Kurt Angle Recalls His Time In WWE Developmental, What The Program Was Like Then

On a recent episode of the Kurt Angle Show, Angle talked about his time in WWE developmental. Angle talked about the WWE developmental system was like when he signed, and the kind of training he endured. Some highlights are below.

On WWE’s developmental when he signed: “Their developmental system back then was very primitive. What I mean by that was they didn’t have a lot. They had a warehouse a couple miles from the WWE headquarters. It was a WWE warehouse, a production building and they had a wrestling ring set up in there and what happened was Dory Funk Jr. signed a contract with WWE to do his Dory Funkin Dojo at the WWE headquarters. Tom Prichard was one of the coaches and that’s how I started and it was different. They brought in 12-15 guys. Edge and Christian were part of it. A kid named Steve Bradley, Glen Kulka, if anybody knows Glen he’s from Canada, pro football player. Matt Bloom, Baldo, there was a lot great talent that came there. Starting out you only trained five days, okay? You’re taking 300 bumps a day. It was brutal. I literally quit the first day because I was like ‘I can’t do this.’ I told my manager I can’t bump around like this. It’s like beating the s*** out of yourself, and he’s like ‘Just stay until the end of the fay and see if you can make it.’, and I did, but I was ready to walkout because it was like self-abuse.”

On the style of training he endured: “It was mainly all wrestling. Some conditioning things we did in the ring a lot of wrestling schools do that. But, for the most part it was technique and storytelling psychology. We would work out at the gym in the morning. We’d do our cardio and weightlifting. Then the afternoon and early into the evening it would go all the way through four or five hours we would train wrestling and the thing is I was only doing it five days a month. Then, I would go home and wait 25 days. But, what they did is they had independent shows after those five days they would have a couple independent shows back to back for day six and seven up in the Northeast near Boston, and that’s where we’d go to have our practice matches. We would go to these small independent shows that had 60-70 people. It was very humbling, but it was a good way for me to start. I really enjoyed doing that. The only thing is, I just wasn’t getting enough training. Because, being there for a week and then being home for three weeks, so I told them I said ‘Listen, I need more training.’ So, what they did is they decided, they partnered me up with a kid named Steve Bradley, who I think is the best wrestler to never make it to the WWE on TV. They partnered me up with him and they would fly me up every other week and have Steve train with me at the WWE headquarters.”

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