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Both Kurt Angle and Shane McMahon wanted to prove a point and steal the show at 2001’s King of the Ring pay-per-view. They did just that, but in doing so, they nearly killed each other, and Shane’s father, Vince, in the process!

What Happened at 2001’s King of the Ring that Scared Vince McMahon?

Vince McMahon is often called ruthless by many names in the business, but you don’t get anywhere without having an edge to you. McMahon certainly has that. His steely-eyed determination led to him defeating WCW to become the only game in town. He laid waste to every regional promoter in a relentless manner. Some might even go as far as to call him heartless, but that wasn’t the case, as shown in the following story.

Vince McMahon got so worked up watching 2001’s King of the Ring, he planned on interrupting it on several occasions because he was so worried about the participants in the bout.

Kurt Angle came off the better, ‘only’ breaking his tailbone on a suplex on the ramp, but poor Shane… How he was still conscious when it was all said and done is beyond me. Those German Suplexes against the glass panels were painful to watch, and the thud of Shane’s head bouncing off the concrete floor was sickening. It was at this stage that Vince, while watching from Gorilla Position, attempted to intervene before being talked out of it.

2001’s King of the Ring was truly one of the most violent and brutal matches in WWE history, so it’s no surprise Vince would be concerned with whoever was involved, but when you consider it was his own flesh and blood out there, you can only imagine the thoughts running through his head. The original plan was for Angle to suplex Shane through a few panes of the glass. However, the glass installed was plexiglass — not sugar glass, which breaks more easily. So, instead, after suplexes didn’t break the glass, Angle simply threw Shane through the panes, cutting him up and hurting him badly in the process.

Kurt Angle Opens Up About What Went Wrong

When we interviewed Kurt Angle for his Reddit AMA back in March 2017, he had this to say about the King of the Ring incident.

“I knew something was wrong immediately. I mean, we were told earlier in the day, ‘Listen, don’t go near the glass! No pyro tonight. No fireworks because this is sugar glass. It will break. It will crack. It will ruin the whole gimmick of the match.’ Kurt continued, “When we were wrestling, and I went to throw Shane in, and he didn’t go through it, I thought, ‘Man, that is some hard sugar glass!’ (laughs) “Unfortunately, they called the magic, the stunt guy. I guess that’s the term they used for the stuff he put together for matches, and he gets the equipment. He ultimately ordered the wrong glass, or they sent the wrong glass. They said it was sugar glass, but it was actually plexiglass. If I had known that, we would never have gone through it. Shane had multiple, you know, fifty, sixty stitches,” Angle remembered. “He got cut up pretty well. We both ended up in the hospital that night. It was the most brutal match I ever had been in. Unfortunately for Shane, I didn’t know what to do. The second time I threw him through the glass, he wouldn’t go through, and I literally threw him face first. Had I known that was plexiglass, I never would have done that to him! Even myself, when I threw him through and my arm followed through, the glass went into my arm, and I was cut up pretty badly. “That was probably one of the most dangerous things I had ever done. I don’t know anybody who has ever gone through plexiglass on purpose! That was, well, it wasn’t a dumb move; it was just the wrong stuff.” Shane Gives Further Details on What Transpired Backstage with his Father Vince McMahon

With Shane McMahon lying almost motionless on the floor, Vince McMahon hollered into referee Mike Chioda’s ears to call the match off. “He was saying gibberish because I got knocked in the head a couple times,” Shane McMahon recalled on The Steve Austin Show podcast. “Vince thinks that I was shooing him off, that I was disobeying an order through Chioda, but I never really got the order. He was so mad, again, because he felt I had disobeyed an order. I didn’t get the message,” Shane recalls.

After the initial chewing out from his father, Vince changed his tone. “In the end, he said something very nice to me and put the match over. [What was said] will stay private, but he said, ‘Don’t you ever do that ever again!’”

Shane then describes the reaction he and Angle received after they finally made their way to the back — which entailed getting a standing ovation both from the fans in attendance and the wrestlers in the locker room. “As we walked in the back, there was a whole line of guys. All of the boys were applauding, and as you know, when you pop the monitor like that, and all the boys are giving you a standing ‘O’ in the back. That is the ultimate high that you can ever get, followed by quickly the ultimate low…”

After Shane turned the corner for the trainer’s room, he was met by his wife, Marissa. “Her eyes were just bawling. She had no idea because I didn’t tell her anything. That’s when I got huge heat. I said, ‘Look, this is going to be rough,’ but she had no idea it was going to be like that. She had no idea if I was going to be okay, she had no insight into the business, she had no communication, so she came back and just saw me gushing and everything…”

This is quite reminiscent of how Mick Foley’s wife Collette responded after the brutal June 28, 1998 Hell in a Cell match he had with Undertaker. After the match, Mick Foley had a long heart-to-heart with his tearful wife on the phone. This conversation almost led Foley to retire from pro wrestling altogether, something he eventually did on a full-time basis in 2000.

Call it “fake,” call it whatever you want. Professional wrestlers have an almost unfathomable commitment to the craft they spent years of their life training for.

Watch Kurt Angle German Suplex Shane McMahon Into Plexiglass at 2001’s King of the Ring Pay-Per-View:

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