I Watched a Kurt Angle vs. Bobby Lashley Match From 2015
I tried writing about something different, and I’m glad I did.
Last night I had an idea to click on what was trending on Twitter and write about the first thing that popped up. It was #WWESmackdown.
I haven’t watched wrestling in years, so writing about a show that was almost over, starring a bunch of characters I didn’t know, seemed the wrong move.
But the first tweet that popped up was about Bobby Lashley. I know him as the giant dude who helped shave Vince McMahon’s head in the Trump match.
I decided to write about one of Lashley’s best matches, which led me to his match against Kurt Angle for the TNA World Championship on March 20, 2015. Lashley was the champ, and Angle the challenger.
The Backstory
First, Lashley and Angle are best known for their time in the WWE, but this match happened for Impact Wrestling.
Impact was an alternative wrestling promotion with a cult following of fans who hated the WWE. It’s still around now, and their roster page has a big-time ‘that guy still wrestles?!’ vibe.
Kurt Angle is a legend and a WWE Hall of Famer, but Bobby Lashley isn’t a name you typically hear mentioned when discussing the great matches in wrestling history.
I was still interested as both of these guys are incredible athletes who should be able to put on a good match together.
They had similar amateur wrestling backgrounds before joining the WWE. Angle is famously the only Olympic gold medalist in pro wrestling history, and Lashley was a championship wrestler during his time in the Army.
Lashley and Angle have a long history, with Lashley even crediting Angle with getting him into pro wrestling.
This was the first singles match between the two wrestlers.
The Match
My first impression was that it looked different than any WWE match I’d ever seen.
I Googled immediately and found out that while the match aired in March, it was taped in January in London. That seemed weird for a World Title Match, but I guess Impact Wrestling does things differently.
The entrances were solid.
They showed both guys walking from the locker room to the ring, ala Goldberg.
Angle walked out with a hoodie draped over his bald head like he was headed for a bare-knuckle boxing fight. But his entrance doesn’t hit the same without the pyro and the “You suck!” chant.
I know Lashley was going for intense with his walkout, too, but the fact that he was wearing headphones made it too outrageous for me.
Maybe I’m overthinking it (I know, it’s just wrestling), but it was hilarious to me that the guy was wearing wired headphones to listen to thirty seconds of a song on the way to his championship match.
The ring announcer gives the “in this corner…weighing in at….hailing from….” spiel, the ref raises the title belt like it’s Simba, and we’re off.
No, wait, commercial break.
Now we’re off.
The six-sided ring jumps out at me right away. I know that used to be their gimmick, but I hate it. Just use a wrestling ring.
The two giant alphas start by sizing each other up. This is wrestling.
The beginning of the match was Kurt Angle trying to do Kurt Angle shit and Lashley knocking him on his ass instead.
The announcers are really putting over Lashley’s amateur background and MMA career. They want everyone to know there are two great athletes in the ring.
Angle counters with the iconic back-to-back-to-back German suplexes before posing in the middle of the ring.
Lashley sprints out of the corner at Angle, gets tripped, and is put into the first ankle lock submission of the evening. It’s Angle’s signature move and one of my favorites.
I always love listening to the announcers try to sell that the match could be over when you know it isn’t.
It’s like when they arrest the first suspect on SVU. It’s way too early in the show guys. Who are you fooling?
After he breaks the hold, Kurt knocks Lashley out of the ring. They’re fighting outside the ring now, and the floor looks like primarily concrete with a walkway of padding. I might be nitpicking here, but it seems dangerous and unprofessional.
Lashley is a big dude, and Angle is 46 years old, so there are a decent number of rest holds to get through the middle of the match. It makes sense so the end can move faster.
They’re doing the back-and-forth punch spot, but it’s weird because it sounds like the crowd is cheering for both guys. It also sounds like crowd noise is being pumped in — it is a taped match, after all.
We get three more German suplexes from Kurt and a spine buster from Lashley. Angle kicks out at two.
Lashley whiffs on a spear and five more German suplexes. If you’re keeping count at home, that’s eleven suplexes of the German variety.
Not many people could keep a match interesting while doing the same move that many times, but Kurt Angle and Eddie Guerrero always did that well.
Angle gets Lashley in another ankle lock, but it’s still too early. The champ breaks free, picks up the challenger, and slams him (I don’t know the move's name) for another kick out at two.
Then they went to a commercial break. I’m not joking.
A commercial break in the middle of a title match boggled my mind. No idea what happened during the break (maybe they stood around and did nothing?), but they’re back, and we have lucky ankle lock number three.
Kurt, my man, it’s still too early. Lashley counters again, but Kurt hits him with the Angle Slam and gets a two count.
The crowd starts a “This is awesome” chant. At least I assume it’s the live audience and not something added after the fact. I’m not sure this match is worthy of that chant anyway, but it’s pretty damn good.
Lashley knocks Angle on his ass again, picks him up way over his head, and suplexes him down. Lashley hits Angle with a spear (always cool to see as a childhood Goldberg fan), but Angle kicks out, and we’re still not done.
Now, Lashley counters Angle into his own ankle lock. We know Kurt Angle will not tap out to his move.
I can tell the match is wrapping up (the Youtube video is), so I knew what would happen when Lashley puts Angle in an armbar.
The Olympic Champion counters to the umpteenth ankle lock of his life and makes the TNA Champion tap out.
The match was crucial for Angle’s career.
In October 2022, Angle said on his podcast that this match “saved his wrestling career.”
Back then, Angle doubted he was still in his prime and considered retirement before facing Lashley. Angle even called it one of his top five moments in wrestling. That’s a pretty bold statement coming from someone with a resume like his.
One Hang Up
The only bad thing I can say about this match has nothing to do with Angle or Lashley.
The on-screen display was infuriating.
Impact Wrestling was airing on Destination America (apparently that’s a network) then — something I didn’t know existed until I watched this match.
Throughout the match, promotion for the next episode of “Mountain Monsters” (apparently that’s a show) was placed next to the Destination America logo at the bottom right of the screen.
If that wasn’t visually displeasing enough, you also have the hashtag in the top left corner to cringe at. Yikes.
These guys deserved to have this match on a WWE PPV, not in an advertisement for “Mountain Monsters.” That’s probably my most significant criticism. That Angle and Lashley deserved better.
Wrap up
I enjoyed the hell out of this match and writing about it. As a kid, I loved wrestling, so it was easy to write about this topic. Especially with Kurt Angle added in.
I wanted to write about something different, and it was the easiest that writing has been for me in a long time.
I hope you enjoyed my makeshift pro wrestling play-by-play because I’m probably retiring after this one.
