Kurt Angle did an interview with Sports Illustrated about Gable Steveson, who is under contract with WWE. Stevenson just won his second straight national NCAA national championship in wrestling and will start his pro wrestling training in May.
Angle is also an Olympic gold medalist and is very high on Steveson.
“To be in the very best in the entire world at his age at only 21, it’s very rare,” Angle says. “And Gable proved he is the best in the world. The way he’s able to shuffle and turn his matches into a dogfight, and then come out on top, he’s really good at that,” says Angle. “He’s such an incredible athlete for his size. Watch his balance; it’s amazing. He has a good knack for knowing where his body and his hips are. The kid is so mature, from a physical standpoint and a mental standpoint. And he brought a positive light on the sport of amateur wrestling. To me, that is incredible. Now he has the chance to make a big splash in WWE.”
Angle noted that he didn’t watch pro wrestling before getting into the business and once in the business, he had to forget what he was taught as an amateur wrestler.
“I didn’t watch pro wrestling before I started,” Angle says. “But I became obsessed by it. I studied it, worked it, watched it. I was watching old tapes and anything I could to get better. And I was a really good listener. I had Triple H, Undertaker, Steve Austin and The Rock telling me what to do. Instead of ignoring them, I kept an open mind. The more I did that, the quicker I learned.
“Now I had to forget a lot of what I knew. Nobody scored on me, nobody did anything to me in amateur wrestling, so I had to learn how to be humbled. Once I did that, it was easier for me to learn.”
Angle recommended that Steveson should focus on his personality.
“He’ll need to make sure he’s well prepared and learns all the techniques, which I think he will do very quickly, but the hardest part is the character perspective,” Angle says. “I would tell him to practice daily, look in a mirror and work on those promo skills. He needs to show he has a lot of fire and personality. That’s where a lot of former amateur wrestlers have failed in professional wrestling. They didn’t have the personality.”