Kurt Angle Thought Brock Lesnar "Had Died" During WWE WrestleMania 19 Match

Kurt Angle revealed this week that he thought Brock Lesnar 'had died' during their WWE WrestleMania 19 main event match in 2003.

The two fought for Angle's Undisputed WWE Title in a gruelling bout that saw Lesnar land on his head after a botched Shooting Star Press attempt.

Angle talked about the match with Conrad Thompson on the first episode of The Kurt Angle Show and detailed what he thought while laying on the mat after the move: “When he went to jump, he hesitated and then just said ‘aww f*** it, I’m just going to go,’ 

“I think that hesitation cost him to fall off balance forward so he couldn’t get a full rotation backward when he went to flip. When he landed, I thought he was dead. I thought he broke his neck, I thought he was dead.

“He wasn’t responding, I said ‘Brock, are you okay?’ He wasn’t saying anything, I went over and covered him and told him ‘You gotta kick [out], you gotta kick,’ because I did not want to hold that title for another day.”

The botch has gone down as one of the most notorious in wrestling history, and it turns out it was Angle who suggested that Lesnar attempt the dangerous manoeuvre in the first place.

“It was my idea,” Angle said. “Brock had no plans of doing the Shooting Star Press. I told him ‘Hey, I know you used to do it in OVW, this is a great WrestleMania moment,’ and boy was it. Especially that he messed it up because everybody remembers the botched spot. It’s a great WrestleMania moment and it will be remembered forever.

“He should’ve been dead. Something like that, hitting that hard just straight on your head, what a scary moment. You just didn’t know if Brock was going to get up or be able to walk again. It was really scary, those are the chances you take when you do stuff like that. I feel badly because it was my idea and Brock had no plans of doing it and I talked him into it. I feel bad about it.”

H/T: Wrestling Inc. for the transcription