WWE Hall of Famer Jeff Jarrett spoke on his My World podcast about a wide range of topics.
During it, he talked about Kurt Angle joining TNA in 2006 and then-President Dixie Carter asking him for his opinions on all things creative.
“Dixie was adamant on getting Kurt’s input on everything. I thought that was a huge mistake. Don’t put Kurt in a position to have to comment on everything because in a lot of ways, that will back him in a corner and more or less force him to give feedback that he’s not really asking to give. That’s putting a top guy that’s coming in, making a boatload of money, and truth be known, Kurt had been in the industry less than 10 years at this point, he learned the WWE way and learned it very well, and learned about Kurt Angle, the Olympic Gold Medalist. Outside of that, I’m positive of this but I didn’t know it at the time, but he didn’t want to give his feedback on everything. It put him in an awkward position.
A lot of times, Dixie, and not just with Kurt but with others, would ask people a question but she would hear what she wanted to hear and she would deliver that. I can remember telling her, ‘Dixie, don’t put him in this position. Let Vince (Russo), let Dutch (Mantell) and other creative members craft the show, but asking Kurt to be involved in everything, the very top of the reason why I didn’t want that to go down was, that, by design, takes Kurt’s eye off the ball of his own stuff. I wanted him to focus solely on what makes Kurt tick, his opponent tick, and the best matches, and the best promos. That’s what we hired him for. We didn’t hire him to be on the creative team, and we didn’t hire him to do anything other than be Kurt, be the leader of the company, and from an in-ring perspective, to put the company on his back. I just thought it was doing Kurt a disservice to put him in a position to have to comment on things that candidly, he didn’t give two craps about.”
H/T to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription