Kurt Angle Says He’s Still In the Top Five In-Ring Talents

– Kurt Angle appeared on The Statement Show for a new interview. Some highlights are below:

On his favorite wrestlers: “Bret was my favorite too, him and Ric Flair. I got a lot out of watching them. I didn’t start watching [professional] wrestling until I signed with WWE in 1999, so I had a lot of work cut out for me. I loved the way Ric Flair was able to entertain, and not just a great wrestler, but a great entertainer. I don’t put him and Bret hart in the same category. Bret was more of an incredible wrestler. When he got in that ring, he did it better than anybody else, but all around, I thought that Ric Flair was the most versatile wrestler I’ve ever seen.”

On Hart turning down a match with him: “I called him in 2003 or [2004] and I said, ‘listen, you don’t have to take a bump. Let me do whole match. I’ll do the bumping and feeding. You just stay in there and lets have a great match.’ He didn’t want to do it and I understand now. After he had that stroke and he got kicked by Goldberg or whatever happened – he had a brain injury – he knew he couldn’t have the Bret Hart/Kurt Angle match he wanted, so he wasn’t willing to do it. And I get it because me, at 50, I can still go. But 10 years from now, if Seth Rollins came to me and said, ‘hey, lets do this match. I’ll do all the bumping. Don’t worry about it.’ And I’m thinking it’s not going to be that good because I can’t stay with him. So I understood how Bret felt at the time. And it hurt my feelings a little bit because two years later, he wrestled Vince.”

On if he can still go in the ring: “Can I still go? Yeah. I can still put myself in there as one of the top five best today at 48 years old. And that’s not a stretch. I can still go. AJ [Styles], boy, would I love to go one more round with him. We had a lot of fun.”