Kurt Angle Says Shawn Michaels Is The Best Of All Time, Recalls Wrestling Machine Gimmick

On the latest episode of the Kurt Angle Show that covered WWE Vengeance 2006, the WWE Hall of Famer talked about how highly he thinks of Shawn Michaels, his wrestling machine gimmick from this time, and more. You can check out some highlights below:

On Shawn Michaels: “All I could say about him is he’s the best of all time. He has had incredible chemistry with every wrestler he’s ever wrestled. I had incredible chemistry with him. I enjoyed working with him every single time and he was so easy to work with. And for him to go 35 years is just unbelievable. I mean, you’re talking 70% of his life he’s been involved with the WWE, that that is something that hardly, hardly ever happens.”

On his preference on where he wrestles on the card: “Well honestly, I don’t care where I am on the card if I’m not the main event, which I knew we weren’t gonna be, ’cause we weren’t a world title match. So I’d prefer to go on first, and I was happy with that being on first… Paul [Heyman] wanted me to dominate. He wanted me, you know, the longest match he wanted me to have is the match I had with Randy, so he wanted me to dominate. He wanted me to be the face of the company along with Rob Van Dam. And they wanted me to be this wrestling machine. They didn’t want me to do any gimmicks or anything, just full-bred wrestling. A lot of suplexes, less punches, all wrestling. That’s what they wanted.”

On his wrestling machine gimmick: “You know what, I came up with it. Vince McMahon came to me and said, ‘Listen, we need to stop doing the funny stuff. I want you to be taken more seriously.’ And I said, ‘Yeah, that’s fine’. I said, ‘What do you want from me?’ He said, ‘I just want a really intense Kurt Angle.’ I said, ‘How about the wrestling machine?’ He said that’, that’s a good idea,’ So that’s how it all started and it was my idea. And I ran into it and I ran with it actually. Yeah, it worked out really well. Unfortunately, it didn’t last that long ’cause I wasn’t in the WWE long after that. But, for the very beginning in ECW, it worked.”

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit the Kurt Angle Show with an h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.