on going another five years, God willing,'' said Angle who's had a few neck operations.
``I just have to be careful. I do a lot of crazy stuff, jumping off the top rope, moonsaults, diving out of the ring. I have to be very selective in what I do. Instead of doing that four times a week every week, I need to gear down and do that strictly for pay-per-views and sometimes on TV.
``I have the best matches. Anybody here will admit that. I'm the best wrestler in the company. That's what I do -- wrestle. Sometimes I go out of my style to impress other people by doing things I shouldn't be doing.
``What I'm going to do is go back to my style of wrestling and entertain fans the way I can because my style is very real. The other guys know when they wrestle me, they're going to get a little banged up, and they know they're going to get really tired. That's how I am, very vicious, intense, and I'm going to stick to that because it will keep me around longer. I'll be more selective in what I do.''
``Last week I did an Angle-slam off the top rope against Shawn Michaels, and I landed on my head and banged my neck up a little bit. Those kinds of things I have to be a little more careful.
``I'm just going to keep going and stay healthy. God forbid, if I have to have surgery, I'll only be out for a month or two. Then, I'll come back, but I don't plan on doing that for a long time. Eventually, in a couple of years, the disc will wear-n-tear a little bit, where I will have to have some of it cut out.
``That doesn't bother me. A lot of people think it's dangerous. It's not real dangerous. Fusion is actually more dangerous.''
``Some days I feel like a million bucks, and some days I don't feel so good. It's just one of those injuries I have to be careful with.''
• Winning Olympic gold and WWE gold
``I won a gold medal, and there's nothing in this world I can do better than that. I have more respect for wrestlers and this [world] title than just about anything except the gold medal.
``What I found it is this [sports entertainment] is my passion. Winning a gold medal in a real sport is the ultimate best thing you can do. It's true, but it also sent me here.
``This is my calling. I'm a great sports entertainer. I enjoy it. A lot of people think I'm the best at it. They rank me up there with Triple H and Ric Flair. It's a honor especially only being in it six years to be ranked among the best. It was my calling. I was meant to do this. Although I won the gold medal and that is the greatest thing I could do, it brought me here.''
• Being the best
``I take pride in having the best match on the card, especially at WrestleMania. I think Shawn Michaels and I proved that last year. Eddy [Guerrero] and I proved it the year before, but I think [on that same card] that triple threat match with Benoit and Shawn [Michaels] and Triple H was pretty good, the best triple threat match I ever saw. Another time Brock Lesnar and I proved it. Chris Benoit and I proved it. One year, Kane and I did a tremendous job. I've had some great matches at WrestleMania.
``It is who you wrestle because you want to steal the show. This year I don't know who it's going to be. It could be Undertaker. It could be Randy Orton. Who knows who's going to come to the limelight. All I know it's probably going to be a pretty good wrestler, and we'll have a really good match.''
• Kurt Angle defends his world title against the world's strongest man and former Olympian Mark Henry during the WWE pay-per-view Royal Rumble on Sunday, Jan. 29 at the AmericanAirlines Arena in Miami.
