Kurt Angle talks about the early structure of his TNA Wrestling deal and why he never wrestled for ROH.
Kurt Angle crossed the line and made the jump to TNA Wrestling in 2006. Angle would end up spending more time as an active wrestler more time in TNA Wrestling than in any other promotion. However, Angle says that during the early portions of his time with TNA, they were also booking him out to other promotions.
One promotion that Kurt Angle never got to wrestle for is Ring of Honor. During a recent episode of his podcast, The Kurt Angle Show, Angle reflected on the early structure of his TNA contract and talked about why he never wrestled for ROH.
“Well, TNA has an incredible contract, they gave me a lot of money. I had a lot, a lot less dates and WWE. I mean, I only had like 52 dates that I needed to oblige. So obliged with the company. So what they did is they started sending me out, marketing me to other companies, so they can make a little bit of their money back. I didn’t get paid for these shows, unfortunately, but I understood why they did it,” Kurt said. “After a while, I told them, ‘Listen, that’s enough,’ because they start sending and over there five times a year. It was ridiculous and I was getting 50 grand a pop in Japan, and I wasn’t seeing any of the money. So it didn’t seem right to me after a while. I was like, ‘Okay, I’m doing way too much. You guys need to back off just let me do my TNA schedule.’ That’s what we did eventually.”
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Speaking about Ring of Honor and why he never worked for that company during that portion of his career or the brief time he was on the independent circuit before going back to WWE in 2017, Angle says it simply came down to him not wanting to work outside of TNA originally and no one ever making contact down the line.
“No, I’m surprised. But I wasn’t really interested in doing anything outside of TNA. I did what I had to do because the company wanted me to. If they would have asked me to go to Ring of Honor — which I think Ring of Honor, at that particular time, was a competitor, so they didn’t want me to go over there and compete against myself. So I think that’s the reason why I never did anything with Ring of Honor. But don’t get me wrong. I would’ve loved to.”
Ultimately, Kurt Angle would end his career under the WWE umbrella. His last match was a loss to Baron Corbin at WrestleMania 35.
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