Kurt Angle Recalls Daniel Puder’s Royal Rumble Beating, Says Puder Got ‘Arrogant’

Daniel Puder famously got chopped to hell by Eddie Guerrero, Chris Benoit and Bob Holly at the 2005 Royal Rumble, and Kurt Angle recently recalled the situation behind it all. Puder, who won his season of Tough Enough had an on-screen segment with Angle three months earlier on Smackdown where he accepted a challenge from Angle and was able to catch Angle’s arm in an armbar but ended up with his shoulders on the mat and got pinned. He went on to the Royal Rumble, where he entered at #3 and was beat on by the three WWE stars before being thrown out.

Angle talked about the whole matter in an interview with Bubba The Love Sponge, and you can check out some highlights below:

On his segment with Puder: “When he got in the arm bar — I broke my neck like three months prior. So my — I couldn’t do three push-ups. I had no strength in my upper body, so my arm was vulnerable. And I shouldn’t have been in that position, wrestling Puder or any of those other guys from Tough Enough. And when I did it, that’s the reason why he got me in the arm bar… the thing is, what Daniel did to me, it wasn’t his fault. He just didn’t know this was supposed to be a wrestling match. He just thought he was gonna, you know, try to make me tap out.”

On why Puder got beat on during the Royal Rumble: “What happened was, he started getting really arrogant and like, telling people he was in the main event of the Royal Rumble. Because he was going to be in the Rumble [match], he thought he was in the main event. Meanwhile, he’s not even a wrestler yet. And guys heard about that and went, ‘Okay, this guy’s an asshole.’ So at the Royal Rumble, they made sure the first four entrants were Puder, Eddie Guerrero, Chris Benoit and Bob Holly. So when Puder went in, Eddie went in and started chopping the s**t out of him. Benoit came in, started chopping the s**t out of him. Holly went in, started chopping the s**t out of him. They beat the crap out of this kid and threw him over the top rope. And it was done. And you know what, his career never got better after that.”

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit The Bubba Army with a h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.