Kurt Angle says Shane McMahon would’ve been a great final opponent

While Kurt Angle has participated in plenty of more acclaimed matches in his career, few were as memorable as his Street Fight with Shane McMahon at the 2001 King of the Ring pay-per-view.

Given the stipulation and the year it took place, the match is famous for the levels of brutality Angle and McMahon meted out to one another, so much so that the spots where Angle tried (and eventually succeeded) to suplex McMahon through the glass parts of the entrance set were featured on WWE’s “Do Not Try This At Home” disclaimer videos.

With that shared history, it isn’t surprising to hear Angle talk about how he wouldn’t have minded facing McMahon in Angle’s final wrestling match.

Kurt Angle on facing Shane McMahon in his final match.

On the most recent episode of The Kurt Angle Show, the former WWE Champion talked about how he would’ve felt about wrestling McMahon in his last match, provided he was healthy enough to have the sort of match that McMahon usually takes part in, while still noting that John Cena would’ve been the best pick for that spot (h/t to Fightful’s Robert DeFelice for the transcription):

"“Shane would have been a great retirement match,” Kurt began. “But I don’t know if I want to go through a match like that. An ‘Anything Goes Street Fight’ with Shane McMahon when I’m 50 years old? I don’t know how my body would hold out with that thing.”He reiterated, “I thought Cena made sense because I started his career and I thought Cena could end mine. so, it made better sense, but I would have done Shane McMahon. I just don’t know if I would have been up for [the physicality].”"

Angle faced neither McMahon nor Cena in his retirement match at WrestleMania 35. Instead, he faced Baron Corbin in a culmination of the power struggle storyline the two were engaged in throughout 2018. Corbin defeated angle via pinfall after six minutes of action.

As for McMahon, he wrestled and defeated The Miz in a Street Fight. Cena didn’t wrestle on that show, but he made a surprise appearance as “The Doctor of Thuganomics”, interrupting Elias’ concert.