WrestleMania 35: What if Kurt Angle isn’t really wrestling Baron Corbin?
On this week’s episode of WWE Raw, Kurt Angle announced that he would wrestle his final match at WrestleMania opposite Baron Corbin. While Corbin made some storyline sense as an antagonist given the issues these two have had on and off for the better part of a year, fans were nonetheless underwhelmed.
After all, Angle had a storied career in which he had memorable feuds with Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock, Triple H, Brock Lesnar, Shawn Michaels and John Cena to name a few. Would it really do him justice to pay off a simple, immediate storyline, rather than facing a career rival, or perhaps seeing through one last first time, intergenerational dream match?
That’s not to mention that Corbin himself generally not a favorite of the WWE Universe. He’s not just hated in the storyline sense that fans boo someone like Drew McIntyre but generally respect him as a performer, but rather more like what used to be called X-Pac heat—disliking a guy to the point of not wanting to see him beat up, but rather not wanting to see him on TV at all.
But what if this lukewarm announcement was part of a larger plan to swerve fans? Or what if WWE listens to the reaction from the live crowd and social media and switches courses? This article takes a look at three ways WWE could turn things around.
#3 This issue can’t wait for WrestleMania
Kurt Angle has spent recent weeks on Raw staging friendly match ups against up and coming talents Apollo Crews and Chad Gable. They’re the kind of guys he doesn’t have kayfabe issues with, probably could have stolen the show with in his prime, and who WWE isn’t invested in enough to protect them from losing on TV.
WWE will likely as not continue this trend to give fans a taste of what we’re losing in Angle’s retirement, build some nostalgia, and give some of these younger guys a few minutes of ring time with a legend.
One “out” for having Angle face Baron Corbin at WrestleMania would be for him to get into with Angle on one of these Raw segments, basically suggesting their issue is too heated to wait for the show of shows and they’ll do it now. Angle wins quickly and decisively, then moves on to something biger and better in New Jersey.