100 Greatest WWE Matches Of All Time (Ranked)
72. Brock Lesnar vs. Kurt Angle (SmackDown, 18 September 2003)
There's an insane backstory to this match.
Kurt Angle received a phone call alerting him to the fact his sister had died of a heroin overdose the night before wrestling Brock Lesnar in a 60-minute 'Iron Man' match on SmackDown. Understandably struggling to cope with this news, Kurt grabbed around 20 extra-strength Vicodin and swallowed them. That knocked him out cold, and he didn't wake up until four hours before he was due to hit the ring.
Angle came to at approx 5pm, then went to the venue and wrestled like it was nothing. WWE had been calling the Olympian all day, but he didn't pick up because he was out for the count. Later, Kurt told Joe Rogan that having such a lengthy and taxing wrestling match to focus on helped him get through the agony of his sister. Even worse, Angle had previously told his sibling that he wouldn't talk to her again unless she cleaned up her act.
Somehow despite all of this, Kurt went the full hour with Brock in an 'Iron Man' that the latter won 5-4. Nobody watching inside the arena or at home on TV could've known that Angle was in no fit state to actually work. That 60-minute clash remains one of the most impressive twin performances on free television to this day.
It's even more astonishing when considering how mentally drained Angle must've been heading to the building for SmackDown. He worked one of the best WWE matches of all time regardless of what was going on in his personal life or how he was feeling mentally and physically.