With a broken ‘freaking’ neck Kurt Angle won an Olympic Gold Medal in the year 1996 which paved the way for him to enter the pro-wrestling industry. He signed a deal with WWE in 1998 to gradually become a wrestling machine.
He became a veteran in the biggest wrestling promotion in the world in his first stint which continued till 2006. Every possible championship was grabbed by Kurt Angle making him a regular main eventer at that point.
However, the relation between him and Vince McMahon deteriorated over the health issue. WWE wanted him to continue wrestling at that point, whereas, he wanted a break to heal his neck concussions. This rift forced him to leave the company.
Although he wanted to take hiatus from in-ring competition, he ended up being on WWE’s rival promotion, TNA Impact Wrestling. He was a main eventer there, as well but he might have missed the potential to have even bigger matches in the WWE against legends.
In a recent interview with WETM NBC Elmira, Kurt Angle stated that how he regrets the fact of leaving the scene, here:
“I had some regrets because I was just starting to get good when I quit WWE in 2006. I was just starting to come into my own, where I was- not that I didn’t have incredible matches there, I did, from 2001 to 2006, but I started really becoming a ‘seasoned veteran’ six years into my career and that was right around 2006.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ArVdEVXx3Xo
“Daniel Bryan. I love his wrestling ability. I think that he is one of the best I’ve seen in a long time. I obviously wrestled AJ Styles, but never on the WWE platform, love to have the main event against AJ Styles at WrestleMania.”
“I’m really happy that I had that kind of impact in six and half years in WWE, where [they induct] me into the [WWE] Hall of Fame 11 years later.”