Kurt Angle Explains Why MMA Fight With Ken Shamrock Never Happened

Kurt Angle is well-known for his legendary professional wrestling career, but at one point, he was rumored to be stepping into the MMA world for a fight against Ken Shamrock. However, the fight ultimately never happened due to Angle's neck problems, as he revealed on "The Kurt Angle Show" that, "there was no way I was able to do it," with this coming after his second neck injury.

"I had no strength in my upper body. If you remember my thing with Daniel Puder, I couldn't do three push-ups at that particular time. Dan caught me in an armbar ... I was in trouble, if he would have kept going, if he wouldn't have pinned himself, I would have ended up breaking my arm," he said. "I was losing circulation to my arms. So my arms got weaker ... and got smaller, and I couldn't do anything, I couldn't bench 135 pounds, I was weak, my upper body was so weak."

Shamrock reached out to Angle as he wanted to organize an MMA fight in Bellator, but the Olympic Gold medalist made it clear to him that he'd "have to take it easy" as his body was very weak at that point.  "I said, 'Listen, I am not in any position to fight right now ... Don't get me wrong, I can still take you down,'" he revealed. "Ken said, 'Don't worry, I'll take it easy on you,' and I thought, 'wait a minute, did we just fix a fight?' Ken said, 'Well, I'm not going to take it that easy on you, if I have to finish you off, I'm going to finish you off.'"

If you use any quotes from this article, please credit "The Kurt Angle Show" with a H/T to Wrestling Inc. or the transcription.