I think this is the match where Angle allegedly told Eddie to sell less because it was interfering with his spots. Not sure if it's true or not.

 

I thought Angle's selling was fine for the most part and Eddie's great ankle selling covered up for any inconsistency. Angle's performance was good but a bit odd, one minute he would do awesome matwork and tenaciously work the leg and then the next minute he would use the Angle Slam as a transition move.

 

Eddie was just outstanding in terms of offense, selling, character work: just someone at the height of his powers. Despite some weird moments and lackluster pacing at times, overall I thought this hit the great mark. Excellent matwork, continuity with the past, creative spots, intensity. ****

This was a good television-level bout, but not a classic pay-per-view bout. I don't know how true the rumours are about Angle telling Eddie to sell less, but I do know that this was a decidedly Angle led match-up and it was far more workrate driven than the great Eddie performances of 2004 thus far. I'm not gonna lie, I'd rather watch Eddie brawl with JBL than have workrate bouts with Angle, which is weird to me, as I'm sure there was a time when I would have jumped at the chance to see Eddie vs Angle over Eddie vs a big guy, but this felt like a step down from Eddie's amazing work against Brock and JBL.