Once upon a time, I had a great amount of respect for Kurt Angle. He's told the story about a bazillion times about how he won the gold in Atlanta 11 years ago despite a broken neck. He's traded off that success ever since, but of late, I've lost a lot of that respect for him. It's all Kurt's fault, and you can trace it to his debut in TNA nearly a year ago.

Everyone knows the story about how Angle was cut loose by WWE after a 7 year run, only to sign with TNA after teasing that he might change gears and sign with UFC and give MMA a try. The on-air behavior Angle has exhibited of late on Impact tells me the man knows he's on his last main event run and wants to milk it as much as he possibly can, but he's going about it in a very bizarre fashion.

Hindsight being what it is, I have to believe now that when Angle came south to Orlando last September, he was given a creative control provision in his contract by Team Oblivious (Jeff Jarrett & Dixie Carter), who could only see dollar signs and ratings points, thinking Angle still had the chops to pull in the viewers. Unfortunately, Angle is on the downside of his career, and it's just now becoming obvious.

Take last night's Impact, for example. Kurt had his wife & daughter appear on the show with him. He was dressed in a black Armani suit with shades. In my report, I referred to him as Lex Luthor's twin brother, envisioning Superman's arch nemesis as played last year by Kevin Spacey in "Superman Returns". That's actually an insult to fans of Superman. I've done enough jokes over the last 5 years making correlations between Angle and Luthor and other comics characters. I digress. Angle played the Randy Savage card last night, repeatedly berating wife Karen, and even belittling his own child, who's too young to understand what her daddy's doing. It got to the point where Karen decided enough was enough and told Kurt their marriage was history. In real life, they were separated for a while a couple of years back, so Kurt's weaving this into his storyline, thinking it'll get him more heel heat. It's doing more than that, pal. It's going to lead to "go away" heat real soon if you don't wake up from your delusional fantasy world. Preferably yesterday.

At Hard Justice on August 12, Angle squares off with Samoa Joe in a winner take all match, where Angle puts up both the TNA & IWGP titles vs. Joe's X title and the TNA tag titles they won a couple of weeks back at Victory Road from Team 3D. If TNA's smart, they'll finally do the right thing and give Joe the title and set up the tournaments that are sure to follow for the X and tag titles. Angle needs to be depushed ASAP after the PPV. For all of his skills and talent, Angle is, unfortunately, no longer the charismatic presence he once was.

There are more than a few people who thought the timing of last night's storyline was way, way off, in the wake of the Chris Benoit case a month earlier. Angle, Jarrett, and co-writers Vince Russo and Dutch Mantel, should've known better. They knew Angle was damaged goods when he came to TNA almost a year ago, but the Olympic Ego wanted to be a main-eventer right away, and got his wish. At a time when TNA should be putting the focus on home-grown stars like Abyss and making the man-monster the face of the company, they're instead serving as a corporate enabler for a past-his-prime champion who won't give up the limelight when he really should.

My message to you, Kurt, is this. It's over. Drop the title at Hard Justice, go home with Karen, and start thinking about your next career. I don't want to be reading about your passing a year or two from now. Do the right thing, Kurt. For all our sakes.