Vince McMahon was reportedly nervous that a Champion would back out of WrestleMania
The first episode of Kurt Angle's new podcast with Conrad Thompson, titled 'The Kurt Angle Show,' dropped on AdFreeShows.com, and it looked back at the WrestleMania 19 PPV.
Kurt Angle recalled all the events leading up to his WWE Championship main event against Brock Lesnar at that year's WrestleMania.
As we had reported earlier, Chris Benoit was scheduled to replace the injured Kurt Angle in the WrestleMania 19 match against Brock Lesnar.
While WrestleMania 19 was main evented by Brock Lesnar and Kurt Angle, the PPV match card also featured a few other marquee matches that were promoted better, for example, the Rock and Steve Austin's singles match.
Angle noted:
"I would have preferred that we be advertised a lot more, but I think that Rock and Austin were the biggest names."
I understand why he promoted the other matches more than mine: Kurt Angle on Vince McMahon being unsure about his WrestleMania status
The former WWE Champion then revealed that he had heard rumors that Vince McMahon was apparently nervous about Angle possibly backing out of the WrestleMania match due to the injury concerns.
Angle understood that Vince McMahon might have decided to promote other matches as the WWE Boss was unsure whether Kurt would perform at the Show of Shows.
"You know, it's crazy; I never thought about that. I think you're absolutely right. I heard rumors that Vince was nervous that I would back out and not go through with the match at WrestleMania. So, he was waiting for me to make a call to tell him that I wasn't going to do it, and I never did call him. I continued on, so I understand why he promoted the other matches more than mine because he didn't know if it was going to happen or not."
The Olympic gold medalist had several neck issues that put his WrestleMania match in jeopardy, but he eventually went through with the plans and postponed the surgery.
At WrestleMania 19, Kurt Angle dropped the WWE Championship to Brock Lesnar. While the match was an exception in-ring effort from both competitors, the botched Shooting Star Press very nearly ended the Beast Incarnate's career.
Kurt Angle also spoke about the infamous spot and more during the first edition of 'The Kurt Angle' show.
If any quotes are used from this article, please credit 'The Kurt Angle Show' and give a H/T to SK Wrestling and link it back to this article.