Kofi Kingston recently spoke with talkSPORT and revealed that he had words with WWE Chairman Vince McMahon following the quick loss to Brock Lesnar for the WWE Title during the October 4 FOX premiere, which was also the SmackDown 20th Anniversary episode.
Kofi also recalled Vince’s reactions after he won the WWE Title at WrestleMania 35 from Daniel Bryan, and how his reign was a special journey for the both of them. Kofi did say that the words with Vince were they had after the Lesnar match were positive. He was asked what Vince is like after you lose a world title and come through the back.
“We definitely had some words,” Kofi said. He continued and compared the reactions, “It was positive because it was very special for both of us. You saw the documentary, when I came through gorilla after winning, he had tears in his eyes and we’re all hugging, myself, Woods and [Big] E. Because, it’s been a wild ride, man. Vince has been on the ride with us and he was actually one of the only people to support the New Day when we were first coming up. Granted, we didn’t want to be three preachers [laughs], but he was the one that actually gave us a chance to go out there and be a unit. So it’s been a journey and a journey for all of us.
“Just going through the ups and downs and him thinking we were going to be this widely accepted thing and we’re going to go out there and preach positivity and then all of a sudden, people turn and the jaded universe didn’t like being positive?! You know what I’m saying? But we were talking to him and he was like ‘Yeah, I thought this was going to be positive and you guys were right, so let’s see what we can do’ and he gave us the opportunity to be bad guys. It was an emotional journey for all of us, but he’s seen a lot of things in this business and it’s his job to make sure things keep progressing forward and he wanted to go in a different direction right then. So, like I said, I’m just fortunate to have had the experience.”
Kofi was also asked what’s the worst thing Vince ever said to him.
“When I first debuted and I was [puts on Jamaican accent] ‘Kofi Kingston from Jamaica, man!’ I had these vignettes of me on the beach foiling these bad guys who were doing all these dastardly things and I’d say [puts on Jamaican accent] ‘Looks like there’s trouble… in paradise’ [laughs]. Terrible vignettes!,” He recalled. “Awful. It makes me cringe to watch them to this day. At the time, I’d go to the shows and I’d be able to listen to them on the headset while it was going on. And as my vignette comes on, I can hear Vince on the headset and he goes [puts on Vince’s voice] ‘Oh, these are barely, barely passable’.
I’m like ‘Oh my god! We still have five left! What am I going to do? My careers over before it even starts!’ And then I convince myself like you know what? He probably knows I’m on the headset, he’s ribbing me. It’s going to be fine. It wasn’t until six months later after I debuted when I realised how crazy things are and there’s no way he knows who is listening on the headset at any one time. So he had no idea that I was there and he had a legitimate concern over my vignettes and I’m like ‘Oh my god’. Thank god I realise that six months later otherwise I would have been nervous and I would have felt the pressure to perform extra like ‘it wasn’t a waste of money, Vince! I’m really good, please! Don’t fire me!’”
