Before there was AEW, TNA was the main #2 wrestling promotion in the United States that sought to compete with WWE. During that company’s peak, many wrestlers to be released by WWE ended up in TNA.
Some of those wrestlers, like Kurt Angle, achieved quite a bit of success. Others, including some that worked with Angle, didn’t.
One such a wrestler was Rob Van Dam, who wrestled in TNA between 2010 and 2013 and then again from 2019 to 2020, was considered a big star by many. He achieved a modicum of success there, including one reign as TNA World Champion and one reign as TNA X Division Champion.
But according to Angle, RVD could’ve had even more success had be benefitted from better booking in that company.
On his Kurt Angle Show podcast, Angle gave his opinion on Rob Van Dam’s TNA career and put to bed some rumors that suggested that RVD’s heart wasn’t in it and that he was only there for a paycheck.
Kurt Angle challenges rumors about Rob Van Dam’s alleged lack of passion in TNA
“He [RVD] just wasn’t vocal. He wasn’t trying to be a leader. He wanted to go there and do his thing and perform. It’s not like he didn’t care about the company. That was Rob. That’s the way he was.
If you’re going to care about a company, if you’re Rob Van Dam, as long as you give everything you have in that ring every single night you go out there, that’s all you need from Rob because he’s not going to give you anything more.
He’s not going to tell people, ‘Hey, my passion is to make TNA the greatest company in the world.’ Rob is Rob Van Dam and what he’s going to do is he’s going to do it his way, his own thing, and his style at a very high level all the time.”
They could have given him a better push. Definitely. I don’t know if they thought that he didn’t care because he had that I don’t care attitude. They might not have known Rob as well as I did, but Rob deserved a better push than he got.”
h/t WrestlingNews.co for the transcription